Why do we need an organic presence along with paid ads

We all know a small business owner who wants to use social media platforms to grow. In his head, all he needs to do is to create a business profile or page and then post on it regularly and tada! Magic will happen with an inflow of customers! But sadly, the reality is very different.

It is hard to make people understand that the purpose of having a brand on social media is very different to expectations. The social platforms are there to keep your brand alive – to nurture your ideal clients (another topic to discuss btw) by being a part of them, and creating a community of people who would be interested in your products.

Social media is a showcase of what is offered by your business and in doing that you need to educate the ideal clients with your knowledge to build on their trust – thus generating leads and eventually converting them into clients. It’s a whole journey!

Few key aspects of social media include:

•  Brand Identity – Your business profile reflects a personality of what your business is about, and what you share or reshare are portraying that individuality. A brand identity is reflected on the social profiles and one needs to maintain that persona.
• Engagement – As your brand is an individual, it will also engage in a similar manner with the audience. As a person, it will interact with other profiles, comment, appreciate, give opinion – in simple words ‘engage’ with the audience. It is a very important aspect which people miss.
•  Leads and nurture – When one engages with the audience, they find leads. Those leads result in relationships where you nurture step by step through your sales funnel and convert them to your customers.
• Educating – Social media is very much about educating – giving enough information to build your credibility. It’s showing value to your ideal audience, gaining their trust to build your relationship with them. It’s an ongoing process.
• Choosing the right platform – this is one of the most important decisions as all platforms may not be the right place for business social interaction. LinkedIn is best for B2B and even Twitter to some extent but Facebook and Instagram are more focused on B2C marketing. I would add here though that it all matters on the content and how you show value to your ideal client. I have seen accountancy businesses on Instagram with great following and a cake confectioner on LinkedIn being promoted to businesses.

Maintaining your own social media profile is possible by delivering the content that is useful for your audience. The key is to deliver the right content for that magic to slowly happen! How can you manage this?

• Research – One of the ways to go about this is to research your competitors. Find the key points in their content and tailor your content accordingly.
• Schedule ahead: There are lots of online scheduling platforms like Facebook Creator Studio, Later, Planoly etc. which you can use for content scheduling. It saves you a lot of time as one dedicated day a fortnight and viola – your social media content is up and running smoothly.

There are also other ways to manage your social media without hurting your pockets too much.

• Seek help from a VA – Virtual Assistants can be a great resource for business as not only they can take some workload off you but also do the social media management.
• Using a Social media strategist like The Social Berry – Generating the right content which resonates with your audience can be painful. That’s where the social media strategists come in who plan and push and strategise your social content thus taking away your headache so you can focus more on your business itself. Check out our Berry Packages.

I have loved social media since its inception. I was one of those lucky generations which saw the rise of many platforms and have seen how businesses have grown via the correct use of it. In this day and time, it is important to have a social presence but it can be mind boggling for lots of small business owners to self manage and I would highly recommend to make it less of a hassle with a little push from the experts.