With over 80% of consumers reporting that social media—especially influencer content—significantly impacts buying decisions, marketers across industries are driving the evolution of social media marketing (SMM) from a stand-alone tool to a multipronged source of marketing intelligence on an increasingly important—and growing—audience.
Within 18 years, from 2004 (when MySpace became the first social media site to reach one million users) to 2022, the dramatic growth of interactive digital channels took social media to levels that challenge even the reach of television and radio.
By Q1 of 2022, there were 4.6 billion social media users globally—over 58% of the world’s population—an increase of over 10% in one year alone.
As the use of social media trends upward, marketers are perfecting strategies to capture the significant competitive advantage that engagement with this key audience can deliver even more rapidly and effectively than traditional marketing.
What Is Social Media Marketing (SMM)?
Social media marketing (SMM) (also known as digital marketing and e-marketing) is the use of social media—the platforms on which users build social networks and share information—to build a company’s brand, increase sales, and drive website traffic. In addition to providing companies with a way to engage with existing customers and reach new ones, social media marketing (SMM) has purpose-built data analytics that allow marketers to track the success of their efforts and identify even more ways to engage.
Why Is Social Media Marketing So Powerful?
The power of social media marketing (SMM) is driven by the unparalleled capacity of social media in three core marketing areas: connection, interaction, and customer data.
Connection: Not only does social media enable businesses to connect with customers in ways that were previously impossible, but there is also an extraordinary range of avenues to connect with target audiences—from content platforms (like YouTube) and social sites (like Facebook) to microblogging services (like Twitter).
Interaction: The dynamic nature of the interaction on social media—whether direct communication or passive “liking”—enables businesses to leverage free advertising opportunities from eWOM (electronic word-of-mouth) recommendations between existing and potential customers. Not only is the positive contagion effect from eWOM a valuable driver of consumer decisions, but the fact that these interactions happen on the social network makes them measurable. For example, businesses can measure their “social equity”—a term for the return on investment (ROI) from their social media marketing (SMM) campaigns.
Customer Data: A well-designed social media marketing (SMM) plan delivers another invaluable resource to boost marketing outcomes: customer data. Rather than being overwhelmed by the 3Vs of big data (volume, variety, and velocity), SMM tools have the capacity not only to extract customer data but also to turn this gold into actionable market analysis—or even to use the data to crowdsource new strategies.
How Social Media Marketing Works
As platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram took off, social media transformed not only the way we connect with one another but also the way businesses are able to influence consumer behavior—from promoting content that drives engagement to extracting geographic, demographic, and personal information that makes messaging resonate with users.
SMM Action Plan: The more targeted your social media marketing (SMM) strategy is, the more effective it will be. Hootsuite, a leading software provider in the social media management space, recommends the following action plan to build an SMM campaign that has an execution framework as well as performance metrics:
- Align SMM goals to clear business objectives
- Learn your target customer (age, location, income, job title, industry, interests)
- Conduct a competitive analysis of your competition (successes and failures)
- Audit your current SMM (successes and failures)
- Create a calendar for SMM content delivery
- Create best-in-class content
- Track performance and adjust SMM strategy as needed
Customer Relationship Management (CRM): Compared to traditional marketing, social media marketing has several distinct advantages, including the fact that SMM has two kinds of interaction that enables targeted customer relationship management (CRM) tools: both customer-to-customer and firm-to-customer. In other words, while traditional marketing tracks customer value primarily by capturing purchase activity, SMM can track customer value both directly (through purchases) and indirectly (through product referrals).
Shareable Content: Businesses can also convert the amplified interconnectedness of SMM into the creation of “sticky” content, the marketing term for attractive content that engages customers at first glance, gets them to purchase products, and then makes them want to share the content. This kind of word-of-mouth advertising not only reaches an otherwise inaccessible audience but also carries the implicit endorsement of someone the recipient knows and trusts—which makes the creation of shareable content one of the most important ways that social media marketing drives growth.
Earned Media: Social media marketing (SMM) is also the most efficient way for a business to reap the benefits of another kind of earned media (a term for brand exposure from any method other than paid advertising): customer-created product reviews and recommendations.
Viral Marketing: Another SMM strategy that relies on the audience to generate the message is viral marketing, a sales technique that attempts to trigger the rapid spread of word-of-mouth product information. Once a marketing message is shared with the general public far beyond the original target audience, it is considered viral—a very simple and inexpensive way to promote sales.
Customer Segmentation: Because customer segmentation is much more refined on social media marketing (SMM) than on traditional marketing channels, companies can ensure they focus their marketing resources on their exact target audiences.
Tracking Metrics
According to Sprout Social, the most important social media marketing (SMM) metrics to track are focused on the customer: engagement (likes, comments, shares, clicks); impressions (how many times a post shows up); reach/virality (how many unique views an SMM post has); share of voice (how far a brand reaches in the online sphere); referrals (how a user lands on a site); and conversions (when a user makes a purchase on a site). However, another very important metric is focused on the business: response rate/time (how often and how fast the business responds to customer messages).
When a business is trying to determine which metrics to track in the sea of data that social media generates, the rule is always to align each business goal to a relevant metric. If your business goal is to grow conversions from an SMM campaign by 15% within three months, then use a social media analytics tool that measures the effectiveness of your campaign against that specific target.
