TO SOCIAL, OR NOT TO SOCIAL – THAT IS THE MARKETING QUESTION
Over the last five or six years we have had dozens of businesses and brands come to us with questions about social media: should we be using it? What do we post? Is it worth it? Is anyone really looking at our page?
And the big one – is social media right for our business?
At Village, a catchy little phrase we use to describe what we do is “We’re in the business of amplifying greatness”, and if you want to amplify your greatness to an audience – be it NZ-wide, international, female-only, the 34-45 age group, or simply ‘everyone’, then social media is a great place to do it. Social media is low investment, high reach. IF you do it right.
The various social media channels are not ‘one size fits all’ and if you require a bespoke social plan tailored to your business and its specific KPIs, our contact details are at the bottom of this post.
To break it down, very generally speaking, here’s a list of key social media channels and what type of businesses, brands, firms etc, they work best for.
1. Facebook
Yes, your business should have a presence on Facebook – even if it’s just a basic profile with fresh content posted 1-2 times per week. Facebook is an absolute giant, and its users are prolific. They use it almost like a search engine, looking for business and brand pages to engage with on a daily basis. If you don’t have an up-to-date Facebook page with information and images that show your audience what it is you can do for them, they’ll go to your competitor’s page.
2. Instagram
If you work in a largely visual industry and can create a steady stream of aesthetic images, Instagram is for you. Bakers, florists, food brands, fashion, travel, jewellery, pets – these all bring to mind visions of yum-looking food, pretty flowers, clothes we want to buy and cute or awesome things to look at. That’s what Instagram is about.
If your business is a law firm, this probably isn’t the place for you. The same goes if you COULD have a library of great images from your business, but you don’t have the time or ability to take and upload them. An Instagram account with three photos posted six months ago isn’t going to do anything for your business.
3. LinkedIn
If your business is corporate or sales-focused, then LinkedIn could be a very valuable networking tool and sales pipeline for you. With LinkedIn, you get out what you put in to it – so a strong and consistent strategy is important. We recommend you do your research when committing to LinkedIn for business or, even better, get us to do it for you.
4. Pinterest
Like Instagram, Pinterest is a very visual channel with a similar user demographic. Pinterest is where people go to plan; weddings, renovations, design projects, dinner – you name it. The great thing about Pinterest is that, unlike Instagram, you can link your images to your website so theoretically you could be driving a whole lot of traffic to your website just by ‘pinning’ a few nice images each week.
5. Twitter
A ‘nice to have’ rather than a ‘must have’, Twitter for businesses hasn’t really taken off in NZ. Unless you have a specific reason for using it, we recommend setting up a basic Twitter profile and linking it to your business Facebook page – that way whenever you post on Facebook, that same post goes out to the Twitterverse.
We Villagers live and breathe social media, so feel free to flick an email to b@villagenz.com if you’d like to know how we can help you.