Social media is continuously evolving at a rapid pace. There is not just a single but many new social media features which catch the interest of users past year. Ephemeral content is one of the latest trends which made a big wave in 2017 and it continues to be a popular trend in 2018. Ephemeral content is the content which is short-lived and stays for a while or let’s just say for 24 hours (as in many social media platforms) before it disappears. Their temporary nature creates a sense of imperativeness or FOMO (fear of missing out) for users to check them out before they disappear.

Snapchat started the concept of ephemeral content. Instagram soon followed and launched Stories in August 2016 to compete with the Snapchat. In Stories, you can add photos and video with filters, stickers, hashtags, and text. You can also tag Instagram users or even create simple polls to ask questions and collect valuable data on your audience.

Instagram Stories is the top trend in social media in 2018 due to the high engagement numbers it produces. For example “According to Statista, the app had 400 million daily active Stories users worldwide, up from 300 million global DAU in October 2017.” Facebook, YouTube, and WhatsApp have also joined the fray of this trend. With the growing popularity of Stories and its potential in providing high engagement rate, it will be impossible for marketers to ignore it. It’s time to start thinking about stories as a key part of your social marketing strategy.

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Hope you enjoyed reading our blog on Top Ways to Use Social Media Marketing for Your Business. Social media is an integral part of the marketing strategy for any business and its sole purpose is not just to drive sales and generate leads but more to build a stronger relationship with the customers as well.  It paves the way for a business to share and strengthen the bond with its audience and understand them better.

On 11th January, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook would be changing its news feed algorithm to prioritize content from “friends, family, and groups.” As he says there will be less public content like posts from businesses, brands and media and businesses will have to work harder than ever to gain their customer’s attention on the platform. It is evident for businesses to post content that will encourage meaningful interactions between people.” We are yet to see the results of new algorithm however it is going to challenge businesses more than ever before to come up with content that really focuses on providing great user experience, is more relevant to the users and triggers them to respond to it rather than just getting likes from the audience.

Now there is a stronger need for businesses to emphasize more on customer engagement and establish more trust with existing or potential customers. Companies which will be able to think differently to utilize the power of social media for building meaningful engagement with the customers will not only succeed but thrive. A fully engaged customer will always remain loyal and emotionally attached to their favourite business brands and will never opt for any alternatives. It is proven that level of customer engagement can be directly linked to crucial business results.

Now the question comes; what type of content will lead to more engagement! There is a plethora of content that gets generated and put on the social media every day. There is no limit to the amount and the kind of content that can be produced. There can’t be one single strategy that will give results for every business. There are content writing strategies that can help acquire more organic traffic but there are certain fundamentals of creating engaging content.

1. Quality and relevance

You need to know who your customers are! With your goals and target audiences in mind, try to find out what can you offer them or what they would like to hear from you. Think about content that will generate a response from viewers and give them reasons to return to your page. It is easy to create just any content; more effort and time is required for creating a good quality content which is relevant to the users as they are following your page for a reason.

2. Your content must be original

Originality confirms uniqueness in your content. What will set apart your view or creation from the content present on other websites on similar topics is originality. Of course, it is not at all easy to come up with new ideas for every piece of content however you can make efforts to present an already existing information or thought from your standpoint and Google will just love you for it! Content need not necessarily be a blog or article; an image, infographic or video is also a content. To preserve individuality don’t stick to creating just one type of content.

3. More visual content

The human brain processes images faster than text, this is the reason your audience will always prefer and find easier to engage with a visual content rather than plain text. Select from multiple creative options like sharing a simple image, infographics, GIFs, videos or any graphics tutorial giving information about your product or services. What makes visuals indispensable part of every content strategy is that they are always less time-consuming, are more enjoyable therefore easy to remember. They stimulate a prompt and stronger reaction so more likely to get shared!

4. Engagement must be two-way!

Think if your content is giving a chance to your audience to share their opinions and feelings. You are creating content for them but if your company is doing all the talking; narrates your business products, viewers will soon start to lose interest as they are not getting any chance to converse. If your content is only meant for reading or viewing and is not provoking users to take any actions, you will never to come to understand your audience, their likes or dislikes, do they feel your content is useful or not! Think of some ideas how you can turn a tedious post into an interactive one.

Be there to connect with your customers, engage in conversations and enhance your relationship with them! Please do share your ideas to optimize social media for customer engagement!

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Social Media Return on Investment (ROI) is simply measuring the value that we got from our social media campaign to determine which social media marketing efforts are working.

How to measure Social Media ROI

ROI = (return – investment) / investment

This straightforward formula has just the two parts: Return and Investment. Buffer blog explains in detail the different methods to tackle the monetary side of ROI.

Keep in mind that setting goals and objective should be measurable and attainable and make sure you choose the right metrics to measure your social media campaign success.

Social Media Examiner discussed in details the different Metrics to track Social Media Success and how campaign performance helps determine which tactics are working.

Social Media ROI Challenge

In an eConsultancy survey conducted by Convinced and Convert, 41% of the respondents have absolutely no idea of social media’s financial impact.

Another social media survey by MarketingProfs: 47% of respondents say social media measurement is important to them; another 36% say it is somewhat important.

A further survey made with 70% of respondents to determine social media’s return on investment (ROI) and most marketers say their companies are not adequately measuring the impact of social media campaigns.

Why you should Measure ROI

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Is it “the end” for Facebook?

