Intro
In today’s digital world there are several reasons your small business needs social media. Billions of people worldwide are posting videos, shopping for products, and communicating with friends on Facebook, Youtube, LinkedIn and Twitter. For many, it is difficult to envision everyday life without these avenues. As a small business owner social media needs to be a part of your company’s modus operandi. Your business also has to be able to adapt to the current times in order to survive. There is a fair share of companies going out of business these days. A business who does not explore all its available options of promoting itself and growing is guilty of complacency. In this article we will explore the reasons why your company must use social media.
Reasons your small business needs social media
Gives you brand awareness
Brand awareness is what keeps companies afloat and expanding. The more people notice a brand the higher chance it has of succeeding. In times past the only methods relied upon to gain exposure included newspaper ads, billboards, telemarketing, TV and radio. Now, because of social media life has become much easier for businesses. Companies can reach potential customers in great droves over the internet. According to Review 42,”There are more than 3.5 billion active social media users”1 Think of the people who can be the target of your business and envision yourself marketing to them. Video ads, high quality images, blog posts, click ads and page like ads are some brand awareness methods to use. Whichever strategies you feel will work best for your business is up to you to choose.
Keeps you in business
The sad reality today is that there are many new businesses in the U.S. closing their doors. If you are a start up company there is a high probability that you will soon go out of business.The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics(BLS) reports,”65% of new businesses failing during the first 10 years”2 There are several reasons why new companies fold. Lack of finiancial capital, poor planning, and little to no market research are a few of those reasons.
Another reason why a company does not survive is that it fails to connect with its customer base. You need to realize how much social media plays a key role in how your customers think. People will be more willing to do business with you if they find you on a social media platform. Review 42 states,”21% of consumers are more likely to buy from brands that they can reach on social media”1 Whether you’re a retail company, selling clothes or running an ecommerce website you need to know where are your customers.
Most small businesses are on social media
With the rise of social media it comes as no surprise that businesses have made their presence known there. According to SCORE,”77% of U.S. small businesses use social media” 3 The last thing that you want to happen to your business is for it to lose customers to other companies.Establishing a name for yourself on social media gives you a competitive advantage. You can research the businesses in your niche that are currently using social media to connect with their clients. You can also borrow ideas from them such as how to use catchy images or how to build customer engagement. The ideas are endless and will help your business to grow if you apply them correctly.
More reasons your small business needs social media
It is cost efficient
One of your main motivations should be for your company to make a profit. Any experienced business person recognizes the value of getting a great return for their investment. If you are a startup company you want to try to avoid overpaying for ads and other necessary resources. The good thing is that not only social media gives your brand exposure it also is extremely affordable for your business. You do not need to spend hundreds of dollars to set up a business page on Facebook and Instagram. Setting up a page will cost you absolutely nothing. These platforms give you the option of choosing the amount of money to spend on advertisements. You can spend anywhere from a few dollars to thousands on ads. The ad management tool on Facebook allows you to set a budget.
Allows you to identify your customers
The world that we live and do business in is analytically driven. Political organizations, corporations and advertisers use data to analayze people and their behavior. Just because your business might not be like Amazon or Apple does not mean that you should not do research. You do not need to be an expert in statistics in order to know who your customers are. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Youtube all have features that you can use to identify your customers. These platforms provide you the gender, age, location and the traffic source of your customers. You can use this information to understand your customers’ needs and develop affective marketing strategies.
Provides traffic to your website
You can never underestimate the power of search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing. These are the top avenues in which you will gain traffic for your website, but you would be doing your business a tremendous disservice by not directing traffic to your website through social media. One thing that social media allows you to do is to post you URL. Having your link visible on your feed or story will give people access to your site. Once you are able to build a social media presence you will see how much traffic your website generates. You won’t have to strictly depend on purchasing ads from search engines to receive customers because you will be gaining it organically from social media.
Conclusion to Reasons Your Small Business Needs Social Media
Now that you have understood the different reasons your small business needs social media of using social media the next step is for you to do is to create a business page. What’s nice about social media is that it is extremely simple to create a page on it. If you can navigate through these blog posts you can set up a Facebook or Instagram business page in just a couple of hours, but if you encounter any technical challenges you can always find countless videos on YouTube that show you how to get through such obstacles.
As much as we want to connect with as many people as possible over the internet I advise you not to feel pressured into using every social media platform for your business. Some platforms might work better for your type of business than others and you probably would not have the time to keep up with more than a few of them at once. Make a list of which platforms you are considering and test them out.