Many people realize that social media marketing can be a powerful tool for bringing in new customers, but there's an important distinction between marketing on social media and simply having a presence. Believe it or not, the fact that you have a Facebook profile and occasionally post some random content is not enough to have any kind of marketing effect. Similarly, the common practice of buying "followers" or "likes" is useful for increasing your numbers -- but the audience you get with these methods will never buy your products or hire your services. So what is the solution?
Rather than simply trying to "get the most followers possible" or "tick the boxes" of having a profile on Facebook and a Twitter feed, in order to produce marketing results it's necessary to take a very different approach. You must actually engage your audience.
In other words, you need to do what you already do on a different level in your business -- provide value to your customers, and communicate with them. However rather than delivering your goods and services (the way you currently provide value) you will be providing a different kind of value: useful and interesting content and information.
How Can You Do This?
When you first decide to set out on social media, you have many choices. Web videos, blogging, podcasting, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pintrest, and many more.
Blogging is in many respects the simplest place to start. It allows you to build up a "digital brand" and an "online footprint" that shows your customers who you are as a company, what you've been involved in, and more. It also serves as a jumping-off point for making more digital connections, like promoting the videos you create and inviting people to "share" your posts via social media.
What's more, it allows you to network online -- customers can comment on your blog posts, and you can comment on other people's posts to bring in new visitors. Your blog is your own personal voice, and other bloggers tend to be quite loyal.
At the same time you do not need to limit yourself to text-only blog posts. Making videos for your blog is an excellent way to engage customers. As the saying goes, "A picture is worth a thousand words. This is a great opportunity to show some happy customers which will in return bring more business because videos create a sense of trust ." But engagement is not the only reason to start doing videos on your blog. For example:
- Videos are very cost effective
Compared with other kinds of advertising (like TV commercials) web videos are fast, simple, and easy to make. You can make your own videos in house with a handheld video camera, or you can hire an external production company. Nobody expects a web video to have huge "production value" or expects you to spend a large sum of money making them. You can put them out quickly, and see results immediately.
- They're superb for SEO
A crucial metric for your SEO is called "bounce rate" -- the number of visitors who go to your site and leave immediately. The more visitors who "bounce," the poorer your rankings will be. This is where a video can be very helpful. If you have a video to show your visitors, they'll stay on your page longer, and lower your bounce rate.
However, this is only the beginning. You can use web videos to bring in traffic from platforms like YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook, and even on local business listings. This one piece of advertising can reach potentially millions of people.
- They build trust
Especially if you're starting out, keep your web videos personal. By showing footage of your business, prospective clients get greater insight into who you are -- they feel they know you, and they can trust you. Needless to say, this all happens while you are showing them what makes you uniquely different from the competition.
If you've spent much time talking with your clients, you probably realize that it's often the small details (rather than the large ones) which are most convincing to prospective clients. Therefore, by keeping your web videos personal and ensuring anyone on camera comes across as natural, you create a powerful tool for building trust in future clients.
- They bring in inquiries
Finally, the simple step of including a "call to action" in your video is often a trigger for people doing just that. It needn't be complex or high-pressure at all. It's simply a matter of converting prospective clients to actual clients. Make sure your website and phone number is at the end of any video you make so your viewers can begin using your services.