The Value of Social Media Marketing for Small Businesses
The landscape of social media marketing is projected to continue growing over the next few years. In this increasingly interconnected world, people spend more time on their phones, with much of that time getting dedicated social media apps.
This trend will only continue, and small businesses need to start using social media marketing to thrive.
It can seem like social media marketing is the “in” trend for marketing, but it’s not a fad — it’s here to stick around. The reason is that a majority of your target audience is on social media and engaging with brands like yours daily.
It’s a huge opportunity that you don’t want to miss.
Why Invest in Social Media Marketing for Small Businesses?
Entering the social media sphere can seem daunting and unimportant to small businesses that don’t see immediate results or quick conversions.
It can seem more effective for your marketing strategies to focus on eCommerce and in-store purchases that see conversions rather than from social media marketing which can seem a little ambiguous.
But with more than 70% of marketers reporting an increase in sales from their social media marketing efforts, avoiding this marketing medium should no longer be an option for smaller businesses.
To help alleviate some concerns about implementing social media marketing, here are some stats about the importance of social media and why it’s worth having an online social presence as a small business:
- Almost 50% of the world’s population uses social media
- A whopping two-thirds of all U.S adults have a Facebook account
- 54% of customers use social media to research products online
- 74% of consumers use social media to make buying decisions
Now that you’ve seen some critical statistics about the growth of social media and the impact it can have on buying decisions, let’s explore the value that social media marketing can bring to your small business.
5 Benefits of Social Media Marketing for Small Businesses
Five important benefits of social media marketing for small businesses include:
1. Increase Brand Awareness
Increasing your brand’s visibility is extremely valuable, and creating brand awareness is a key step in promoting your products and services.
Social media has proved to be a valuable tool in growing brand awareness. With an active social media presence, you can reach more customers, both current and new. And according to one study, 53% of people who follow brands on social media are more loyal to those brands.
Social is about more than sales — it’s about how people view you. When your small business uses social media to build brand awareness, you’re using these networks to create positive associations that can lead to sales later.
2. Increase Web Traffic
Social media is a great way to get inbound traffic to your website.
Each post or piece of content you share is a path back to your website. The more quality content you share and the more relevant it is to users, the more inbound traffic you will generate — which means more sales.
The more effort you put into your social media marketing, the higher the reward.
Whether it’s connecting with your audience by providing blog content or advertising a new product or service, sharing content on social media channels can assist you in driving more traffic to your site and achieving higher conversion rates.
3. Improve Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
While social media doesn’t directly contribute to SEO, it does positively affect a page’s ranking.
Social media helps build your business’s authority on search engines, which makes it an important factor to focus on. The more your authority and brand recognition grow, the higher your site’s reputation will grow over time.
This means that as people search for your business or a keyword related to your product, your social media account will more likely show up in search result pages, which increases the number of ways people can find you.
4. Gain Valuable Customer Insights and Satisfy your Customer
By using social media, you have a wealth of insights into how customers feel about your brand, what they want, the problems they face, and how you can help them.
With social listening, you can gather relevant customer insights and use it to help make smart business decisions or improve your marketing strategy.
Social media is also a great way to satisfy your customers when issues arise.
Have a customer who had a problem with your product? You now have a fast way of reaching them to help alleviate their issue, while also showing others your top-notch customer service.
This is also another great way to communicate with your customers and build relationships that can develop into brand loyalty. The more engaged you are with your customers, the more engaged they’ll be with your brand.
5. Gain Insight into What Your Competitors are Doing
For your business to be successful, you need to know what your competitors are doing. By monitoring what your competitors are doing on social media, you can see both their strengths and opportunity gaps for you to capitalize on.
What kind of content are they sharing? Is it mostly blogs, or do they share videos, infographics, or images? What makes them unique? Do they engage well with their audience? Can you do better? What types of content do you have that they don’t utilize?
By gaining a social presence, you can find a wealth of opportunities that your competitors have yet to use.
Get Started with Social Media Marketing for Small Businesses Today
Your potential customers can’t find you if they can’t see you.
Having a social presence in a digital world is invaluable to growing your business and reaching new customers. With social media growing every day and more companies jumping on the social media bandwagon, there’s no time to waste.
Your business needs it. And the only way to see the value that social media marketing brings to your business is to apply it.
If you want the best social media results but aren’t sure where to start, check out our social media services or contact us directly to learn more about how you can leverage social media marketing for your business.
