Over the course of the last 5-10 years, social media marketing platforms have grown exponentially. If you use social media regularly then you must come across hundreds of brands every day. Chances are that you may even follow any one of these brands. If you are just a user, then you may not know the advantages of social marketing. As a business, using social media for marketing can help them grow its business, but if you think that just building a page on the best social media platforms for marketing is enough then you are wrong. Using social media for marketing can help you build a huge audience. You need to learn about the types of social media marketing and the advantages of social marketing.
Let’s give a number to how huge social media has become, according to several studies almost 45% of the global population uses social media for 3 hours a day. This population roughly adds up to 3.5 billion people. Whether you want to build your personal brand or create awareness for your business, the social media platform is the ideal spot.
In this blog, we will be sharing the best social media platforms for marketing, types of social media marketing, and what is social media marketing.
What Is Social Media Marketing?
All the steps you take to promote your business using images, videos, or written content on several media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter are known as social media marketing. Unfortunately, social media marketing isn’t the same for each platform and each business. Best social media marketing platforms can help you in directing traffic, growing conversion rates, and increasing brand awareness. Social media marketing doesn’t work like putting up a billboard or passing fliers on the road. A social media marketing plan can help you target people that are interested in your brand’s products and services.
As we mentioned, one social media marketing plan cannot work on all the best social media platforms for marketing. Social media has helped thousands of small and medium scale businesses to grow into huge brands. All you have to do is build an ideal social media marketing plan for all social networking platforms. To do that, you need to learn all about social media marketing platforms.
1. Facebook
Facebook is the biggest social media platform right now. It is also the most used social media platform by both marketers and consumers. If you wish to build yourself into a brand, you need to have a presence on Facebook. Facebook offers some of the best social media marketing tools to help brands grow themselves. You need to build a solid Facebook marketing plan for growth. Here are crucial statistics about Facebook that may help you understand the need for the platform:
- 89% of marketers use Facebook for business and for marketing their brands.
- 83% of users visit the platform every single day.
- 66% of users follow at least one brand on the platform.
- Facebook had 2.6 million new active users by the first quarter of 2020.
2. Instagram
Instagram is now owned by Facebook, and it has changed a lot since its launch. Primarily, it was a social networking platform based on sharing photos. Instagram is the most dynamic of all social media platforms with new features rolling out every few months. Instagram was the first-ever platform to introduce the “story” feature which now can be found in almost all social media platforms.
Instagram also launched another feature by the name of IGTV, where users and brands can post longer videos to promote their products and services. Instagram has a young user base with almost half of its users being 34 years and younger. You need one of the best Instagram marketing plan to put your brands above millions of brands. Here are some Instagram statistics for you to understand the platform better:
- According to Instagram’s reports, 90% of the user base follows one or more than one brand.
- 89% of marketers say that Instagram is the best platform for influencer-based marketing.
- 500 million and more users visit Instagram stories every day.
Instagram marketing plan has to be different than other platforms as standard marketing techniques don’t work on Instagram. It still offers a great space to engage and communicate with your audience and other brands.
3. Twitter
Content marketing and blogging completely changed with the rise of the microblogging site, Twitter. It is one of the top social media platforms that mostly revolve around the latest trends all around the globe. Twitter is one of the best social media platforms for marketing if you are a brand looking to be discovered. Users can read and post tweets as well as follow other users via update feed, and re-tweet the posts that resonate with them. Live-tweeting takes over during sporting events or very famous television airings. As a business, you need to derive a great Twitter marketing plan so you can be discovered easily. Here is some data for Twitter that makes it great for promoting a business:
- Users are 26% more likely to view ads on Twitter than any other platform.
- Twitter becomes one of the top platforms for business discovery because 79% of users like to discover what’s new.
Twitter marketing is one of the best types of social media marketing as a business can engage and communicate about their products and services.
4. LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a different type of social media platform, and you need to develop a great social media marketing strategy for LinkedIn. It is a professional networking site where you can’t sell your product, it is a great place for employee marketing, brand awareness, and for increasing B2B lead generation.
LinkedIn is ranked as one of the highest social media platforms in terms of daily users and lead generation. Using social media for marketing can easily help you grow your brand, here are some stats of LinkedIn that makes it a suitable option:
- LinkedIn is 277% more effective than Facebook in terms of lead generation.
- 95% of content marketers use LinkedIn to promote B2B services.
- 90 million users of LinkedIn are involved in influencer marketing.
LinkedIn is a great platform to use your B2B services, engage with similar brands, acquire great human resources for business, and build an incredible online presence.
What Are Advantages of Social Marketing?
- Increase Brand Awareness
One of the main purposes of social media marketing is to increase brand awareness. You’ve set up your business, a high-powered website and a sturdy sales funnel but now you need to invite people to that sales funnel. Social media is a great tool to gain a new audience. You can also include links to your pages, your website, and your product to let people find you.
- Generate More Leads & Boost Conversion Rate
Let’s say that you successfully went through the first process and now a lot of people follow your social media accounts. Now is the time to advertise your product and services to these people which will compel them to buy your products and services. All this will lead to a higher rate of conversions, you can provide your audience with offers, discounts, bonuses, and a lot more to boost conversion rates.
- Brand Relationship with Customers
Social network marketing has turned into a great method to interact with customers. Marketing has evolved from just showing the audience your products and services, you also have to connect with your customers. Using social media for marketing helps in engaging with your audience, telling them about your USP, and building a healthy relationship with customers.
- Learn from Your Competitors
As a business, you can learn all there is to learn about your competitors, their strategy, and the products they offer. Following your competitor’s social media marketing strategy can benefit you as you can avoid making the mistakes that they made.
Types of Social Media Marketing
Now that you know about the advantage of social media marketing, you need to know about the types of social media marketing. For each social media platform, your strategy needs to be unique and different, here are the most common marketing types.
- Social Network Marketing
It’s called a social media “network” for a reason. In social media, the network works like suggestion based marketing. If you create content that is relatable to one person, they are most likely to share it with people who will relate to your content too. People can post whatever they want, respond to content type they like and since it’s all public, your content gets viewed by all those who wish to engage with your brand. As a business, you can respond to customer’s concerns which shows that you care about their concerns and their needs.
- Images and Infographics
People are always running, and so is their social media. You only have your audience’s attention for a few seconds and you need to show them something impactful. Most users don’t have the time to engage with lengthy posts, so you need to use catchy images and Infographics. A single picture is better than thousand words and you must use these platforms to engage with your customers in an impactful way.
- Video Marketing
YouTube is one of the biggest video platforms out there. It’s important that your brand has a presence on the biggest video platform. You can make all kinds of videos and including video tutorials, tell your brand story, show insights into your work, and more. If you don’t have the resources to make long videos, then use Instagram stories, reels, and IGTV videos. Short videos can be really captivating as you have to deliver your message in 15 seconds.
- Blogging
Blogging is one of the earliest forms of social media marketing platforms. There are social blogging sites such as Medium and Tumblr that are changing the landscape of the blogging industry. All you need to do is to keep putting out great, informative content that keeps bringing the audience back to you. Blogging is one of the most preferred ways of social media marketing.
- Community Sites
Reddit and Quora are a few of the best social media marketing platforms and they offer features other websites don’t do. These sites help in building communities of people for indulging in their interesting niche. This is a great place to be if you’re looking to gather a fresh audience, you can target one community related to your niche and serve your target audience in a single go.