There is no doubt social media can help effectively advertise and market your business. Social media helps to reach a larger audience and create poweful connections.
That is why some of the largest established businesses like Coca Cola and Nike have a Facebook page and Twitter account. Social media can even help you run for President!
Before we get into using social media to grow your business, let’s take a quick look at some recent changes.
Social Media Marketing and the Adpocalypse
Of course, social media marketing (SMM) is also a double-edged sword. Recently (as of June 2020), major corporations like Coca Cola, Unilever and others began boycotting Facebook, by stopping their paid advertising/marketing campaigns.
They consider themselves socialpreneurs, as well as entreprenuers, who have a duty, obligation and responsibility to the general public. They want to help support their consumers they market to and … dare I say it? … to contributing to world peace.
The major brands want Facebook and other popular social media platforms to take definitive action to curb and even prevent the use of their social networks for promulgating and spewing out hate speech and similar rhetoric.
They have taken the position that something must be done to stop others from using social media to provoke civil unrest, divide the people of the United States, and ultimately erode the American ideals of freedom, equality and justice for all.
If Mr. Zuckerberg (Facebook owner) and other corporate executives of social media companies don’t do something to curtail this type of activity, then the businesses simply won’t advertise, which, in turn, will result in significantly decreased revenues. How can these digital platforms survive with no profits?
To quote Nancy Smith, president and CEO of Analytic Partners, “[Advertisers] don’t want their brands next to hate language, but this takes it a level further because of the social activism component”. This move has been referred to as an “Adpocalypse” and actually started in 2017 when major advertisers pulled their ads from YouTube.
The Advantages of Social Media Marketing
Do you agree with this Adpocalypse movement? Many people do.
But let’s assume this real social issue is not a matter to be concerned with and the question simply put is: Can social media help market your business?
The obvious answer is yes. However, in my opinion the question is not can social media help you market, but rather: How do you harness the power of social media?
Most small home businesses have limited funds and resources. Since social media accounts are provided as a free service, creating an account is easy and effective.
Once your profile is created, you can create Facebook business pages for your blogs and websites, at no extra charge. You can do the same thing with Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Pinterest.
Does Social Media Marketing Help?
I have no doubt it helped put my home biz projects on the cyberspace map. The fact that Facebook made it quick and easy to create business pages was a huge help! Having a page on Facebook or accounts on Twitter, Instagram, Whatsapp is akin to giving your business cards.
Not only is social media marketing a means of gaining exposure to potential customers, but it’s also a way to connect with fellow entrepreneurs and share business advice, tips and tricks.
Managing Your Accounts
The one downside of using social media is that it takes a good amount of time to interact with the community and grow a following. The more social media profiles you have, the more time that is required to manage them.
If you have a presence on a lot of social platforms but do not have time, you can do one of two things.
- Hire a social media manager to run your social media campaigns for you. This is a good option to get the personal touch for your accounts and have a human interact with your customers.
- Use social media automation programs like Hootsuite, BufferApp, and IFTTT. Automation is a good way to simplify your tasks by scheduling posts. The downside is that it is hard to interact with the community.
Which Social Media Platforms to Use
Instead of using only 1 or 2 social media platforms, you need to use a variety to reach more customers. Sure, you can do well with only Facebook or just Twitter, but you’ll see better results by adding more.
My SMM path was Facebook first. Then LinkedIn, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Instagram. Your LinkedIn profile serves as a resume and shows your work experience, various work-at-home projects and how long you have been in the business. LinkedIn members can also give you public reviews to build your credibility.
Twitter and the other networks are also good for developing social signals, which are the likes, shares, and comments that your content receives. They are an important metric for analyzing the effectiveness of your social media marketing efforts.
Basically, they let you know if people are interested in the product or services you offer and will become customers, subscribers, etc. It also gives you an avenue to talk to them direct and one-on-one.
So my advice is that you should create a presence on all of the popular social media platforms and get your business and work out there.
Sure it requires a lot of effort. But what business was ever a success without hard work? Part of that hard work includes persistent and consistent social media marketing efforts.
