How do I use social media to grow my small business? How do I market my business on social media and what works best? Over the past 10 years, Social Media has become an integral part of every day life in our personal and professional lives. This creates a huge opportunity for B2C and B2B business owners to connect with prospects at a personal level. In order to shed some light on the subject, we’re going to talk about two different forms of social media.

Free Social Media, and Paid Social Media

First, Free Social Media: Almost everyone has a social media account, whether it’s Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, YouTube, Google+ or Pinterest. People love these platforms as a no cost way to stay connected with friends, colleagues, clubs and businesses they like. So how can you use this tool to help grow your business? The first step involves your content. It’s so important to consistently create engaging content that’s informative and exciting for your customers. Just think about all of the people you personally follow on social media for a second. I’m willing to bet you follow them because they make a positive impact on your life, posting exciting content you’re interested in on a regular basis. Whether it’s friends, family, influencers or other businesses, whoever you follow on social is there for a reason. So creating a solid content base using videos, blogs, pictures, events, testimonials, and any other types of media you wish is a great way to build a foundation. Once you’ve been posting your exciting and informative content consistently, you’ll generate more followers, website activity, even direct messages from people who want to work with you. These are all signs that you’re on the right track, but not everyone will come to you right away. Patience and persistence will make all the difference when trying to organically grow your social media fan-base. Nothing worthwhile ever comes without hard work, right? So if you’re ready to put the work in and consistently create content without spending any money, then free social media is the way to go.

Paid Social Media: Social networks have a massive, targetable, captive audience and offer ads to monetize this asset. Companies advertise on the social networks because it works and data shows even better performance from video ads. These are both forms of paid social media marketing. The advantage of paid social media marketing is its ability to target a specific audience with ads. Instead of hoping to reach a vast and relevant audience with free social media (which won’t happen) you now have the ability to invest in a paid social media marketing campaign to instantly reach your target audience. Obviously it’s important to know which social networks your audience is on. For example, if you’re a B2B, LinkedIn is the more appropriate network, whereas B2Cs will find better relevance on the personal social networks like Instagram and Facebook. Either way, social media is a great channel to reach prospective customers “in the moment” when they are on their phones or computers reading and interacting with their social media accounts. Social media will continue to play an ever increasing role in many people’s lives and is an excellent channel to test alongside your other digital marketing efforts.

If you are unsure about how to utilize free social media or paid social media for your business, or if you’re not sure you’re doing it right, give us a call at 203-682-4585 or book a meeting for a free social media evaluation. If you liked what you read, subscribe to our monthly newsletter for updates on breaking news and tactics in digital marketing. We hope you make 2019 your year for growth with social media. Happy New Year!