Social media is a great way to increase brand awareness, attain authority within a targeted audience, build a brand identity, identify opportunities, collaborate with influencers, and more.
Above all, social media is a great way to attain a competitive advantage over competitors.
But what does embarking on social media sound like from a business perspective?
Statistics indicate that over 90% of U.S. marketers expressed a desire to invest in social media mainly for marketing purposes. Today, businesses and brands see it essential to exist on at least two or more social media networks. Having a social media marketing plan, hence, is crucial.
Let’s discuss some interesting ways you can build one.
Table of Contents
What Is a Social Media Marketing Plan?
A social media marketing plan is a strategy that helps businesses to create content and engage with their target audience accordingly. It serves as the road map to your business or brand’s success.
Creating a tailored social media marketing plan can help you to execute social media marketing activities effectively. It also enables you to stay in touch with your audience and be equally motivated to interact with it. Most importantly, it evaluates your strategies’ efficacy and implements new techniques where necessary.
That said, there are many things you will have to follow to build a reliable social media marketing plan.
What are they?
1. Set Goals
Joining social media without defining the intended goals offers a low advantage. The online realm is congested with many businesses and brands, and joining the arena without an actual framework hinders sizeable achievements.
As a marketer or a business owner, first define why you want to take your brand to social media.
Let it be clearly stated if it’s to increase brand awareness, attract customers, build loyalty, or bridge the gap between the business and the audience. You can leverage any of the different reflection models to set realistic targets.
Set SMART goals (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.
For example, to attain 1000 followers in four months, evaluate whether it’s possible. Assess the resources that will help you get those followers in four months. Also, define how much time you will spend on social media to attain the set targets.
2. Research Target Audience
The cornerstone of any social media marketing strategy is the target audience. Understanding your target audience and their preferences can help create an effective social media marketing plan.
However, you must first understand your brand personality. What do you sell, or what services do you offer? Where is the top destination of your target audience?
If you specialize in selling apparel or cosmetics, you must understand the top social media platforms your audience uses. In this case, your top social media platforms should be Instagram, Facebook, Google My Business, and TikTok. That’s because millennials and Gen-Z highly use these sites. Statistics show that 90% of millennials and Gen Z use Instagram daily, and 68% use it alongside TikTok.
Likewise, if you’re a service provider, for example, a web developer, then LinkedIn and Twitter should be a priority. Learning about different platforms is important when starting a business, even a small one, as you won’t benefit from all of them. A specific channel is targeted toward a certain audience. Boomers, for example, primarily use Facebook, whereas TikTok is popular among Gen Z. An essential component of business strategy is understanding platforms, especially when you are first starting out and entering the market.
Understanding where most of your target audience is the first step to building a foolproof social media marketing plan.
An interesting case study on this is the one done on Domino’s. It faced severe backlash from its audience due to its poor-quality pizzas.
The company conducted a survey and launched a turnaround campaign to revive its brand image and sales. This was not just by improving the quality of its pizzas but also by improving the technology surrounding it. You can read more about this case study here.
3. Determine Which Social Media Platforms to Use
There is a wide range of social media platforms, from Reddit and Instagram to Pinterest. However, not every social media platform can produce the intended results.
If you’re an online merchant, it serves best to invest in a user-friendly website and extend your outreach to Instagram and Facebook.
Why?
The Facebook marketplace is currently a perfect destination for selling and buying products. The story isn’t different with Instagram shop, too. Brands can directly sell to customers to boost sales. Being on Facebook and Instagram will drive organic traffic to your website and improve conversions.
For the case of SMEs, it’s best to prioritize Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. That’s if you are unable to create a website for your business. You ought to know that Facebook and Instagram provide selling features that can help you sell directly to your customers. Apart from selling, they provide marketplaces and Shop features that social media users commonly use to search for products.
The more social media platforms you use, the more time is required to run them effectively. Therefore, focusing on a few to optimize results is essential instead of being on all social media networks. This will also help you track marketing KPIs that directly reflect the performance and growth of your business.
We also recommend leveraging SocialPilot to manage all your social media accounts seamlessly. The social media management tool is perfect for powerful insights into your social platforms’ performance.
You can understand where your social media users come from and what they do while interacting with your brand and having real-time conversations. The tool caters to automation and will certainly save you time.
Interesting Read: How to Increase Your Social Media Engagement and Audience
4. Create an Impressive Social Media Profile
A business social media platform serves as the landing page for your target audience that can either make or break your brand.
Hence, you must focus on a few major elements to create a powerful social media profile. These include:
- Choose an appropriate profile picture: Select a clear, high-quality headshot or create a logo that accurately represents you or your brand.
