10 Ways You Can Improve Your Social Media Today

There are lots of ways you can make an impact through your social media but frequently as a small business owner, time or cash might be in short supply. So, we’ve put together a handy list of things you can do quite easily that won’t take a lot of time or break the bank in order to make your social media channels work more effectively for your business.

Review your channels – are they driving traffic to your site? Is it where your ideal client is? Are you generating any interest or simply posting because you’ve always done? If a social network isn’t working for your business, you don’t have to stick with it. However, if you are removing a channel always do a review first as it might simply be that you changed your content type and your audience doesn’t appreciate it so much, a look back over your analytics / insights might tell you more than you realise.

Look at the content you’re posting – video is where it’s at right now but what if you’re creating a lot of videos and not getting a response? Video can be a big commitment but just because you’ve been told you should do more doesn’t mean you need to jump straight in. You should try different types of content – photos, graphics, animations, video, text – see what works for you or not.

Audit your social media channels – you can ask a professional (like us!!) to do a comprehensive audit for you but there’s nothing to stop you looking in detail at all of your social media accounts. Ensure where you can include links to your other networks they are completed, look at your profile photos, make sure your images or video work for what you’re selling right now, not when you set the accounts up.

Explore new options – social audio is having a moment right now, podcasts are also extremely popular. You don’t have to get stuck into them for yourself if you’re not sure they’re right for you but how about finding your way to becoming a guest of another podcaster, find out if you like it? Then do the research, if your audience is likely to be there look at whether it’s viable for you to run with an option like this i.e. can you come with content ideas, if you’re going to interview people can you come up with guests?

Engage – being active on social media isn’t just about sharing your latest updates, get chatting on threads, in groups, with other accounts, learn how to engage on behalf of your business as you would on your own behalf in the appropriate places.

Plan your content – all too often social media is one of those jobs people get to when it’s not so busy, a little planning though and you can create content in one go for the week ahead, schedule it and you’ve just got to follow up on any feedback. Some businesses will do this on an ongoing basis, eventually it becomes a habit just like any other process in your business. You can get tools to help you plan whether it’s a planner diary, a downloadable planner or even just a simple excel spreadsheet, trick is to find something that works for you.

Ask for feedback – not your family or close friends, they’ll always think you’re amazing and might not like to offend. Find a business person who’s judgement you would trust and ask if they wouldn’t mind having a chat, see if they understand exactly what it is you’re selling. You can also use tools such as surveys that come as part of various platforms to ask questions where you might get more honest feedback if it’s not being shared directly with you.

Study the competition – in every business you should know what your competition is up to (within reason, no need to stalk them!!) and see what’s working or not for them. You should never ever replicate their style or content, imitation isn’t the sincerest form of flattery on networks where you should always have your own voice. However, you can learn a lot from spending a bit of time studying what’s happening in your marketplace both close to home and further afield, it’s often areas like the comments that tell you a lot more than you might expect and give you food for thought.

Think about your audience – in every business you should know how to define instantly who your ideal client is, can you do this? If you have defined your ideal customer how many types are there? How recently did you actually look at your customer, is it likely their habits have changed? In a time where attention spans definitely aren’t what they used to be there’s a whole lot of people on TikTok that weren’t there just a few short years ago, should you be there too?

Look at your business, your USP (unique selling proposition) – can a potential customer tell from your social media just what it is that makes you different to all the rest? In the online world particularly your competition might be worldwide, is it clear on your social media platforms why somebody should work with you and not a competitor?

Within each network there are specific tasks you can undertake, those are for other posts though as this is designed to give you some ideas for a quick, low-cost, update that can refresh how you’re performing on social media without a significant spend.

If you’d like to learn more about Social Media or Marketing for your business, get in touch with us at debbie@themarketingshop.ie and we’ll be happy to discuss options we offer such as Social Media Management or Training, Coaching, Content Creation and more.