The marketing long game is very much about improving your overall natural reach of your messages and information you communicate. Increasing the amount of people you have on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and mailing list etc will give you a greater scope to tell your story about your business. In this blog, I’m going to cover some of the ways you can do this!
Social Personality – One of the most important aspects when building a brand is personality, and making your business relatable. New customers and existing customers want to know about the people behind the business, no matter what sector you’re in. When posting on social media, try and make updates about the people that run the business, how the product is made, photos of customers with your product etc. Real stories, images of real people and videos will get people interested in the business and the products or services that you offer, and ultimately result in more interest in your social media pages.
Be reactive – With content becoming an increasingly vital part of your marketing strategy as a whole, ensuring that you’re talking about relevant and recent information should be always at the forefront of your mind. When posting on social media, look at what’s trending in your area/country to see if you can join in the conversation. Seasonal posts and graphics tend to do well also, especially around the festive period. Brainstorm some blog ideas, social media posts and online graphics for seasonal periods to ensure you’re making the most out of the additional reach. It’s good practice to check on the latest news in the industry and communicate as soon as you possibly can via social media/blogs, at the same time trying to create and encourage discussion. The more people you have interacting with your marketing, the more people will see it virally.
Pay for online advertising – Money talks. In the world of social media where there’s so much noise (images of cats dancing getting more social engagement than important statements from the prime minister in some cases), sometimes paying to boost your content will help you get in front of a lot more people. Facebook, Twitter and now Instagram all have platforms for small and large businesses alike, covering all budgets in order for any business to use it as an effective advertising format. Advertising on social media basically gives you more of a choice as to what people see on social media sites more often, so choose wisely what posts or information you choose to use. Always ensure there’s an end goal like a product purchase or newsletter subscribe.
Give people a reason to follow you – Along with what I’ve mentioned above when it comes to content, giving people incentives to follow and subscribe will increase the chance of your retaining that person for future communication. If you’re B2B, make sure your blog pages have a mailing list subscription button somewhere prominent on the page. Setup autoresponders, so that when someone signs up to your newsletter they get a free brochure/tip sheet. On the other hand if you sell products, offer discount codes in return for a like/follow on social media, or a subscribe to your newsletter. With e-commerce, email marketing is incredibly powerful, so it’s a good idea to regularly introduce new discount codes and reasons for people to keep coming back to your website.
Don’t be annoying – Retention is as important as gaining new followers and subscribers. Generally, people don’t like being sold to – especially if it’s something they really don’t need or aren’t interested in. Be subtle when promoting your products/services. Sandwich sales and offers amongst interesting and useful content on your e-newsletters. When you have a really unique new product, package or service combine an appealing FB or Twitter advert to reach out to more people and encourage those all important sales… but remember to keep this relatively infrequent. Think of a tight but aggressive poker player!
In short, be interesting, relevant, reactive, offer incentives and don’t be afraid to dabble in social media advertising. Combining all of these elements will definitely get you on the correct path for gaining good quality followers and subscribers, which should in turn result in more sales!
[button color=”accent-color” hover_text_color_override=”#fff” size=”large” url=”http://email.superflymarketing.co.uk/h/j/B080F5739BE46312″ text=”Sign up to our E-Newsletter to get free monthly marketing tips!” color_override=”” image=”icon-check”]
