Businesses big and small are realizing the huge benefits of social media marketing and its increasing importance in the race to stay relevant and attract new customers. Long gone are the days when your secretary was the first point of contact between the outside world and your company – that role is being replaced by websites and social media profiles.
Social media can reduce your overall marketing costs
Social networks are a cost-effective way to get your brand in front of fans and prospective customers. It doesn’t cost you anything to tweet a message, pin a product photo to Pinterest, or promote a discount on Facebook, so there’s no cost outside of your own time spent.
Social media can impact your organic search results
When it comes to impacting your website’s position in search engines, you need to create optimized and compelling content if you want your domain to appear high up on the search results page.
You can offer better customer service with social media
If you’re looking for a way to field customer comments, concerns, and questions, then you are going to find social media to be extremely beneficial.
Customers using one of the common platforms like Facebook or Twitter can communicate directly with you, and you can quickly answer them in a public format that lets other customers see the quality of your customer service.
You can design your own online personality
Social media is meant to be more like a cocktail party than a business meeting. You will always do a lot better in a social situation if you are more like yourself and less like a corporate robot. Social media is a great way to display your business’ personality, as well as behind-the-scenes information about you, your employees, your workspace, and more. When you humanize your brand in this way, it makes it easier for consumers to connect with you and develop loyalty.
Social media lets you associate with other businesses
The fact that you are able to connect directly to the consumer means you can use this platform to also connect to other entrepreneurs and business owners.
Customers can validate your business on social media
The idea behind allowing customers to correspond directly with you is so that they can get the best customer service possible. When this occurs, it happens in a very public forum that can be seen by other prospects.
You can provide value with social media
The idea that you can provide a truly valuable service to your target market means you are positioning yourself as an expert in your industry. Whether that’s educational and entertaining blogs, posts, or tweets, if you are solving a problem or providing information, you’re adding value that customers will appreciate.
Social media lets you gain the competitive advantage
The true advantages of social media are the ability to get a leg-up on your competition by connecting with your current and prospective customers in an organic way across the web.
If used correctly, social media can help you boost your search rankings, provide better customer service, craft a compelling online personality, connect with new business partners, build connections, and earn word-of-mouth marketing from your brand advocates.