How to Build A Competitive Social Media Strategy

In our previous post, we outlined WHY you need a social media strategy, how it helps to set your business apart, and contributes to sales and growth. To recap, it helps you:

• Establish a brand presence and image
• Humanize your brand
• Target your audience more effectively
• Not to worry about what to post next
• and finanlly! Increase website sales conversion rate

Today, let us talk about how we go about building a social media strategy that helps your business attain all the aforementioned goals. Below are some of the actionable steps you can take to kick off your social media strategy today.

1. Define your social media goals

Again, define what your agenda is behind developing a social media strategy, and be very specific about it. Set SMART Goals:

• S – Specific
• M – Measurable
• A – Attainable
• R – Relevant
• T – Time-bound

If your goals are not SMART, they are more like wishes. Be specific about what outcomes you are looking for, and start your strategy making the journey from there. Most importantly, be in it for the long haul. Do not abandon your strategy midway and fall back into not having a plan.

Have a Mission Statement for your Social Media goals that reads something like this:

“My business page is going to reach 10,000 likes and followers on Facebook in the next six months”

Or,

“My Instagram Account will grow by 1000 followers every month for the next six months”.

Now that you have your goal, work to put together a plan that will help meet it within your projected timeframe.

2. Research and define your audience

Answer each of the questions below to help design your plan:

• Who is your content directed toward?
  • What is the age range of your target demographic?
  • What geographical region or area are they from?
  • What languages do they speak?
  • What is their gender ratio?
  • In what form do they prefer to consume content?
    • Is it a blog post?
    • Is it podcasts?
    • Is it YouTube videos?
    • Is it Instagram posts?
    • Design your content accordingly.
  • Where are they accessing the content?
    • Are they streaming it on YouTube?
    • Are they on Patreon?
• Where are
  they accessing the content and why?
• Facebook,
  YouTube, Twitter
• What do
  they need to consume your content for?
• How does
  your content meet their learning or entertainment needs?

3.Depend on your data

The extensive research you just did on your target audience is of little value if you do not use it. Base your strategy on the data of your research, and your business should experience a greater and more effective reach to your target audience in a reasonable amount of time. After you have defined your target demographic down to a tee, design content that will specifically appeal to them.

4. Watch out for the competitors

Keep a close eye on the kind of marketing content your competitors are putting out. Watching what others are doing can be a great way to pick up a few tips, or avoid some mistakes. It can inform you of the strengths and weaknesses of your own strategy.

5. Pre-plan and schedule your content

By now you have decided which social media platforms you are going to be most active on, based on your market research. Pre-plan and pre-create the content for each of your platforms, and fix specific times for posting. You can automate scheduling and posting with social media scheduling and management platforms such as Hootsuite, Buffer, or Tailwind.

6. Be consistent and punctual

It takes time to build trust. Consistency and punctuality are dependable ways of doing that. Let your audience know what kind of content they can expect, and when. Deliver on time as promised, and your audience will learn to view you as dependable, adding more credibility to your expertise.

Lastly, focus on what is most important. Delegate the mundane tasks so that you can focus on your entrepreneurial skills. We can help build your social media strategy. Check out our services and packages!