Issue #37 | 5.2.2014

5 keys to social media marketing success

Here are five easy steps to build a strong and profitable social media marketing plan.

1. Before you begin, clearly define your social media objectives and business goals. Be realistic here: there’s no way you’ll get a million fans and draw in thousands of paying clients overnight. Your set objectives will keep you on track to accomplish your long-term goals.

2. Identify your target audience. Create a profile of your target audience containing demographic information and all other relevant factors. These include location, profession, and interests.

3. Target the right social media networks. Targeting the wrong ones can be costly and waste time; focus on the networks that your target audience will have the strongest presence. As a starting point, concentrate on some of the major sites – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.

4. Create a social media calendar. Remember that the calendar is not just for content creation. It is also needed for you to define themes, identify marketing channels for the content and reach your target audience in a productive fashion. An editorial calendar will act as a guide to define what content to create, where to share certain types of content and how much time to devote to each social platform. For more on creating a calendar visit our blog post here.

5. Define your Unique Selling Proposition (USP). This sets your business apart from others in the industry. Make sure your USP is relevant to your target audience and in conformity with your social media objectives. Build a list of keywords, phrases and topics and design your social media strategy around them.