Social media marketing is a powerful tool that can help your business grow. However, there are many people who are still skeptical when it comes to embracing social media. This might be your boss or even yourself who is not convinced that social media can assist your business. In this post, 10 benefits are presented for you to consider incorporating social media into your marketing mix.
1. Social media strengthens your brand identity
You are the creator of your content and have control of the message that you put out into the world of social media and used correctly, each platform can attract and engage with your intended audience. Cross platform branding and correct management of social media platforms (e.g. responding to messages, comments etc.) will establish your brand identity and will open the doors for you to build and manage customer relationships and earn brand loyalty.
2. Social Media helps you earn brand loyalty
Open dialogue and communication through social media platforms provides an opportunity for you act and respond to your fans. You can gain a true insight into what your fans like and do not like when you monitor the content that you post to social media. When you respond to your fans and give them the opportunity to act and respond back you will build trust and gain a loyal community.
3. Social Media marketing can assist in creating brand association
Using social media marketing successfully can ensure that your Company is associated with specific products/services. When your social media ‘fans’ see advertisements from other companies that offer products and services similar to yours, those ‘fans’ will instead associate those products/services with your Company and are likely to ignore the advertisements form the other Company.
4. Protect your online reputation
The content that you provide via social media and the efforts that you go to managing the content will determine user opinions of your brand. However, if you are not active on social media you do run the risk of not knowing if your brand has a bad reputation online. It is in your interests to setup and control the social media profiles for your company to ensure that no one else is doing this for you and deliberately harming your brand reputation.
5. Improve Company culture
Regular exposure of the work produced by your organisation that is marketed through social media will provide acknowledgement to your employees and send a clear message that you appreciate the work that they produce and this will encourage a positive company culture.
6. Celebrate and empower your employees
Employees are fantastic advocates for the products/services of any organisation and therefore they should be celebrated and made to feel appreciated. Celebrate their work on social media and the Company website and in doing so, you will be sending out a positive message to your employees that you appreciate their hard work and commitment to the Company. As a result you will empower your employees to be proud of what they do and to be proud of the organisation that they work for. This will further encourage employees to support the organisation, creating a positive link between your organisation and its employees. A positive, happy and supportive workforce provides evidence to outsiders that your organisation is a positive place to work and therefore it must also be a great organisation to do business with.
7. Gain a competitive advantage
If you are using social media for your business and your competitors are not, then you have the opportunity to gain competitive advantage. The vast audience readily available via social media is all yours if your competitors are not using social media. Just think what you can achieve and be steps ahead of your competition. You can attract an audience, engage with potential customers and then gain customers through social media as well as building a loyal fan base.
8. Social Media marketing can help your organisation step-it-up a gear
Social media marketing and general marketing is a great method that can challenge your workforce to step-it-up a gear without the need for you to single out individuals or use a top down management approach. Through letting your workforce know that you are going to start using regular marketing techniques, your workforce will want to step-it-up a gear to ensure that they are not going to be associated with mediocrity. The introduction of social media marketing into your everyday running of your organisation can assist in encouraging your workforce to up their game.
9. Share content quickly and regularly without costing too much money
Social media content can be shared with a quick click of a button. It is that fast. The costs associated with sharing social media content is time and effort. You can create a quick tweet to start a chat with your Twitter fans and you can post some fantastic product images to your Instagram or Facebook profiles that quickly let your audience see your products. This is much easier, cheaper and quicker than traditional marketing techniques that require more expensive printed materials posted out to homes and businesses.
10. Increase website traffic and search ranking
Social media fuels website traffic and search ranking position. If you are sharing content on social media then you can add links to your website and get your audience where you want them. Not only can the links help increase website traffic you can benefit from social media shares that help boost your search ranking position.
Conclusion
Hopefully the 10 benefits listed above have provided you with some insight into some of the benefits of using social media marketing for business.
Remember
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