What is the Most Important Part of a Social Media Strategy?
To successfully build your business through social media, you need to develop a strategy. In my 10 years of providing social media management services, I have helped raise brand awareness, generate leads, increase revenue, and grow loyal followings for numerous businesses. The most important part of your social media strategy is also the most important metric of any business. Whether your business provides a service, sells a product, or manufactures goods; there needs to be one constant for your business to be a business. That constant is, you need a person, a business, or an organization to pay for your good/product/service. Those purchasers are called customers or clients and they are the most important component of your business's success. That is why the most crucial part of a social media strategy is to determine who is your target audience.
“A vision without a strategy remains an illusion.”
Lee Bolman
But who is my target audience or how do I figure that out?
This question is the most essential step of them all. You need to go deep into the weeds with this determination. First, ask yourself what problem does my product solve or what need does my product fill. Now ask yourself who is my perfect customer or who will benefit most from my service. Be honest with yourself and do not get lazy with your answer and say “Everyone is my customer!”
Defining who is your customer/target audience is truly the most vital step to grow your business. Take the time to sit down and write out the answers to these questions to help describe your perfect customer in detail:
What is their age?
What is their gender?
what is their relationship status?
Where are they located?
What are their hobbies?
What is their job title?
Are they members of organizations or groups?
What type of blogs do they read or do they listen to podcasts?
What Facebook pages/groups do they like or follow?
What stores do they frequent when they shop?
What languages do they speak?
What is their current stage of life? (i.e. college, retired)
Think about who your competitors are and research who they are targeting and who is engaging with them. Obtain as much understanding of who your client/customer is (demographic, behaviors, interest). These are just some of the questions you need to ask yourself to define your audience. By obtaining this knowledge, you will have a clear, concise picture of who you need to attract and convert into loyal paying customers. If you do not want to handle the marketing initiatives for your business, you can hire an ad or marketing agency to target these individuals. When you provide them with a clear understanding of your target audience they will be able to launch laser-focused ad campaigns to target these specific individuals and provide you with a higher ROI (return on investment) in your paid ad campaigns.
Even though defining your target audience is most significant for setting up your social media strategy, there are still a few more steps. In my ebook Facebook Marketing Mastery 2020, I provide the guidelines we use when setting up social media strategies for all our clients. We use this ebook to train business owners, realtors, mortgage brokers, and sales professionals on how to utilize and capitalize on organic Facebook Marketing. Check it out!
HOSPITALITY MARKETING is a family-owned, Full-Service Boutique Marketing Agency located in Fanwood, NJ. We work with small to medium-sized local businesses throughout the boroughs of New York and New Jersey providing them with a one-stop-shop for all their printing, social media, and digital marketing needs.