Well… it’s 2021 and the world of social media is continuing to grow as we know it. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that having some sort of social media will be essential for your business to be successful. 

According to a recent study, 91% of businesses in the United States use social media for marketing purposes—and that number can only go up from here. 91%. That’s, like, everyone.

But while everyone knows it’s important, many people don’t understand why. We see it over and over again with our clients who think that likes are indicative of a solid social media strategy. It’s our goal to help them see the bigger picture to understand why and how social media ties into a holistic marketing strategy. 

Luckily for you, we will be teaching you all of this in this blog. Let’s dive in.

What is social media marketing?

Social media marketing is the use of different social media platforms to promote a particular product or service. 

Posting good content that resonates with your audience will help drive traffic to your website and brand and keep people wanting more. Using social media to grow your business can be a daunting task considering there are so many social media platforms in the world right now. Let’s take a look at the social media platforms driving the most traffic in the world currently and the ages of their target audiences.

The most popular social media platforms are:

With the way that the world is working around social media, the consumer will typically use at least one of these platforms to search their favorite brand before purchasing. Seriously, it’s true. Another survey says that 54% of social browsers use social media to research products before buying them. 

By strategically using these platforms, there are a lot of smart ways to post content from our website to highlight your best products and services. This will be helpful to utilize this trick since a brand’s social media profile is typically going to be the first thing a future consumer will look at before they take the time to look up their website.  

How effective is social media marketing?

Social media marketing done well is one of the most effective ways to give your business a vote of confidence that you will not regret. By using social media to interact with your audience—and make it as specific as possible for them—they will not only continue to come back, but actually tell their friends about their brand preference to your business. 

You know the old saying that your parents would bring up constantly when you were growing up that says, “If your friend jumps off a bridge, would you jump too?” The same type of idea that your parents were trying to get into your head as a kid can also apply to the world of social media marketing. 

No, I might not be jumping off of a bridge, but if my closest friend bought something from their favorite brand on social media and won’t stop talking about it then yeah, I am going to buy it too. And after I buy it, I will follow this brand’s social media accounts, stay up-to-date on their newest products, and then tell my other closest friends about it. 

We know social media marketing is effective because we see it on a daily basis in our own lives. It’s quick and easy, and people want to stay up-to-date with the rest of the world and will do anything to be in the know. 

Advantages of social media marketing

With the world we live in now that revolves around social media, there are endless advantages to using different social media platforms to market your brand:

• It’s cost-efficient
• It creates brand loyalty & creates community
• It’s fun

Social Media Marketing Is Cost-efficient

Out of all of the marketing and advertising strategies out there, using social media to market your products and services will be one of the most cost-efficient options out there. 

This is because almost all main social media platforms are free to download and create accounts and post to your liking. Plus, many of these platforms (like Instagram and Facebook) provide you with free social media analytics with business profiles. These can show you how their posts are performing, give you suggested times to post your pictures and updates, and let you know how your profile performs over an extended period of time. 

Not to mention that brands can ask their followers to create their own content based off of hashtags that you have created for specific campaigns or their newest products. By your followers doing this, it gives your brand even more visibility and free content to repost on your social media (with your followers permission of course!) 

One company that does this really well is Glossier. As you can see in this Instagram post below, they have reposted a picture of one of their followers wearing some of their products in her selfie and tagging them in her own post. This is a good example of using content created from some of their most loyal customers in a cost-efficient and useful way. Not only is this a smart way to get new content for your brand’s feed, but it also keeps your followers wanting more and motivates them to continue tagging you in their posts in hopes of being reposted. 

If you don’t know what you are doing with your brand’s social media and don’t know where to start, that’s okay. There are SO many people in this world who are willing to show you the ropes in this category, like us, at MAKE Digital Group! (Subtle plug, we know.) 

Social Media Marketing Creates Brand Loyalty & Community

Brand loyalty is defined as the positive association consumers attach to a particular product or brand. No matter the season or state of the world, the people with the strongest brand loyalty will stick with particular products and brands through thick and thin. 

A strong social media presence centered around your target audience will give your followers something to talk about and create an instant community of people who love your brand and business. 

Brands are starting to act as friends to their most loyal followers. Social media has completely changed the game these last few years when it comes to connecting with your closest friends, family, people you don’t know, celebrities and your favorite companies. 

That means the best thing to do for your audience is simply listening to them, responding to them, asking their input, sharing their content, and keeping them engaged. 

A great example of a brand that has created incredible brand loyalty is Starbucks. As you can see in these two Instagram posts below, Starbucks is simply just responding in a kind way to almost every comment from their followers. They are creating conversation and giving their people a reason to come back to their social posts. Something as simple as responding to your followers’ comments, positive and negative, is the first step in creating a loyal community for people to return to daily.  

Social Media Marketing is Fun!

And lastly, social media marketing is FUN! There is so much opportunity to establish your brand voice and aesthetics of your social media profiles that make it completely unique to your brand or business and your target audience. 

The world of social media provides a lot of freedom to brands to post whatever they want and followers love to see the fun side of companies through this. Over time, things have gotten less uptight in a sense and has allowed everyone to pump the brakes on the necessity to be business professionals all of the time. 

People are using social media to take a break from their daily lives and have fun, and your brand can do the same. 

Now let’s get down to business

Yes, social media marketing is filled with a wide variety of benefits. Are you in a spot with your social media marketing where you feel stuck or confused? Your brand voice is becoming quiet and you need help establishing a new one? Luckily for you, our copywriter, Taylor, is a trained expert in this field. 

MAKE wants to be here to not only help you establish a new presence on social media, but strategize innovative ways to do this in a way that the world has never seen before. Contact us today with all of your social media marketing needs.