What is the likelihood of Facebook users losing their trust in them? Will users still share their data on Facebook? Facebook has been faced with a lot of tough questions this month. History of the digital world has proved that all social platforms like Friendster, Myspace and Orkut have a lifespan. So is it the time for Facebook to rest in a digital graveyard?

People have known for years that advertisers can get our data from Facebook or target ads by using that data but the current environment started a spark. There has been a raising hashtag delete facebook movement since the news broke that Cambridge Analytica used data collected from Facebook to sway voters in favor of Donald Trump.

The Facebook VP and Deputy General Counsel, Paul Grewal, posted on Facebook “The claim that this is a data breach is completely false. Aleksandr Kogan requested and gained access to information from users who chose to sign up for his app, and everyone involved gave their consent. People knowingly provided their information, no systems were infiltrated, and no passwords or sensitive pieces of information were stolen or hacked.”

Do you agree that Facebook is a victim of Cambridge Analytica?

All we know is that Cambridge Analytica obtained data from Facebook in a way that violated Facebook privacy policy.
Facebook was aware of this breach since 2015 but it was only when the New York Times and other media published the story, Facebook crosses the bridge.

As Marlo Thomas says “Despite our ever-connective technology, neither Skype nor Facebook — not even a telephone call — can come close to the joy of being with loved ones in person.”

Facebook holds probably the largest data on personal insights that has ever existed. “Facebook itself has more than 2 billion users, those other three apps now have more than 3.6 billion combined. The entire population of Earth is around 7.6 billion, which gives you some perspective on just how entwined Facebook is – and these apps aren’t even available in the most populous nation, and in many low connectivity regions”.

There is a fact that even if people deleted their Facebook account, Instagram is climbing the charts and it is owned by the same company Facebook!

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For any startup or small business, the most important mission is to find and acquire new customers. Unless a new business with limited budget and resources has a powerful team to develop a great marketing strategy and create the right content, it will be constantly struggling with challenges to remain visible to the potential customers. A business owner might be tempted to work on different marketing strategies and plans each day in an attempt to find the one that best suits his business and brings good results.

Social media marketing can be one of the best options for small businesses. With more and more active users joining social media sites, there is more opportunity for businesses to create brand awareness, engage with the current and potential customers, and serve them better. As we spoke about SEO in our recent blog, though SEO will bring targeted traffic to your website, social media can have the influence on buying decision of the customers.

According to a recent study from Forbes, 81% of respondents said that recommendations and posts impact their buying decisions, and 78% said that social media posts directly from a company influence their buying decisions.

Let’s look at some interesting statistics that show how social media marketing is impacting businesses.

• • As Social Media Examiner shares, 92 percent of social media marketers said that social media was important to their businesses

  • Social Media Examiner’s report shares that 84 percent of marketers have integrated their social media strategy with their traditional marketing strategies

  • 90 percent of businesses said that social media has increased the exposure of their business

  • Over 50 percent of marketers say that social media has directly increased sales

  • Forbes reports that three out of four consumers say that social media impacts their buying decisions

Here are some of the top ways to use social media to market your small business:

1. Advertising on Social Media

One important benefit of advertising on social media channels is more targeting options. Social networks carry a huge amount of user information like their behaviours, interests, age-groups, demographic or geographic information; which a business can utilize to reach specific audiences by creating relevant advertisements. You can create social media campaigns using the platforms where your target customer is more present and most engaged. There are tools you can use to track the performance of your social media advertising campaigns, how successful were your campaigns and what next strategy would you want to implement.

2. For Branding

For a start-up, branding becomes even more crucial and is not limited to luring customers only but also to become visible to other investors and partners in this ever-increasing competitive market. Begin by choosing the right social media platforms and creating the content that visitors will find interesting, they would want to follow and can give you the opportunity for better customer engagement. A simple activity such as running a quiz or contest with giveaways is a great way to connect with your audience and gain more following.

No other marketing method will give you the opportunity to know your customers at a personal level. At the same time, interactive posts with your brand logo will help you create an identity of your business among the audience.

3. For Building Community

Why startups should care about building community. According to David Spinks, CEO, and co-founder of Feast, community building can wield power even at the earliest stages of growth for startups and he shares examples of many startups who have invested a great deal of time and resources into building community. It is important to understand why a startup with so many things to figure out should focus on building community on social media. As David Spinks says; the simplest and most valuable thing you’ll get from a community is highly engaged customers or users.

Social media community is more than receiving a huge number of likes and comments on your posts. A true social media community is the one where followers interact with each other. They will react to other follower’s response, share their thoughts, ask questions, and seek advice and so on. They feel important and included as part of one group. They develop strong emotions for a brand and build relationships with other members.

4. Track Your Results

As you start gaining experience in social media, you can use tools and software that provides data about your social media platforms. Social Media Analytics can really help to track and measure results of your social media strategies leading to more information-driven business decisions and increased customer centrality for brands and businesses. You’re analyzing your own efforts on social media, but what about your competitors? Remember another challenge for startups is competitors and it is vital for them like for an established business to compare their social media presence with other similar companies. They can learn a lot by analyzing social media profiles of their competitors, what kind of content they are posting, the mistakes they are making, and their social media practices. This information can be used to create a competitive advantage over them.

Having a social media profile does not mean you need to be on every platform and connect with everyone. Choose a platform that is relevant to your business, connect and interact with the right audience, find creative ways to engage with them, monitor your strategies, don’t be afraid to experiment and implement what works best for you!!

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