Make the Most of Your Social Media Marketing

Social media has completely changed marketing. Whether you are a small business or an international corporation, you are probably just now really learning the pros and cons of social media marketing (SMM).

Most small businesses now acknowledge that reaching out online is not only a prime way to increase exposure and brand awareness. but also an opportunity to make that marketing budget stretch just a little further.

What fewer companies have realized is the opportunity to bridge the gap to established, proven tools to make the most of both of traditional and new media marketing campaigns.

Make the Most of Marketing on Social Media

Online marketing still requires a marketing specialist - who, in turn, often now needs to have some level of web-based background - to squeeze the most out of a limited budget.

Even though the cost of printing has diminished in recent years, the level of understanding required to properly exploit online opportunities means paying a little more for the people who fuse the two together. Thankfully, there are various tools that you can also use to help whoever is in charge of your marketing out.

A versatile, consistent marketing hook is the key to bridging the gap between these two worlds of traditional and new media, which have very different requirement but the same end-goal: to increase awareness of your business and drive more sales leads. 

These hooks usually form the first point of interaction for potential customers with your brand, making a memorable vanity number and website address the first ports of call to connect your online presence to your offline marketing spend. A toll free or local vanity number that's easy to recall can be used across any advertising, whether audio, visual, or anything online. Similarly, a short sharp website name gives people am easy place to go when they want to do some more research on who you are and what you can do for them.

The biggest benefit of social media marketing is to support these two hubs of your marketing communications. Engaging customers in an environment they already trust, convincing them that you deserve their attention, then drawing them over to your main marketing channels, should remain at the core of your activities. SMM also allows you to target advertising and branding initiatives towards a certain group of people, for example young people with specific entertainment interests on Facebook, or legal professionals exchanging industry advice on Linkedin.

Social media helps the high end of your sales funnel, identifying leads and sparking interest, but it's assets like your website and the contact number that brings callers to your sales team that truly close the business. All need to be in sync and supporting one another to make the most of money your business invests in social media marketing.

This, once again, is why it's crucial to remember that online marketing is not only limited to Twitter and Facebook.

Dozens of other options and platform opportunities exist for your business, from newer social networks like Pinterest to Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising, product blogging and many other avenues that your social media efforts will support.  We've look at how effectively use the likes of Twitter and Pinterest before, and will continue to add articles that show you how to make the most of social media marketing on a specific platform.

So let's close by focusing on the beginning...

First and foremost, it's crucial that any of the SMM options you choose to boost business are backed up by those memorable marketing hooks, like a custom, relevant website and an easily recalled vanity phone number. Get these in place and you have the foundation to make much more of all of your other marketing outposts.