I don’t believe in one-off online marketing drives, unless they’re a prelude to a long-term engagement. Social media marketing isn’t just a tactic, a special effect to be used at will. It is an entire domain on its own and one that lets you reap more results the more sustained effort you put into it. You don’t start a social media strategy by randomly deciding to get on Twitter and you don’t sustain it by just tweeting every now and then, whenever you remember to. So, how do you get started and how do you take it from there? Here are some ideas we found worth a try.
A) Getting there is part of the battle
A great social marketing strategy begins long before your first online update. That starts getting some key elements in place:-
Vision: What do you want to achieve online? Awareness? Sales? Referrals? A following?
Buy-in: Make sure all stakeholders know what the strategy is about and are aligned to it.
Information: Get your research in place; find out what the trends are, what competition is doing and who and where your audience is
Goals: Define specific goals: reach, inquiries, etc.
Find the right tactics: Awareness requires a wide spread of content. Community building is all about good moderation and keeping dialogue going. Driving sales needs great calls to action. Find what tactics are suited to your goals.
Budget: Find out what it will all cost. This will help shape what you can and can’t do.
Secure resources: Make sure the people and equipment you need are available to drive your strategy
Plan and create content: You need to have content calendar and a reasonable amount of content ready before you go live.
Define metrics: Define what you are going to measure and how.
B)Keeping it going is not about auto-pilot:Once your strategy takes off, it isn’t time to take a breather.
C)Review everything: How is your content being received? What are your metrics telling you? Have you chosen the best metrics? Can you try other content types and platforms?
D)Rethink if you have to: Be prepared to jettison things that are not working and re-assess any of the aspects of what you are doing.
E) Repeat what works: If something isn’t broken, don’t fix it. But do keep at it – consistency pays.
F)Listen as much, if not more than you talk: This may well be the one most crucial magic mantra of successful social media marketing.
As you can see, a good social media strategy isn’t a matter of chance. It is the product of a rigorous, painstaking method that’s geared towards real business goals. For a great strategy, why not turn to the professionals – the i-Vista Digital Marketing team!
Author Bio: Narayan Rajan, is the founder of iVista Digital Solutions and he is the driving force behind iVista’s growth story. An individual with an insatiable passion for all things Digital, Narayan is a first-generation entrepreneur and virtual brand evangelist. His expertise is based on a unique blend of different facets of experiential and digital marketing, product development, sales management and organizational building. A keen observer of business and technological trends, he constantly looks at ways to customize existing offerings and new possibilities in digital industry