- Write a compelling bio: Summarize who you are, what you do, and what you’re passionate about shortly and engagingly.
- Show your personality: Use the bio, header image, and other elements to showcase your personality and what sets you apart.
- Curate your feed: Share content that aligns with your interests and values and reflects the image you want to project.
- Engage with others: Interact by commenting, liking, and sharing their content, and encourage others to engage with you.
- Stay active: Regularly post new content and updates to keep your profile active and relevant.
- Stay professional: Keep your content and interactions professional to maintain a positive image, even if you use a personal profile.
When it comes to promoting its products, Adidas is known for using celebrities and influencers. For example, the brand recently made posts featuring Messi and the club’s celebrations after winning the trophy. This is undoubtedly a strategic marketing technique.
5. Create a Posting Strategy
As a marketer who wants to increase sales and online reviews, your content posting strategy can’t only revolve around resharing memes and motivational quotes. You will need to create a content posting strategy.
A content posting strategy will not only help you keep track of your social media activities, but it will also help you identify the areas that you need to focus on. You will need to define when and what to post and on which days. A content posting strategy will allow you to increase engagement.
On the other hand, don’t always be about promoting your products or services. A recent study indicates that 94% of Gen Z and Millennials prefer buying from brands with an excellent CSR program. Moreover, 73% would pay extra for sustainable products.
By only promoting your products and services, you may come across as desperate rather than building actual relationships with your content strategy. You should make space for content that motivates your audience or tackles social causes. You can also use a growth marketing playbook to help you further with your social media strategy.
6. Create the Right Content
As much as social media marketing provides a chance for businesses and brands to create any type of content, many online users are more attracted by content that offers value. Marketers can leverage several forms of content to ensure interactivity.
Try understanding the different content marketing practices while formulating your content marketing plan.
A social media content marketing plan will allow you to create interesting and digestible content. You should also try to understand the type of content suitable for the social media networks you use. Content marketing strategies like videos, Reels, Stories, and user-generated content are all content forms that can increase user engagement.
Use the right keywords and hashtags to increase your social media profile’s outreach.
A great example of this is that of Nike. It is among the most vocal brands when it comes to equality.
For example, in the image above, the brand pushed for the “black lives matter” hashtag to show solidarity and to stand against discrimination, racism, and racial inequality experienced by black people. With such decisions, Nike has remained in the top spot among the most preferred footwear brands among other accessories.
7. Get Social and Stay Consistent
A foolproof social media marketing plan requires diligence and a choice to prioritize your social media efforts.
Do not simply create and post content.
You need to analyze its influence on the target audience and how to make experiences better with every passing of time. Find content that works in the best interests of your social media visitors. You can leverage SEO tools and social media analytics for better insights. These will also help you during your decision-making process.
In the post above, Fenty Beauty pushes for its wide makeup collection, including options for those with skin issues like Vitiligo. The brand has proven to be an all-inclusive makeup line, enabling it to conquer the global market.
Interesting Read: Top 7 Social Media Management Tools for Agencies
Conclusion
In conclusion, building a social media marketing plan that achieves your business goals requires careful consideration of various elements. You can create a strategic, actionable plan tailored to your needs by following the seven ways outlined in this blog.
From defining your target audience and setting clear objectives to creating engaging content and staying consistent, these steps will help you build a social media presence that connects with your audience and drives real results.
Remember, social media is a dynamic and constantly evolving platform, so stay flexible and be willing to adjust your plan as needed to stay ahead of the curve.
Frequently Asked Questions
🌟 Does every brand require a social media marketing plan?
Certainly yes! Businesses widely use social media, and brands that fail to run a social media marketing plan find it difficult to stand against the competition. A social media marketing plan serves as a roadmap for running successful social media marketing campaigns. It generally summarizes what a business will do to attract customers and retain them using social media.
🌟 What tools to use when executing a social media marketing plan?
There is a range of tools when running social media marketing campaigns. Social media management tools like SocialPilot offer a variety of features built to scale and smoothen social media marketing efforts.
🌟 How to schedule social media posts?
Social media for business isn’t all about posting what you feel like. Businesses must be strategic, plan content, and publish posts that matter to the target audience. Therefore, to properly stay organized and schedule social media posts excellently, certain tools can help. SocialPilot can be used to schedule Instagram posts, whereas Facebook Business Manager is another magnificent tool for Facebook marketing.
🌟 How impactful is social media marketing?
Social media is an effective marketing platform since more than half of the world’s population uses it. Social platforms like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok greatly influence customer purchase decisions. They generally display trends that customers get attracted to. Also, these sites help customers find new products easily. Generally, modern customers believe that any credible brand must have a social media presence on at least two or more social media platforms.
