Reading time: Just 4 minutes!
We all know that social media marketing is now an integral part of any company’s marketing strategy, rather than simply an optional extra. Social media is fundamental to building a brand’s awareness, content distribution and lead generation and there is no reason why startups can’t take full advantage of this reality, even with smaller budgets.
Last year it was revealed that 40% of people spent more time socializing on social media than face to face. And while this is likely to build a generation of the socially inept... it’s great news for your startup social media strategy!
Of course, its not always is easy to get it right so Marketing Envy compiled a list of our top 3 social media tips for startups and have even found some great examples to help you along your way!
Social Media Tips
Tip Number 1: Create a Strategy
Nothing is going to work unless you have a plan! You’ve already figured out your target audience; whether they are a consumer or business,their age, gender, where they work/live and so on. Now it’s time to think about what interests them. As with everything in business, a carefully planned strategy increases your chances of success.
Think about your target audience and ask yourself;
- Which social media channels are they using? (And therefore, what will you use). The big 3 are Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin, but your company and audience may prefer GooglePlus, Instagram or Pinterest
- How often are they using them? Millions of times a day? Once? In the morning? In the evening?
- What information do they enjoy? Do they respond better to articles and detailed text or do they prefer pictures and infographics?
You also need to strategize the message you want to send through your social media channels. Will you be focusing on your company, your clients or industry news? Perhaps it will be a combination of all three? As always, don’t be afraid to test different posts or tweets at different times to see what received the most comments, likes or retweets and then adapt your strategy from there.
Hot Tip: If you aren’t sure where to start when trying to build your strategy, Hootsuite has a few great templates that might help get you started.
Tip Number 2: Repurpose your content
This basically involves reusing your content and bringing it back to the front and center of your social media channels. As a startup, your aim is to take the content you already have, and distribute it to as many people as possible.
Not having time to create new content or write a new blog post does not mean that you can’t keep your social media channels busy. Take your content and give it a makeover! Tweet out key sentences from the blog post you wrote in January and link to it. Turn March’s blog post into an infographic for Facebook. A representative from your startup spoke at an event in May? Great! Film it and put snippets of it on your LinkedIn page in July. It is important to remember that repurposing only works when you create ‘evergreen’ content that continues to be valuable and relevant.
Read our full content repurposing guide to learn more.
Tip Number 3: Perseverance
Don’t stop trying! You didn’t come this far as a startup by giving up! Metrics and KPIs are important, but social media conversion rates are hard to measure. You may have spent hours writing a great blog post only to find that your ‘likes’, ‘retweets’ and ‘tags’ measured in the hundreds not the thousands! Social media marketing is not an overnight miracle and this is why it needs patience. Remember that when you promote your startup on social media, you are working to create and promote your ‘story’ and ‘image’. As long as the information continues to be relevant and interesting, we have no doubt that your hard work will be worth it in the long run.
Hot Tip: It’s totally normal to feel a little overwhelmed if you are managing all your startup’s social media platforms. Marketing Envy uses social media management tools to help make our life a little easier. Try Hootsuite, Oktopost or Buffer and see which one works for you. There are quite a few options out there and YouTube offers really clear demonstrations.
Cracking Cases….. 3 Companies Who We Think Have Cracked Social Media
We aren’t about to give you all this great information about social media without giving you some examples of companies we think have cracked the social media code!
Here’s a list of a few companies we think every startup can learn from
General Electric (GE): The LinkedIn Leader – GE may not be a particularly exciting company, but they sure do know how to make their social media pages work! GE is a great example of how social media allows you to take any brand or product and humanize it for the masses. GE have tried to make photography their ‘thing’ and regularly post artistic pictures of their machinery and colleagues at work around the world. Accompanied by engaging questions and updates, it’s little wonder how GE has nearly one million Linkedin followers and 186,000 followers on Instagram. Don’t assume that just because your startup isn’t a ‘fun’ and ‘exciting’ product that you can’t attract users through social media – you just have to have the right strategy!
Memrise: The Facebook Fanbase – Memrise app is a learning platform that teaches users new information through games. Their Facebook page has 178K followers and is packed full of funny quotes, pictures and memes. Memrise’s strength is their eagerness to encourage audience participation through their page. Don’t be afraid to pose questions on Facebook, this encourages followers to ‘share’ ‘like’ and ‘comment’ and puts your page on as many News feeds as possible!
EatWith – The Twitter Triumph - Established in 2012, EatWith has blazed through the startup scene to become a global sensation. Created in Israel, EatWith allows you to entertain strangers and enjoy gourmet meals in the kitchens of people you have never met. EatWith have cracked the Twitter code - they tweet great content, often! Their Twitter feed which is filled with industry news including restaurant openings, recipe ideas, food trends and salivating pictures. With at least three tweets a day, we predict that EatWith social networks will just keep on growing!
Remember, strategize, repurpose and persevere and you are sure to have social media content other startups will envy…
