84% of C-level and VP- level decision makers are influenced by social media when purchasing a product or service. (Source – IDC)
What is Social Media Marketing in B2B?
Social media marketing in B2B is the utilization of different social media channels like LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, etc.., to engage with your potential prospects and customers to boost brand awareness, increase website traffic, build trust and increase sales. This involves creating and posting great content on your social media channels, listening to your audience and engaging with your followers, analyzing your results, and running social media campaigns.
How to create a Social Media Marketing Strategy?
Let’s us check out the different methods to create a successful Social Media Marketing Strategy below.
Identify your Target Audience
The most important part of creating a social media marketing is to identifying your target audience. There are various Social Media channels available in the market. You need to identify the right set of social media channels for your business by understanding where your target audience are active.
Content Calendar
Maintain a content calendar and start creating unique and engaging content to attract your potential prospects and customers. Identify the trends which is relevant to your business and create content according to the trends in the market. Check out your competitors page and understand what type of content they are creating and sharing, based on that you can try to create similar content.
Organize Posting
Organize a schedule to post on your social media channels. Research and find out when your target audience is active on the social media platforms, based on their time schedule your post accordingly.
Social media posting tools like Hootsuite and Sprout social allows you in scheduling your post in advance and it also offers the opportunity to track and monitor your post’s performance on various social media channels.
Post Constantly
Post constantly on your social media platforms to engage with your target audience. It allows you in growing your followers in longer term. If you are not posting constantly on your social media platforms you followers may forgot you and you would start losing your followers.
What are the most popular Social Media Platforms?
Some of the most popular Social Media platforms are listed below.
What are the Benefits of B2B Social Media Marketing?
Social media marketing offers several benefits, let us check out the key benefits of B2B Social Media Marketing below.
1.Boost Brand Awareness
Social Media Marketing is one of the best ways to boost your brand awareness across globe. Social Media allows you to directly engage with your audience by posting interesting content on your social media platforms and you can encourage your followers to like, share and comment on your posts on your social media channels to reach wider audience. It also allows you in driving traffic to your website by posting links on your posts.
2.Generate Leads and Increase Sales
Social Media Marketing provides you an opportunity to generate inbound leads, it can be done by organic and paid advertising. By sharing your products or service and promoting it on your social media platforms you can increase your website traffic, improve lead generation and increase your sales.
3.Improve Customer Loyalty
Social Media Marketing allows you to improve your customer loyalty by directly engaging with your customers. By connecting and engaging with your prospect and customers on social media platforms ensures the best service of your product or service and you will be able to build a strong relationship with your customers and your prospects.
4.Build a Community
Social Media Marketing allows you to build a community of followers who are interested in your product or service offerings across globe. These followers would become your customers eventually, they help you to reach wider audience, build trust on your brand and become the brand ambassador of your business.
5.Cost Effective
Social Media Marketing is the most cost-effective method of a marketing strategy to any business. Signing up and creating social media profiles for your business is totally free in all major social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and YouTube. If you have a good marketing budget allocated for social media marketing you can utilize their paid advertising service.
6.Increase Traffic to Website and Blogs
Social Media Marketing allows you to increase traffic to your website and blogs by sharing links on your post which can direct your potential prospects and customers to your website and blogs when your followers click on the links. Driving traffic to your website and blogs through social media platforms can be achieved by organic and paid advertising.
7.Thought Leadership
Social Media Marketing offers you the opportunity to establish your brand as a thought leader in your niche. Engaging your followers with insightful and well written content on your social media channels is a great way to position your company as an expert in your niche. Thought leadership is one of the best ways to develop trust with your potential prospects and customers.
8.Competitor Analysis
Social Media allows you to listen to your competitors, you can keep a track of your competitor companies product or service updates. If a customer of your competitor is facing a challenge with your competitor product you can directly engage with the customer via social media if you could solve the customer problem.
9.Collaborate with Social Media Influencers
Social Media offers you an opportunity to partner and collaborate with Social Media Influencers to promote your company’s brand to reach wider audience. Social Media influencers are the people who have huge network of followers on their social media channels who can direct their followers towards your brand. Word of mouth boosts 20 – 50 purchasing decisions according to a marketing survey.
10.Social Media acts as customer support
Customers expects brands to be available on different social media channels so they could reach out to them anytime related to customer service and support. Brands can also directly engage with the customers who seek for customer support by responding to their customers challenges.
11.Listen to your audience through Social Listening
Social Listening provides you an opportunity to listen to your prospects and customers social conversions around certain topics on different social media channels. You can learn about your audience pain points and you could try to solve their challenges.
12.Social Media Insights
Social Media Insights are data which allows you to understand the success of your posts on several social media channels. These insights are the data which help you track the engagement like the no of followers, likes, shares, comments on each social media platform.
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