While some businesses may consider their social media as a space to connect with their audience and showcase their brand, social networks should also be leveraged to shape and nurture your customer journey to improve lead generation and acquire new customers. With 54% of B2B buyers using social media to research products and make purchasing decisions, implementing a marketing strategy tailored to meet the needs of your customers along their journey from education to advocacy has never been more crucial.
From choosing the right platforms to paid ads, let’s take a look how your business can boost online sales through effective social media marketing:
Choose the Right Platform For Your Customer-Base
Like any other facet of your business, social media marketing requires strategy in order to be successful, and this is true even when it comes to where your business should have a presence online. While you may be tempted to create a profile on every social media platform available to you, it’s crucial to strategically invest both your time and efforts into platforms where you know your customer-base is active.
If your business is currently cross-posting on all social platforms, you’ll want to take an audit of the engagement levels on each, as well as delve into who those audiences are. If your business is in the midst of building its online presence, you’ll want to conduct a thorough analysis of your target demographic to help decide which platforms will yield the best results. Facebook is universally used by the largest population, but has lost favour with Generation Z. If you’re skewing towards a younger adult audience, you would be best to focus your efforts on Instagram and TikTok. That said, it’s important to consider the type of product or service you offer as well when choosing the right platform. If you offer a business-related offering, such as computer software, you may want to consider having a presence on LinkedIn. Whereas if you are a lifestyle brand, your products may be best showcased on Instagram and Pinterest. Ultimately, by using the social media platform where your audience is most likely in the mindset to buy, you’ll increase your prospect of driving sales.
Create Content Strategically
Similar to choosing the right platforms, it’s important to choose quality over quantity when it comes to content creation. Always keep your audience top of mind when developing content to ensure you’re fostering engagement, answering questions, and adding value so your audience flows seamlessly through your customer journey.
Consider posting interactive content to entice and educate, share product reviews, and use brand specific hashtags consistently. If you’re unsure of the content that attracts your consumer base, it’s always helpful to lean on social media analytics to review what has performed well, in addition to using social listening to discover topics that resonate with your audience.
Utilize In-App Purchasing Options
Many social channels now offer in-app purchasing options that encapsulate the entire customer journey by allowing consumers to discover your business and then purchase from you all in a single channel. With a streamlined checkout process, your target audience is more likely to make purchases in the moment. While the method of how in-app purchasing is featured on platforms varies, it’s often as simple as uploading your product catalog to the platform so that you can include product links within your content.
Facebook and Instagram offer two methods for in-app purchasing, the first being through a native integration on your grid posts that allows users tag products and shop them instantly from the platform. The second method is through shoppable tags on your stories. With either option, when an individual clicks on the tagged item, they can view the product name, description, and price, as well as be redirected to the corresponding webpage to purchase. Pinterest also offers buyable pins that allow individuals to purchase products within the platform creating a simple shopping experience for your target audience. With its “Add to Bag” feature, this is an effective way to increase conversions instantly. For the platforms that do not offer in-app purchasing options, it’s key to let the shopper know where and how to purchase the items highlighted in a post and the simplest way to do that is by sharing a URL in the caption.
Prioritize Generating Leads
Having a large audience on social media is fantastic, but it’s important that those individuals are being converted into leads in order to boost sales. You can best achieve this by optimizing your profile information and using effective calls to action. Your profile should clearly state who you are, what you do, and how to access your products or services. Ensure your profile includes your website, business telephone number, and brick and mortar location. To help further convert those leads, you can include a call to action within your profile. An example of this could be including a passage that reads “Receive early access to our new product line by signing up for our newsletter” on your profile. This will help entice your audience to interact with your business and generate leads. You will want to prioritize having calls to action in all the captions of your posts as well.
Engage with Your Audience
In order to turn followers into customers, individuals need to be talking and sharing their experiences with your business. The best way to foster that sort of engagement is by interacting with your audience first. Try liking and replying to comments on your posts to help create a bond and foster a sense of community within your consumer base. Sharing user-generated content is also a great way to show authenticity and is more relatable. It is said that customers are 97% more likely to purchase from content that is user-generated. This could be resharing tagged photos and posts or having customers create content for you through contests and giveaways.
Implement Paid Ads
While the aforementioned tips will help you to boost your sales, if you’re looking for a drastic influx in customers, implementing paid ads may be the best course of action for you. Paid ads on social media can help you to reach a larger target audience quickly (and more eyes = more engagement = more sales). Every social media channel has advertising abilities that allow you to specifically target the demographic you’re looking for. They also allow you to set goals for your ads to ensure you’re yielding campaign specific goals including increasing website traffic, broadening your reach, enhancing your engagement levels, or building brand awareness.
By taking advantage of these tips, you can expect to see your business grow. However, trends and algorithms on social media are ever changing and it can be challenging to keep track. Working with LRO Solutions as your marketing partner ensures you stay ahead of your competition and move your marketing in the right direction. To learn more, contact us today.
