While this might seem like a silly question to answer here in 2020, it’s still something I want to cover because I feel that the traditional definition of social media marketing is somewhat incomplete.
What is social media marketing?
The traditional definition is simply using social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to market your business, but really it is so much more than that.
To us, social media marketing is a marketing system that allows you to build and engage with your community, increase brand awareness, and ultimately get more customers. Simply put, it is the ultimate marketing tool that allows you to accomplish any goal that your business has.
We see social media marketing as so much more than throwing out posts every once in a while. We see it as a carefully balanced ecosystem that includes content creation, strategy development and a dose of paid advertising to give it all an extra boost!
Turns out, it’s not much of a silly question to ask what social media marketing is, is it?
Why is social media marketing so important?
Despite it being around for well over 10 years, many people still seem to think that social media marketing isn’t important to their overall marketing strategy. While it is true that social media marketing isn’t the “end-all-be-all”, it’s still a very important part of your overall strategy and without it, you could be leaving tons of new customers on the table. So why exactly is it so important?
1) It’s where people spend the majority of their free time
All marketing evolves around attention. Whether you are marketing on TV, Billboards, or bus stops, the whole point is to meet your customer where they are spending their time and attention. When it comes to the attention of people in today’s world, social media is by far the winner.
Recent statistics show that the average person spends 2 hours and 22 minutes per day on social media. That’s almost DOUBLE the amount of time people spend listening to the radio.
That’s a lot of scrolling!
This is a very important thing to understand because once you see how big of a deal social media is in the lives of so many people, the more you can start to understand its importance.
2) Allows you to develop relationships with current/potential customers
At the end of the day, social media is exactly that… Social.
Giving both customers and potential customers 1:1 interaction allows you to develop personal relationships with them and make them more likely to come back and purchase from you again.
The social aspect is also a huge advantage for your business because it allows people to recommend you, tell their friends about you, and drive even more business your way because of how much people trust the opinions of their friends and family.
In today’s world ….. Social media = word of mouth.
3) You can do a lot with your content!
Social media is really the swiss army knife of the marketing world, meaning, you can do so many different things with it.
Whether you want to post videos, photos, blogs, or anything in between, you can do it using social media. This allows you to get creative and try all kinds of new things. Unlike other marketing methods, you are going to get real-time feedback from your community. If they like it, you’ll see all kinds of interaction. If they don’t, they’ll give you crickets.
So if you are like me where most of the fun of marketing comes from trying different things and experimenting with new ideas, Social media is perfect for you!
4) Throw in paid advertising and you have a marketing machine!
Paid advertising on social media is to this day the best bang for your buck in marketing, hands down. Unlike TV and Radio where the costs have continued to climb to crazy levels, social media advertising (despite its own price increases) has stayed extremely affordable.
Not only is it one of the cheapest, it also gives you the most options to better help you reach your target market.
Platforms like TV and Radio are very limited because you don’t know exactly who is seeing your message and doesn’t allow those people to take immediate action.
Social media ads let you get extremely targeted based on people’s interests and previous actions and allows you to drive them to a website to get more information or make a purchase immediately.
It can take some time to master, but with a little bit of work, you can learn to take advantage of social media advertising and supercharge your strategy.
Here’s a short guide we wrote to help about Boosting a Facebook Post The Right Way.
For some reason, social media is still one of the most polarizing topics in the world of marketing. Despite 1000s of businesses finding tons of success using it, many people will tell you that it isn’t worth the time and effort.
We are here to tell you that social media marketing should 100% be a part of your strategy and that it can and will change your business if you put in the time and effort on a consistent basis!