Social Media Matters - Why Social Media Should Be Part Of Your Digital Marketing Strategy

Having a social media presence is a critical part of a comprehensive digital marketing strategy. Creating social media accounts is very low cost (or free!) with very few barriers to entry. Regardless of your business or industry it is likely that many of your customers and potential customers are also connected to one or more different social media accounts of their own. Despite the low cost and large potential audience it can sometimes still be difficult for busy professionals to see the value in having an active social media presence for their business. Below are six of the top reasons every business can benefit from social media.

Increased Exposure
This may seem like an obvious one to start with, but it is probably the most important reason to engage in social media marketing. The more opportunities you allow for people to find your business, the more likely they are to become a customer. If your only online presence is your website, you are missing out on simply a ton of internet traffic! Setting up multiple different social media accounts like Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn allows for customers to find you while they are on their preferred platforms.

Engage With Customers
When you consider that 28% of time spent online is spent on social networking it becomes clear that creating and maintaining a social media presence is a great opportunity for any business to get their message across and to promote their brand. Having active social media pages gives your customers a convenient place to find your business. It also allows you to interact with those customers in a way that helps them get to know your product or services without being overly promotional. This sort of connection can be very beneficial for both brand awareness and differentiating your company from your competition.

Builds Trust & Loyalty
A great benefit of engaging with your customers on social media is that is helps to build trust. As customers interact with your company or brand they are able to get a feel for what it is like to do business with you. They can see the types of content you post and how you respond to questions and comments, which helps to humanize your company and set you apart from the pack.

Customer Service Opportunity
Whether or not your business is active on social media, chances are your customers are talking about you somewhere online. It has become natural for people to take to Facebook or Twitter to voice their concerns or ask questions about a company, and to speak about pleasant experiences they may have had. By having a social media presence, you can provide great customer service in a way that is convenient to your customers and showcases your customer service skills to potential customers. Even if someone posts a bad review or comment, you can use your social media accounts to respond and show your audience that you care and are working on the issue. Seeing and engaging with these opportunities helps you to manage your brand reputation online.

Content Reach
Yes content, there’s that word again! If your company is regularly creating helpful content, social media provides a great opportunity to get that content in front of additional eyes. Half of the battle is to create great content, and the other half is in promoting the content once it has been crafted. As customers like, retweet, or share your content, it has the potential to garner a great amount of exposure with no additional investment. And even if you decide to put some ad spend behind your content, social media ads are more cost-efficient than other types of digital advertising.

Provide Marketplace Insight
Companies and their marketers always want to know how they are doing, particularly in relation to others in the same industry. Social media enables business owners to experience customers in a more personal way, to learn about their habits and likes. This insight can prove very useful when crafting content to target a specific demographic or customer group. In fact, over two thirds of marketers have stated that having a social media presence has provided either new insight on or affirmed trends of their customer base.

Website Traffic & Lead Generation
Maintaining an active social media presence is one way to boost traffic to your website. The impact of social media on SEO continues to increase, which can help improve your website’s search ranking. Including relevant links to products and content in your social posts is a great way to get more people clicking through to your website.

The key to using social media to your advantage is to use it properly. While setting up your accounts is relatively quick and easy, the real effort comes in maintaining your accounts, posting useful articles and information and promoting your ideas. Social media marketing is just one of the many professional services we provide at Denver Website Designs.

Does your company have an active social presence? If not, what is it that has been holding you back? We would love to hear from you. Contact us today and let us help you determine how social media can fit into your overall digital marketing strategy.