Using Social Media to Grow Your Business Brand.
Your brand is your voice and identity. People/ customers identify with you through your brand. It represents how people perceive you, your products or services and your customer service.
For the longest time, branding and marketing was mainly through print media, email and broadcast ads on TV and radio.
With the addition of social media more businesses are now able to reach and connect with their customers online. Entrepreneurs are starting businesses online and those whose businesses are more of brick and mortar are building engagements online.
Retail Dive shows that 87% of customers first research a product or a company online before visiting the physical store or buying a product. Meaning, a good number of customers are more likely to first identify with you through an online search on google leading to your Website or your social media pages.
The same way you can build your personal brand on social media, you can build your business brand identity on social media. Your social media presence says a lot about your business. Make use of common social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. Choose the platforms where your target audience is and work towards building a strong brand for your business.
Generally, a business brand is represented by a logo, a business slogan, packaging, product or service quality, price, typography, customer service, and corporate responsibility.
However, customer service and corporate responsibility have the highest stake when it comes to a brand than a logo or a slogan.
Brand building is not an easy task and there is a lot of work to be done when it comes to doing it on social media. However, having brand goals makes the process easier for you and your team.
Common brand goals.
According to Canva, your brand goals could be one or more of the following:
- To increase your product or service awareness.
- To generate business through new leads.
- Increasing your sales and profits.
- To increase your customers’ loyalty.
- Providing a higher standard customer service.
Creating a strong brand identity.
Creating a strong brand identity helps you reach a broader audience and it revolves around these 3 key elements.
- Your brand’s name.
- What your brand is about.
- Whatever makes your brand different.
To build a strong brand identity that customers can instantly identify with, these 3 elements have to be consistently used and visible.
With knowing your brand and knowing what you want you want to achieve, this is how you can build your business’ brand on social media.
1.Have brand consistency across social media platforms.
Be consistent across all the platforms you are using on social media.
Your brand’s profile should be unified across all platforms. Your Facebook page should not look like it belongs to a different company when one checks your Instagram.
Find your brand’s voice and tone and use the same voice across. Your brand voice represents who you are and what you stand for and it could be friendly yet informative, empowering and uplifting. It could also be professional and ambitious or weird, wacky and bold.
Define whether your brand speaks in first person, or in collective voice or both and let that be seen across.
Let the colors, graphics, the style and the language you use be consistent wherever your brand appears online. Look at Dove, Google and Nike for example, their brand profiles are consistent across their social media platforms.
2.Create relevant content that speaks for your brand.
Content is the backbone of social media – images, videos, posts, reviews, testimonials, etc.
Depending on your brand goals, create content that speaks for your brand and represents what you are about. Let your content show who you are as a brand.
Let your website, Facebook page, Instagram or Twitter have content that is helpful to your target audience and shows what you offer to them.
Your content should entertain your audience and educate them about what you do and why you do it.
Let your content repeat your message differently depending on what your brand goals are.
Knowing your target audience will help you narrow down to the topics relevant to them.
Branded content revolving around your products, services or the solutions you provide increases conversion rates.
Additionally, let your content show the difference between you and your competitors and whatever makes you different be noticeable.
Keep your content meaningful and simple and don’t post for the sake of posting. Also, be consistent in your content posting to get more engagements.
3.Engage with your online community.
Engaging with your online community is very important when building a brand for your business. Don’t let the customers feel you are the only one that matters. Instead, make them feel valued as this is how they will trust your brand.
Let the communication be engaging and two way, not just you telling them about your products or services. Interact with customers by actively listening to them and responding to them.
Respond to your customers’ comments and let them know you care and appreciate them.
Respond to Direct Messages from customers as fast as you can and be honest in these conversations.
Matt Simpson on Magnetic Creative encourages brands to actively seek out social conversations. There are conversations happening involving your brand and you need to find them. See what people are saying about your brand on Twitter, Google alerts or even on LinkedIn search.
Have key people in your team manage your online community and proactively engage with your audience. Let them know the voice to use in different situations, whether it’s responding to a critic (negative feedback), a positive feedback or addressing a concern.
4.Have a great customer care service online.
Remember this, customer service has a great steak when it comes to building a brand. How you make your customers feel is very crucial and can either make or break your brand.
How do you help customers online when it comes to answering questions about your products or services?
Customers are very needy and always expect a fast and helpful reply. Don’t ignore your customers or put them on holds. Being consistently active will ensure timely replies and active engagement with customers. Avoid excessive use of automated replies as they don’t always give precise answers customers are looking for.
Follow up with your customers especially when they have raised a concern or after making an order or after delivery. Ask them about the products or the services they receive, give them a discount next time or simply thank them.
Don’t underestimate the power of reviews from customers. Research from Vendasta shows that 80% of customers trust reviews as much as personal recommendations. 63% of shoppers are more likely to make a purchase from a site that has user reviews.
A great customer service builds trust and customer loyalty, and this helps build a strong brand identity.
5.Let your pages be visual.
Research shows that users engage more with a visual post compared to ‘flat posts’ that are just words.
Visuals are more attractive to the eye and catch the emotions and attention of customers instantly.
Display colorful and clear photographs on your social media pages. You could also use colorful infographics to break down information that is in numbers or statistics.
6.Be consistently active in your social media.
Clearly, consistency plays a huge role in building your brand identity on social media.
Don’t pop in and out of social media when you feel like. Be consistently active in your social media platforms.
Post on your platforms consistently and engage with your customers frequently.
Have a content plan/ schedule that indicates what you are posting, who is posting and when you are posting.
When you are consistently active on these platforms, you will engage more with your audience.
Conclusion
Building your brand on social media is all about your brand goals and your consistency. Consistency in your brand’s voice and tone across social media platforms and being consistently active.
Engage with your customers and keep them interested by posting relevant and compelling content.
Use your social media to increase your online presence as a brand and to stand out among customers.
