Like it or loathe it, social media can be a valuable asset in your marketing toolbox. Here we look at ways of enhancing your digital presence by identifying the principles of social media.
When it comes to your firm’s social media strategy you need to consider the following:
- Why are you doing it?
- Who do you want to communicate with?
- How often should you be doing it?
- What should you be posting?
1. Why are you doing it?
You need to identify what are your objectives for using social media. Is it to raise your profile (firm-wide or on an individual level); attract new clients; engage with current clients; increase traffic to the website; or attract and recruit staff? Your strategy may include one or more of these objectives. However, be mindful that the more objectives you have, the more time and effort you will need to commit to social media.
A word of warning! If your reason for being on social media is ‘because everyone else is’, you are unlikely to post very often or engage with others. If this is the case, I suggest you don’t do it and deactivate all your pages, rather than having outdated pages which will reflect badly on you.
2. Who do you want to communicate with?
Or put another way, who is your target audience? Once you’ve identified your audience you should then do some research to clarify if they are on social media and if so which platforms do they tend to use. You should also aim to get involved in online groups and forums, including trade associations and member groups they may be involved in.
You should aim to follow and connect with your targets, perhaps ask existing connections to introduce you to other people. Ideally, engage with them and their posts.
If your target audience is not using social media then this marketing channel may not be the right one for you. Instead, you should identify other marketing activities that would get you in front of your target audience.
3. How often should you be doing it?
Time is the limiting factor here. Clearly, firms who have an in-house marketing person or use a third party marketing company will have more social media activity than someone trying to fit it in alongside the day job. That said, you don’t need to spend a lot of time on social media for it to be effective. Some experts suggest they only spend 5 minutes a day and possibly a further 30 minutes once a week.
Creating a social media posting plan can help you to map out what topics you will cover and when. This will give you a structure to work from and make it easier to keep your social media platforms up to date.
However, you can post too often. I see some firms posting 6 or more posts a day on the same platforms. Whilst this can suggest you are involved in lots of things and have lots of advice to share, it can become overwhelming and in the long run, can switch off people from tuning in to your feeds. Conversely, not posting enough can indicate that you are not committed to that form of communication. So getting the balance is important.
As a rough guide, I would suggest large firms should be posting 1 -2 a day, smaller firms 3 – 4 times a week and sole practitioners should aim for 1- 2 a week.
4. What should you be posting?
In order for your social media posts to be as effective as possible, you need to mix up the contents. By all means, promote the different services and products you have, but also include posts which:
- give facts and advice,
- mention or link to things which your target audience would find interesting,
- promote events you are organising or attending,
- link with local community projects or charities you are involved with, and
- inject some fun into the day!
You should also aim to comment on and share other people’s posts so that you are fully engaging with others and not just broadcasting your own news.
Using social media can be a very effective form of marketing and communication. However, you must adhere to the principles of social media to make it really work for you. Deciding your aims, allocating sufficient time to it and having a diverse range of posts are key, as is linking it to other marketing activities that you are implementing.
You can follow Momentum for Professionals on Twitter or Facebook or follow Vicki Banthorpe on LinkedIn.