How to Build Your Brand’s Authority on Instagram
With the right strategy, Instagram can be one of the most powerful tools in your marketing arsenal. Follow these steps to establish your brand on the social media platform.
Instagram is one of the most popular social media networks, appealing to everyday people just as much as those with creative ideas and eyes for design. It’s an excellent platform for building your brand’s authority and can serve as a vehicle for increasing your business’s audience engagement and revenue. There are key strategies you can implement to establish your brand on Instagram – but also mistakes you’ll want to avoid.
In December 2021, Instagram hit 2 billion active monthly users, according to Statista. With that many eyeballs scanning posts every day, it can be challenging to make your business stand out. The tips below will help you establish your brand’s identity and authority on the platform.
Develop your Instagram strategy.
The first step toward establishing your brand’s authority on Instagram is to integrate social media into your content strategy and determine your approach to using Instagram for your business. A sound plan helps everyone on your team understand how your company will be presented on the platform. We’ve outlined five steps for developing a solid Instagram marketing strategy.
- Set your goals. Prior to using any social networking site, you need to have clear goals in place. Otherwise, you could waste a lot of time and resources with nothing to show for it. The goals of your Instagram strategy should align with your overall digital marketing goals. Examples of objectives you could set include increasing brand awareness, driving traffic to your website, and improving the overall reach of your digital marketing campaigns.
- Find your target audience. Before you start sharing content on Instagram, you should have an idea of who your target audience is. If you’re not sure, begin by analyzing your current customers. Look at who already buys and enjoys your products and services.
- Research your competitors. You need to know what your brand rivals are up to on Instagram. It pays to regularly monitor their feeds because you’re likely targeting the same user base. Find out which of your competitors’ posts get the most traction. What kind of content do their followers engage with the most? What takeaways can you apply to your own efforts to set your business apart while still appealing to your shared audience?
- Plan your content strategy. Run tests to find the kind of content that drives conversions. Once you know the type of content that works best for your audience, create a content calendar. It’s also a good idea to experiment with your post timing. Find the times your followers are most responsive and schedule your posts accordingly. Have a visual approach that aligns with your brand’s personality, and stay on top of the trends and social events that involve your users.
- Hire talented product photographers. Instagram is a visual medium, so the aesthetic quality of your posts has to be top-notch. But not everyone has the natural skills to craft posts that draw people in and resonate with users. Consider hiring talented photographers and other creative people to help you design the posts your brand and products deserve. The messaging and photographs should be consistent with your overall marketing strategy and brand.
Be consistent in style and theme.
Any time you’re building a brand on social media, you want to find a loyal audience that trusts you. To do that, your brand needs a unique personality that you can showcase through consistent, quality content. If you share arbitrary posts with an inconsistent style, you’ll confuse – and possibly lose – followers. Instead, choose a color palette that suits your brand and stick with a consistent artistic theme.
Use Instagram Stories.
Instagram Stories are pictures and videos posted on Instagram that disappear after 24 hours. Stories are a good way to share things you don’t want permanently displayed on your company’s profile. They are usually fun, off-the-cuff moments that can humanize your business. This is a great opportunity to get creative – you can doodle, place stickers and write on pictures, which helps your followers experience your brand’s personality in a new way.
Make smart use of hashtags.
Trying out different filters or witty captions is important, but what’s more critical is ensuring people actually see your pictures and videos. To increase your views, use the right hashtags. When you add hashtags to the captions of your images, those images will appear in the feed where the hashtag is publicly aggregated. When you search for a hashtag, the popular tagged photos are shown at the top. If your pictures are hashtagged properly, they will come up when users search for a relevant hashtag.
You can use hashtags to indicate your geographic location or show you’re supporting a cause or charity. A hashtag can describe what’s in your photo, or you can use a category hashtag to specify your expertise or industry. You can also participate in ongoing trends with the help of hashtags.
Work with influential Instagrammers.
To build your brand’s Instagram authority, identify relevant influencers for potential partnerships. They can talk about your company with their followers and increase brand awareness. You can use Instagram influencers for different promotional campaigns and product launches, too – it’s one of the top ways to use social media to grow sales.
Influencers, even those who don’t have massive audiences, build their followers over a long period of time and develop trust with them. When you collaborate with a micro-influencer on social media, you get immediate access to their audience. And when a trusted voice vouches for you, your brand gains more authority in your industry.
In this noisy digital world, where every company broadcasts its message through mainstream advertising, people develop brand blindness. Consumers often don’t pay attention to brand messages that they don’t willingly opt-in to hearing or seeing. Since influencers are real people with a loyal following, they can amplify your brand’s message and help you break through that noise.
How Can One Get Started in Social Media Marketing?
To start working in social media marketing, it is good to have at least a bachelor’s degree in marketing or a related field. Then, it’s critical to gain a good understanding of how marketing campaigns work on platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. After that, showcase your talents by creating compelling and effective content. Follow influencers and other social media marketers to learn what they are doing well and where they fall flat. Together, use these steps to create a personal brand that you can use to sell yourself and your work.
The Bottom Line
Social media marketing (SMM) is the use of social media platforms to interact with customers to build brands, increase sales, and drive website traffic. As social media usage grows around the world, both via computer and mobile devices, the ability to drive sales from certain user populations is a growing business, rife with competition for views and clicks.
