Social Media 101 – The Five Ws

With 90% of all internet users active on social media, our money is on you being one of them. Are we right?

If you are part of that 4.2 billion cohort, we’re also confident in saying (based on you clicking this link) you’ve realised running a brand’s social media presence online is a whole different ball game to your personal feed.

The stakes are higher with a public page, and you may feel like you’re talking to a silent crowd. Well, we assure you that you’re not alone; nailing your social media does not come easy.

In this blog we share, for free (who doesn’t love a freebee?), some tips every social media marketer should know.

Our first tip is to ask yourself “WHY am I on social media?”

What are you aiming to achieve?

• Increase brand awareness
• Generate sales or leads
• Engagement an online community
• Grow your brand’s audience
• Increase web traffic

Something else?

Goals not only help you measure your success but they can guide your budget, and definitely guide your strategy.

If your focus goal is to convert sales, you’re probably going to need a budget for running ads that gets your product in front of people ready to hit ‘add to cart’.

If you’re looking to engage your existing community of brand lovers, you’re going to be investing your time instead of money to reach them.

Once you’ve worked out why you’re there, you need to think about the WHO’s and WHERE’s.

WHO is your audience and WHERE do they hang out?

Are they Gen Z TikTokers or suiters and booters scrolling on LinkedIn? Whatever channels you decide to focus your efforts on, there will be an investment of your time required, and this needs strategy, not just for time management but content research, production and sharing too.

Our advice? Don’t feel you have to be active on every channel.

It’s better to be active, but consistent on a few channels than sporadic and unfocussed on many.

Does WHEN you post matter?

ABSOLUTELY!

Our advice is again to go back to your audience. If you already have a following, Instagram and Facebook insights can tell you when they are the most active. If not, trust your gut! You know your audience best; when do you think they’d be online?

Just remember every channel comes with nuances, some examples:

• Twitter moves fast so you need to post a lot more if you want to be heard
• LinkedIn moves slow but you want to be posting during office hours
• Instagram favours quality over quantity, but there’s scope for more on stories
• Facebook may be where personally you’re posting less, but brands continue to be posting more and more

The final and by far the most challenging W is WHAT.

Or as you might be wondering, “What on earth do I post about?!”.

We can’t give all our secrets away, but our simple advice is: 

• Make sure it’s visual – in an increasingly interactive world, text-only posts are an immediate no.
• Think about how you can add value to your audience’s experience. Everyone loves getting something for free, so if you can, share content or advice that your audience can actually use.
• How you can help make people fall in love with your brand? Everyone loves a story, so share yours.
• Do your research (cheat and see what your competitors post about).
• Keep it short and keep it sweet. If you can’t tell that story with an image and a few sentences, it’s probably going to be too long to work on social – consider starting up a blog?
• If it feels like an ad, it probably should be.
• Give us a call; our team have the expertise to help you build a social media strategy, putting your brand in front of the right audiences.

Want to learn more about how you can optimise your social media management? OR are you looking to outsource your social media management? Get in touch with our social media specialists at the source – @Fox&Bear_uk