25 Top Tips for Successful Social Media for Business

1.  Are you using the right platform?

Make sure you’re using the right platforms to engage with your audience. Twitter and LinkedIn are good for B2B interaction whereas Facebook and Instagram are better for connecting with a consumer audience.

2.  Make your content relevant to the platform you are using

Make sure you think about each platform and the type of audience you will be engaging with. Make sure your posts are written in such a way that ‘fits’ with the platform – they all have a different style. Be careful about using exactly the same wording for different platforms.

3.  Make your profile attractive

Make sure your profile is attractive to the people and businesses you want to target. Does it say how you can solve their problem? Do you come across as friendly and approachable?

4.  Be consistent

Consistency is key to making your social media a success. Don’t overload yourself – pick one or two platforms that are right for your business and be realistic about the amount of content you can regularly create.

5.  Think about timing

Use insights tools to analyse when your audience engage with you the most so that you can upload at ‘peak’ times. Is your audience more active online, on a weekend or first thing in the morning before work?

6.  Keep your page up to date

Making sure you have the correct contact information listed on your accounts is vitally important. People use social media as a search tool and if they can’t get in touch with you, they aren’t going to do business with you.

7.  Build quality connections

Make sure you’re following the right people to keep up to date with local and industry news. See what key influencers in your industry are talking about and think about ways of joining the conversation. Creating the relevant, high quality content will bring you the right audience so make sure all of your marketing material tells people how to find you on social media.

8.  Twitter Lists

Twitter lists are a great way to segment your Twitter feed. You can create a private list of key contacts or specific sectors so you can easily find those people you want to engage with.

9.  Make it visual

Pictures say a thousand words - and posts with pictures have a 39% higher engagement rate than text only posts.

10.  Use video

Video is a great way to capture your audience’s attention and share content in an emotionally engaging way. It allows you to be creative and communicate your messages in different ways.

11.  Have a plan

Make a plan for the next 3 months, which weaves in your key messages and provides a structure to work from. That way your social media will encompass everything you need to get across to your audience and you will be more likely to do it.

12.  Schedule your posts

Use scheduling software like Hootsuite to schedule everything in advance, maybe once a week. It is more time effective and means that you will stick to your plan.

13.  Have flexibility

Having said that, don’t be too rigid. Don’t forget on the spot opportunities for quick pictures of something that suddenly happens in your business will probably make the best post! These add personality and bring colour to your page.

14.  Create campaigns

Think of ways to create campaigns around specific events both inside and outside your business. Link to special offers, the season, TV programmes, new product launches etc.

15.  Link your posts back to your website

Don’t forget to include links to your website – remember you want people to visit your website to find out more about you! Using online tools bit.ly or ow.ly enables you to shorten your page URL to allow room for more content

16.  Use hashtags wisely

You can build a campaign or tweets for an event around a hashtag. Make it relevant, short and memorable. Don’t over use hashtags. Research what others are doing and follow what works.

17.  Create great content

Creating informative and engaging content that is relevant to your audience is the key to getting the most from social media. Use our top tips to create content that really works.

18.  Measure your success

Look at insights tools to see how you are doing. Find out which posts are most popular and create the best engagement. See what difference that makes to your website traffic with google analytics.

19.  Build your likes and reach using paid for posts and adverts

You can pay to boost your posts to reach a wider audience and target people who have relevant interests and fit your demographic. You can also run targeted advertising campaigns which are a great way of driving traffic straight to your website.

20.  Share other peoples content

Make sure you are being ‘social’ and interacting by sharing, liking and commenting on other people’s content. Remember content still needs to be relevant to your followers but being part of the conversation is a great way to increase your visibility.

21.  Share your own content

Not only share other people’s content but think about reposting your businesses success stories or content you are proud of and think your audience will benefit from seeing again.

22.  Grab your audience’s attention

Using statistics or facts in your headline is a great way to grab people’s attention and encourage them to read your content. ‘10 top tips’ or ‘5 easy ways’ are great titles for encouraging click throughs.

23.  Be authentic

Your audience want to get to know the ‘real’ business, the people behind it, your values and personality, so be authentic. Post about topics you and your colleagues care about and are involved with – this adds a human touch.

24.  Build a community

Your followers are your fans and your opportunity to create a community. Give them what they need and it will grow!

25.  Have a conversation

Remember it is ‘social’ and have fun interacting with others on social media. Share, like and comment and start a conversation!

Get in touch to find out how we can help you and your business!