When it comes to social media marketing, there is no one-size fits all approach.
How to best use social media for your business will depend on your industry, target audience, resources and overall business goals.
There are dozens of brands that are using social media effectively; they are growing their audience, providing value and growing their community through high-quality content and engagement.
There are also dozens of brands that are failing to harness the power of social media marketing; they aren’t engaging or repurposing user-generated content, they lack strategy and aren’t clear on how to best use each social media platform to it’s full potential.
This blog post will function as Part 1 of a 4-part blog series intended to help you crush it across the four biggest social platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest.
Through looking at positive use-cases and brand success stories, you’ll have valuable insights on how to apply platform-specific best practices to increase the reach, exposure and engagement of your social media content.
When it comes to marketing on Facebook, you have to be super strategic about what you post, when you post it and how you engage with your audience.
Similarly, since Facebook is a pay-to-play platform, you need to ensure you have a budget to spend on paid ads and boosted posts throughout the year.
I’m going to detail three brands that I think are crushing it on Facebook, and provide tips and tactics that you can implement to see similar success for your brand.
lululemon Athletica
Lulu does a great job at creating content on a consistent basis, posting about 5-6 updates per week.
They share a variety of content; they post photos, status updates, links and videos to create a diverse and engaging stream of updates.
When it comes to the links shared, they do a great job and sharing promotional links (links to their product pages and special offers,) while peppering in valuable, informative content about fitness, health and wellness.
This “fluffier” content, which isn’t brand-centric, provides value to lululemon’s Facebook audience. It also provides them with a reason to come back to the page time and time again; fans know they’ll find special deals, healthy recipes and informational articles about exercise and wellness.
Takeaway tip: think about what types of information your audience values, and brainstorm the types of non-branded content that you could share with your audience. Start peppering in informational and/or inspirational content to create a diverse, engaging Facebook page.
Sharpie
Through humor and creativity, Sharpie does an incredible job at creating an inviting and attractive Facebook page.
The page, which is updated regularly, is filled with short and sweet updates, making it easy to scroll through their Facebook page with a smile.
The high engagement on Sharpie’s Facebook page shows the power of being short and sweet on social media.
Sharpie shows that a picture is worth a thousand words; they don’t spend the time creating sentence-long updates. They keep it short and sweet so that the attention stays where they intend: the graphic.
Takeaway tip: there is power in brevity. When creating content, aim to keep updates as short as possible, while still offering room for engagement.
Kleenex
Kleenex does a fantastic job at showing the power of story-telling through their Facebook efforts.
By sharing a variety of photos, articles and videos, Kleenex creates a diverse stream of updates filled with inspirational stories.
Kleenex also does a great job at finding creative ways to tie non-branded content back to their brand hashtag: #KleenexMoment.
Takeaway tip: there are ways to promote your brand even when you’re not sharing brand-centric content. Using a brand hashtag, and finding stories that you can share and apply the hashtag to, is a great way to provide value to your audience while simultaneously increasing the exposure of your hashtag.
Consistency, creativity, humor and diversity are four powerful elements to if you’re looking to build a fantastic Facebook page for your business.
Don’t be afraid to think outside of the box, post short and sweet updates, use humor and share valuable articles and information with your audience.
Providing value – in the form of creativity, brevity, and high-quality information – is going to be what keeps your Facebook audience growing for months and years to come.
Stay tuned for next week’s blog which will showcase three success stories from brands that are crushing it when it comes to marketing on Twitter!
