Are you one of those that have jumped on the social media marketing bandwagon to promote your business? Are you following the rules of social media engagement?
You expect it to boost your sales and improve audience relations, right? Or do you think it will help you manage your online reputation and reduce every bit of overhead you have? So what happened? Why have you not started reaping those benefits even though you exist on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube?
Entrepreneurs and brands sometimes forget that social media is not just a two-way communication between brands and the target audience. You need to follow the rules of engagement on your social media channels.
What is Social Media Engagement?
Social media is a multi-medium. It lets your existing customers have conversations with your potential customers regardless of their country.
You can use social media in your marketing mix or customer service by adequately knowing your business environment.
Potential clients prefer to learn more about your brand from existing clients on social platforms, not adverts. Social media is the perfect platform for this to take place.
Since it is a relationship-driven multi-medium, consumers ignore your marketing and advertising efforts and go straight to your social media accounts.
You need to adapt to the situation by looking for other ways to grab a person’s attention. This is not as easy as it sounds.
One important thing to note is that your tone and language of communication with people online go a long way in telling about your character and person.
It also reflects on your brand because the public associates the person with the brand these days.
According to this article, engagement refers to the response you receive when (and after) publishing your message.
In social media management specifically, users are engaged at a certain level if they read posts, tweets, drop comments, listen to a podcast or watch a video.
This article says social media marketing success is not measured by numbers alone. For example, if you have more followers than a celebrity, your presence will count for nothing if you’re not creating and maintaining a meaningful dialogue with them. You might as well pack up and vacate all your networks.
The article mentioned above mentions that the more your content resonates with your followers, the more likely they will share and respond by leaving comments.
Offer value and knowledge. Use appealing, relevant and engaging CTA, captions and hashtags.
Social media is a multi-medium. It lets your existing customers have conversations with your potential customers.
Potential customers prefer to learn more about your brand from existing customers, not adverts. Social media is the perfect platform for this to take place since social media is a relationship-driven multi-medium.
There are five basic rules of social media engagement that you need to respect.
The rules are:
- Relationships Come Before Sales
- You go to the Community; The Community Doesn’t Come to You
- Communities are grown, not built
- Don’t try to replace the community
- Content is king
Relationships Come Before Sales
Building relationships take time. Building trust takes time. Social media affects your sales after you have built a strong relationship with your clients.
Offer value to your community to build genuine and long-lasting relationships.
This relationship helps them to become more loyal advocates. These loyal advocates will refer their friends and family to you.
Potential customers prefer to learn more about your brand from existing customers, not adverts. Social media is the perfect platform for this to take place. Click To TweetYou Go to the Community; The Community Doesn’t Come to You.
Don’t expect that you’ve set up an account on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter, so they should flock to you. Don’t wait for your clients to come to you. Instead, go to them.
If your target market is using Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, or Instagram, join those too. You need to talk to your community as if they were on the phone or sitting next to you.
Please make sure you talk to them in a tone and voice that will resonate with the community and not alienate you from them.
For a genuine relationship to develop with your online community, please don’t sell yourself at all times. Instead, seek to educate, entertain and give back to them in any way possible.
Communities Are Grown, Not Built
Would you please get to know members of your online community and start building relationships with them? You still have to put in some effort. Building an integrated online tribe takes time. Make some noise.
Make friends. Show your friends and your tribe what you can offer them. Be patient in time; you will find your voice.
Don’t Try to Replace the Community.
Don’t try to re-invent the wheel. Don’t build your customised online communities from scratch to compete with Facebook, etc. There is no point. You can never catch up or compete.
Instead, concentrate on adding value to these platforms through your brand’s presence.
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Content Is King.
On the world wide web, content is king! Content includes articles, blog posts, social media posts, images, infographics, photos, tutorials, videos, podcasts, reviews, etc.
It will fail if regular content production isn’t part of your social media strategy. If this sounds overwhelming, outsource your social media marketing (SMM). Then you can focus on running your company.
But it applies to your target audiences’ demographics that you continue producing engaging content on various media for your social media campaign and that it is regular.
Because once you stop producing articles, photos, podcasts, reviews, and videos, you stop participating in SMM, and relationships will whither, and your business will suffer.
Regardless of the type of content, focus on producing valuable content.
Here is an infographic to keep reminding you.
Conclusion
If social media engagement isn’t working for you, ask yourself if you are following the above rules of engagement. An honest self-assessment will help you find a solution to improving the level of engagement in your campaigns.
You need to think beyond just advertising on social media platforms to connect with the modern-day hyper-connected consumer.
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