Embracing the New Norm: Why Social Media Marketing Should Be Your Business' New Best Friend
When it comes to small business, word-of-mouth is arguably the very best means of gaining new customers and of course, holding onto long-term clients. This has been the case as long as there’s been economy, so it’s no wonder that small business owners in particular might be hesitant to cross over— to become a thriving participant in a more “modern” means of spreading the word. So think of it this way: social media marketing is like word-of-mouth on steroids because not only does it provide a (free!) platform for your current customers to engage, but also has the ability— when done right— to reach hundreds, even thousands of new potential leads on a daily basis.
The problem, we here at GEAUX Marketing Group know, is that social media is a strange, ever-changing beast and there’s a whole lot more to it than merely creating a page or group for your business. Essentially it comes down to finding and creating your perfect place in the social media world, and then growing that space organically by posting the types of things that people react and respond to.
Times are a changing but the one constant seems to be the way consumer’s trust one another when it comes to making decisions to spend their hard-earned cash. But even before social-distancing, businesses without an online presence, had begun to feel the effects of a much more virtually interactive world. Because unfortunate as it is, fewer and fewer Saturday morning’s are being spent with friend’s at the local Hardee’s. Instead, I can no longer scroll any of my social media feeds without finding multiple “ISO” (in search of) posts. It’s how the vast majority of the world— close to 3-billion people— garner service and/or product recommendations every single day.
So, let us meditate for a moment on the fact that social media marketing is a real thing— is perhaps the most real thing out there right now— or at least, the most influential. Some (like me) might even argue that it’s bigger for consumerism than even Google, or whatever your favorite search engine and even if you don’t believe that, there is actual tangible proof that businesses with active social media accounts rank higher when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO— see next week’s post for more on this).
What does this mean for you? And us? It means, if your business doesn’t have a social presence (and yes, that means even if your business has multiple social media pages but limited interaction), it is absolutely pivotal to the future success of your small business, to get with the times— to build an actual following on social media, so that when Jane Doe posts she’s looking for a great hair colorist in Baton Rouge (example), your business immediately comes to mind and then all I have to do is “tag” your business page and voila— potential for a new customer and a whole lot of eyes on your business that otherwise, wouldn’t have been.
See how that works??
And want to know a secret? There is no time like the present. Because in this socially distanced world, people are literally craving connection; and your business, no matter what your product or service, could and should be working to meet that need. It’s empathetic marketing at its most basic. So why aren’t you taking advantage, again?