7 Reasons Your Business Needs a
Strong Social Media Presence

Want to make a quantum leap in your business and beat the competition? Add social media into your digital marketing toolkit.

Social media has the power to boost sales and enhance your brand awareness. The mere act of interacting with customers on social media is enough to drive targeted traffic to your site, and studies show that customers spend 20-40% more on companies that engage with them on social media.

1. Increased Brand Awareness

Exposure is what helps to build brand awareness. Social media is one of the most effective digital marketing methods you can use to gain global exposure and make industry connections.

Use Twitter hashtags to find out what people are tweeting about your neighborhood or certain products. Learn what excites them most and the kind of services they love or hate and then use this information to tailor your products/services to their needs; and be sure to use social media to let them know you offer products or services that meet their needs. For example, someone planning to visit London from the US may search #LondonCafe or #LondonPubs to get a glimpse into their options during their trip. If they love your style, they’ll no doubt pay you a visit.

Social media platforms offer creative ways to connect with customers and seek out a new audience. Create social media accounts for your business and start interacting with others. Get your employees, friends, sponsors, and business partners to follow, like and share your posts. A single shared post will be introduced to a new audience who have the potential to become customers.

2. More Inbound Traffic

If you’re looking into driving more traffic to your site, social media is the best place to start.

A good number of your customers are already active on social media. A recent study found that 69% of American adults are on social media. What’s more interesting is that 81% of young adults aged 18-29 are on Facebook, and social media is part of their daily routine.

Alarming, right? That’s why social media is a bus you don’t want to miss if you’re serious about digital marketing. Having an inexpensive way to reach out to all those customers can really bring traffic to your site.

We all know how hard it can be to “impress” Google especially if your website is new. You update your blog with new content but only a handful of viewers get to see your content leave alone to subscribe.

But when you post it on social networks, you give the public an opportunity to view your products and click through to your website.

And since your posts will only appear in the timelines of those who follow you, you get targeted traffic. This means you attract only those who have the potential to become leads.

3. Cost Effective

Social media marketing is undeniably one of the most affordable advertisement strategies. Signing up and creating a profile for your business is free for almost all social networking platforms. And if you opt for the paid advertising option, you can always start with a small budget, then fine tune your strategy depending on the results. Some social media networks such as Facebook even allow you to choose a location-based target market, which can be local or international at no extra cost.

Social marketing is beneficial for your business because you get a higher return on investment (ROI) at a lower cost. You can then reserve the higher budget for other business expenses.

4. Increased Brand Authority

A successful social media marketing campaign can add authority to your brand.

Customer satisfaction and brand loyalty are paramount to the success of your business. However, communication is the key. When customers see you posting valuable content on social media and responding to their queries, they put more trust in your brand.

Consistent interaction with your customers helps to build a loyal customer base. Increased customer engagement signals to search engines that you are trustworthy and a useful resource in that particular niche. This translates to more brand authority.

Once you’ve satisfied your customers through quality services, content, and continuous interaction via social networks, they become your brand ambassadors. They will share your content on various social platforms and you benefit by getting more traffic. With time, you’ll have amassed enough brand authority to position yourself as an industry leader.

5. Understand Your Audience Better

Knowing your customers is one of the key fundamental principles that govern the success of any business.

At this point, it’s worth noting that no marketing strategy can help you to understand your customers better than social media.

Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram analytics can help you to understand the demographics and patterns of your customers’ behavior.

Better even, social media can help you to know where your customers prefer to hang out when they are not working.

Also, by just reading their status updates and tweets, you’ll learn more about their personal lives, buying patterns, and more. This can give you answers to questions such as:

Such insights have tremendous marketing benefits. For instance, by understanding what kind of content they love to share, you can tailor your content to meet their standards.

For example, if they love to share YouTube videos, you can create a business YouTube channel where you’ll be posting all your videos and tutorials. Sharing those videos on social media will get you more post shares, which translates to more traffic.

6. Improved Customer Service

The good thing about social media is that it gives you instant access to feedback from your customers.

Through this feedback, you get to know the areas in your business that need improvement and work on that to serve your customers better.

A recent study found that customers are willing to pay as much as $20 more on future tickets for airlines that respond to their tweets within six minutes. This underscores the fact that social media is the key to customer service.

It’s also easier to interact with customers on a personal level on social media than on phone. For this reason, many customers prefer to post their queries on social networks.

Customers love the fact that when they post comments on your page, they receive a modified reply rather than an automated response. A strong social media presence can help to keep your customers happy and satisfy their needs.

Do you know what customers are saying about your brand? If not, you may not be able to keep up with the ever competitive business world leave alone serve them better.

Keep in mind that social media can make or break your business.

Failure to address customer’s complaints can hurt your online reputation and taint your public image. That’s why it’s very important to listen to what your customers are saying about your brand and act accordingly.

Fortunately, there are many social media marketing tools, such as Social Mention, that you can use to monitor what customers are saying about you.

7. Improve Brand Loyalty

Want to improve your brand loyalty? You might want to delve deeper into the social media marketing world.

When you have a strong social media presence, you make it super easy for your clients to connect and interact with you. Consistent interaction with your customers on social is what builds brand loyalty.

This continuous interaction builds a strong positive energy that keeps your customers buying your products repeatedly rather than going to the competing brands.

A recent study found that companies with strong social media presence have more loyal customers. The reason for this is simple.

When you’re engaging with your customers on social media, you are not soliciting for any assistance or rapport. Instead, you are taking your time to provide them with valuable information and to keep them entertained without asking for anything in return.

This shows your customers that you treasure them and not just because they’re a source of revenue. Once customers note your devotion and how much you care about them, they will stick to your brand.

Such loyal customers are willing to forgive minor mistakes because of the trust and the value they put into your brand.

Final Thoughts on the Importance of Social Media Marketing

Everything said, there are virtually no reasons to not implement social media into your marketing strategy.

Never underestimate the importance of social media marketing if you want to remain on top of the competition. Keep in mind that all your competitors are on social and are working overtime to win your customers.

And since social media is the most affordable marketing strategy available, you’ve got nothing to lose. The impact is huge, and when used to your advantage, will open doors of success for your business.