Social media marketing…we have heard a lot about it. But what is it actually? A simple answer would be a way of marketing through social media, hence social media marketing. Yes, that is not wrong. But a detailed answer of what social media marketing is would be one form of online marketing that makes use of various social media networks so that marketing communication and branding and promotion goals can hopefully be achieved. Activities such as posting images and videos as well as sharing contents for marketing purposes are all parts of social media marketing.
Living in this digital era, having only a website to support your business is absolutely not enough. Your business should have, at least, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter; these three are the social media accounts that most people have and check out each day. Our suggestion, if you havent had these three accounts, you have to change the priorities on your to-do list. Why do we insist? Because social media marketing is beneficial for your business. How is it beneficial? We will explain below:
You will gain insights about your customers.One of the advantages that social media has to offer is that you will be able to get up close and personal with your audience. It was not that easy before the rise of social media. What is more, you can learn about their behaviours and analyse their specific needs.
You can connect personally with your audience.Through social media, you will be able to connect with your audience one by one. How cool is that, right? You can see their messages and reply to them immediately.
When problems occur, you can respond to them right away.When there is something not functioning well with your products or services, you want to, of course, know about it immediately and give a solution to the problem as soon as possible. If you have social media accounts, you can know about this in an instant. Your customers will let you know about the problems by tweeting (if you are on Twitter) or writing on your wall (if you are on Facebook), for example, and you will be the first to know.
You can even better your customer service.By staying up to date and being responsive at all times, you will improve your customer service. Customers love companies who provide excellent customer service.
More sales will certainly be yours.When people love your excellent services, they will tell others about you, as simple as that. People will come to you without you having to go looking for them.
More potential customers, both local and international.On Twitter, for example, you can monitor what people are tweeting about from anywhere around the world (think about keywords that are related to your business) and what topics are trending. On Instagram, when you are posting pictures of your products you can use appropriate hashtags, so that people who are browsing for something related to your products will be seeing your photos too. It is not only local audience that will likely see them, but also international audience.
You can expand your professional network.In addition to building relationships with customers, you can also expand your professional network by connecting with others from the same industry through social media.
Last but not least, it is free.Everybody loves free stuffs, right? There is no better way to brand and promote your products or services than by making use of all social media accounts that are available for free out there. All you have to have are the Internet connection and any electronic devices, such as computer or laptop.
