Using Social Media to Market Your Business

Be it Covid-19 lockdowns or just social distancing, faced with more time at home, users are looking to the digital world to keep them feeling connected, updated, and entertained.  If this time is showing us anything, it’s that digital channels are where customer engagement is happening and businesses that neglect them do so at their peril.  This presents a great opportunity for savvy marketers.

Today’s topic focuses on social media and how to maximise the different platforms to market your business.  The use of social media should be an important part of your business strategy as a way to market your service or product and enhance your brand.

The most popular social media platforms in South Africa are Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube.   There are others and a list of the most popular social media platforms and the audience reach can be found at the end of this article.  Not every social media platform is right for your business, so as part of your strategy, consider which would be the most effective for your business. 

First and foremost, a company website is a must.  If you are just starting out, there are free tools to assist you in building a business website, such as https://www.wix.com/, so you don’t have to invest in this resource immediately.

Facebook is the one of the most popular social media platforms, with more than 2 billion users.  Whilst it started out as a social networking site for college students it can be an effective tool for business.  Posting on Facebook should be more personable rather than a hard-core strategy to sell your product or service.  As community sharing information and connecting for social purposes it should appeal to the interests of the demographic you are targeting.  It is one of the best tools for targeting a specific audience through paid campaigns.

Instagram is popular because an image can say a lot without writing 100s of words to describe something.  It can be a powerful marketing tool where an image can catch the attention of a potential customer without being bombarded by a lot of information. 

LinkedIn is somewhat different to other social media platforms because its focus is business.  It was designed for professional networking and career development.  It is a good place to publish articles and in so doing establish thought leadership in your area of operation. 

Twitter should primarily be used to drive audiences to your website.  As it is a fast paced medium, how you construct your tweets and hashtags is critical in order to grab the attention of your audience to create an interest and the need to know more.

YouTube is an attractive platform because videos are a lot more appealing than text.  However, it is time intensive and the content, purpose and quality of the production need to be of a high value. 

Read more about the different platforms by clicking on the links below and explore which of the platforms could benefit you to grow your business.   

We look forward to your feedback.  Let us know if you found this article useful and what else you would like to know more about.