Social Media Marketing (SMM) is an often misunderstood form of digital marketing, especially for businesses. Rather than seeing Social Media Marketing purely as a platform for vanity measures such as likes and shares, it can help businesses of all sizes to spread awareness, build interest, convert leads and generate sales.

Social Media Marketing– What is it, and how does it work?

Even calling sites like Facebook and Instagram “Social Media Networks” is to disregard the true purpose of these platforms. They are intensive data driven marketing tools, where users actively share their personal interests, hobbies, likes and dislikes. This data is then made available to digital marketers. This data is used to “personalise” the user’s data feed with adverts that will interest them, that they are more likely to interact with.

How many times have you discussed something, and then seen adverts about that exact product? These sites know extensive and copious amounts about their users. They know what posts the users interact with, which they ignore, how they interact with them, and who they share them with. They can even monitor your activity across the web as a whole, not just on their respective applications.

This knowledge can be used to the advantage of your business.

What are the main benefits of Social Media Marketing?

Rather than waiting for customers to find you, social media marketing allows businesses to be proactive in identifying and targeting potential customers. You can then re-target interested prospective customers and accompany them along their digital journey to paying customer. Social Media paid campaigns offer large swathes of analysable data, giving you an insight into the online activities of your customers and prospects.

How can my business use Paid Social Media Marketing?

To build Brand/ Product Awareness — The most common use for social media marketing, however this is due to the ease of doing so rather than as a result of the effectiveness. Businesses are able to target users they believe would be interested in their product/ service/ business, and place the business adverts into the user’s news feed. The intention is to interest the viewer.

Converting interest into Consideration — The middle stage of the conventional sales funnel. You can retarget users who have displayed an initial interest in your product/ service/ business, and tempt them with follow up adverts, such as product reviews, testimonials and demonstrations.

Turning Consideration into Sales– When the potential customer is ready to make a purchase, SMM can ensure they come directly to you, rather than the competition. Retarget users who are reaching the buying stage with adverts with strong call to action’s such as Add to Cart, Get Quote or Get Directions.

What are the key features of Paid Social Media Marketing?

Targeting and Retargeting– The Social Media platforms collect valuable personal information about their users, which in turn they use to tailor adverts specifically to the user’s interests and hobbies. If a user changes their relationship status to ‘engaged’, advertisers can then deliver wedding related adverts directly into their news feeds. Your business can ensure that your adverts are seen by users with an interest in what you have to offer.

Creative — On a platform dominated by memes, if your advert is boring and bland, it will be ignored. You need a way of ‘stopping the scroll’. One of the significant plus points of SMM is that you can tailor the advert to each user, so that it is in the form most likely to be interacted with. Some users like to watch an advert, some will listen, whilst others will read. You can tailor to all of them at once.

Call to Action — If the user enjoys and is interested in your advert, you need to ensure you capture that interest there and then. The correct call to action (shop now, get quote, learn more etc) will ensure that hot leads are dealt with immediately.

What potential pitfalls should I be aware of?

Sometimes, Social Media Marketing is not the solution for a product/ service digital marketing focus. If the product is a mundane niche, it can be difficult to target potential customers, and instead your focus should be on making sure your customers can find you, via routes such as SEO.

Overall, Social Media Marketing can be a powerful tool for small businesses to build their online presence and drive valuable actions such as e-commerce sales and lead generation, when done properly.