Rise Up, Take Your Place and Make Your Mark!

Let’s face it; starting a business isn’t the hard part, if it was then very few would ever attempt it. Getting your business noticed amongst the vast sea of SMEs and maintaining a strong presence however – now that’s a different story. Whether we’re talking about miniature start-up businesses or huge global giants, online presence in all forms has become a must have asset for all companies. 

 

One sure fire way of attaining and managing this is with social media. In reality this isn’t anything more in depth than promoting your brand, values and products but without the right plan it is something that can become quickly ineffective. 

 

Here we will go through some tips that you may wish to consider when looking at your social media campaigning plan to guarantee that your business really makes its mark in the public eye. 

 

 

Careful selection of who is going to take the lead on your social media campaigns is key. As the old adage goes, the pen is mightier than the sword and as such it is important to ensure that the person holding the pen (or keyboard in this instance) is equipped with the relevant personal skills. 

 

If you don’t have a cunning linguist or social media expert in your employee banks then it is most definitely worth considering utilising the skills of a social media expert or outsourcing to a company in order to fulfil your business’s needs correctly. After all, if you’re going to do it then you want to be doing it well. 

 

 

Aristotle once said; “The fool tells me his reasons. The wise man persuades me with my own.” 

 

This couldn’t be more true then when it comes to social marketing. For any business, you’ll find it much easier to promote your services or products to people who are actively seeking them. Whilst it’s fair to say that you may convert some from further afield, you’ll definitely expend a lot more energy in trying to do so for smaller results. 

 

You really need to have a clear idea about who your target audience is as this can often be the biggest factor in success. Take some time to establish what platforms your audience use and devise your content to suit. 

 

 

There is an absolute abundance of media platforms out there, with new ones cropping up every day it seems. Some older platforms will fade into obscurity (here’s looking at you Myspace and Bebo) and others will seemingly skyrocket into the public eye overnight (cue TikTok and Instagram). 

 

Whilst it’s tempting to think that having a presence on every platform going is crucial, you run the risk of spreading yourself too thinly and the quality of your impact suffering as a result. As with our previous tip, work out which platforms are going to be important for you and really focus on honing the quality and effectiveness of the content that you create for them to get maximum results. 

 

 

You know that frustrated feeling you get when a timetable changes unexpectedly, or your favourite television show suddenly disappears from the scheduling one week? The same goes for social media. Your customers may not be interacting with every single thing you post but we can guarantee you that switching between posting 10 things one week to nothing for a fortnight is not going to help you. 

 

Think of some of the most popular brands out there, for example; McDonalds, Starbucks, Apple etc. The one thing they all have in common is consistency, their customers know exactly what to expect and know that they will reliably receive it. Create a schedule you can maintain and stick to it. 

 

 

Your time is valuable, often business owners are inherently more aware of this than many others, but so too is your customers’ time. If they are taking time out of their day to interact with content you post then this is something you should acknowledge and celebrate. Not only will it let your customers know that what they have to say does indeed matter to you, it will also give them confidence in their ability to get clear and trustworthy communication from you. 

 

By publically interacting with your customers you are also showing all of the silent viewers just how you operate as a business which, in a world where most interactions now take place briefly online, can make a huge difference in how someone portrays your brand. 

 

 

Making sure you stand out from the crowd is one of the most difficult things to achieve in business and, one of the biggest ways businesses fail in doing this, is by never changing up their content. It’s recently been reported that the average person is exposed to around 5,000 adverts per day and that is a LOT to contend with! So if you’re posting the same five things on rotation then you can imagine just how quickly that is going to become repetitive and eventually ignored by your customers. 

 

Keep up with the world and refer to current events or trends. If your customers can see that you’re on the ball then it confirms that you are relevant. Likewise, don’t be afraid to try something new! 

 

 

Staying relevant is difficult and social media platforms don’t sleep so it can be easy to overstretch your capabilities or feel crushed under the weight of having to be ever present. Nonetheless there is a wealth of social media/web presence management tools out there that can alleviate this entirely and you’d be misguided not to be using them. 

 

Not only will management tools make the day to day tasks seem like a breeze but they will also allow you to put full plans into place meaning you can make sure you are able to focus on consistency and quality to achieve a strong and attentive audience. 

 

The main thing to remember when starting out on your quest to make your mark in the business world is that it takes time. Creating an impactful image, strong brand and building a faithful following isn’t going to happen overnight and it’s important not to give up if your first forays into social media don’t instantly go viral. 

 

With careful planning, effective research and the right people, you will be well on your way to establishing a firm presence and leaving a lasting legacy for your business.