“Please create a social media management strategy.”
That seems like a straightforward request that any digital marketing agency might hear. But what does even that mean?
When thinking about creating a measurable social media strategy, it’s key to start from the ground up.
This work will take some time and focus, but once you’re done there are countless benefits from being consistent in brand messaging and remaining active and engaged on social. Above all else, you’ll finally be putting social media to work for you in a meaningful way that spans more than just checking the “I posted to Facebook this week” box on your to-do list.
Know your space
Before you can spend time creating meaningful goals, creating content, and springing into action, you must first have a solid understanding of what’s currently in play.
Know your business and how it fits into the current social media ecosystem
What social media profiles do you currently have? How are they doing? Has it been 3 years since your last tweet? Maybe you’re winning on LinkedIn and you didn’t even realize it.
Conduct a full audit of all current social media channels
This will give you a solid understanding of the low-hanging fruit as well as a baseline to measure against as you implement your new strategy.
Conduct competitor research
Understand the platforms your key competitors are seeing the most success with, pay close attention to their value proposition, specials, messaging, and make notes of how you can differentiate your business.
Audience Identification
Chances are good that your business has identified more than one audience segment. But do you know how to speak to each audience? Getting to know who is engaging with your content, which types of content, and on what platforms will allow you to tailor your message to the proper audience.
Know what levers you can pull inside of each social media platform that you are going to be using. These vary widely from platform to platform but think age, education, income, parental status, geographical location, interests, the industry of employment — even life events, like moving, having a baby, or getting married.
Define your buyer personas. Is your buyer a small-business owner or the HR rep for a mid-sized company or perhaps 18-34 females with a new house? In any case, you’ll need to clearly identify these personas to know who you’re speaking to.
Defining your goals and KPI
Setting goals for your social media management efforts will provide you with something to measure progress against.
Subscribing to the tried-and-true methodology of S.M.A.R.T. goals are only truly meaningful to your business if they are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. Take this one step further if you’re in a larger organization or working with multiple teams and add an “A” for “agreed upon by all teams contributing efforts.”
For example, gaining 250 followers on your company’s LinkedIn page in Q3 is something you can measure progress against, while “gaining more likes on my Facebook page” is not specific enough to measure against.
Don’t feel pressured to jump into the deep end with a ton of goals right out of the gate. Starting small with one or two can be the perfect place to get the ball rolling.
Grab your KPIs (key performance indicators) directly from your goals. With the example above, followers is the obvious KPI you’re going to measure. (But keep in mind that looking at follower/audience growth rate is another metric that is very valuable to monitor.)
Get Organized
Social media content comes in many different formats: blogs, images, short-form text, video, etc. Taking a step back to put some thought into your overall content strategy will yield better results and feel more organized as you work.
The days of cross-posting the same message across all platforms are gone. There are different formats for many of these social platforms, and in many cases, the tone needed to address the proper audience will feel a bit different. Customized content for each platform is the way to go. Even something as simple as adding the verbiage “swipe to see the final result” on an Instagram post with multiple images adds a layer of differentiation from a Facebook post; small changes can make a big impact too.
Determine your content mix and frequency. There are many different schools of thought here, but it is important to mix in non-promotional content that is informative and/or entertaining to keep your audience engaged.
Develop a content calendar. It could take any number of formats, and that’s okay. For some, a simple Google sheet with links out to documents works perfectly fine; others like to use a tool like Airtable. No matter where you start, just start!
Measurement
You’ve done competitive research, spent countless hours poring over your buyer personas, and set your S.M.A.R.T. goals; now all that is standing in your way is ensuring you are collecting and reporting on accurate data. This is what ultimately allows you to make informed changes and run tests so you can continue to refine and grow your social media strategy.
Conduct a complete audit of your current campaigns to uncover anything that may not be tagged correctly.
Are there points of conversions or actions on the path to conversion that are completely untracked? Phone calls, tap-to-text features, chats, and newsletter signups are some areas that can be overlooked.
Are you using consistent and well-defined lead scoring methods? Leads should be graded against the same criteria when being considered a marketing qualified lead (MQL). When there aren’t clear definitions in place for lead scoring—based on actions that can be taken along the path to conversion—there is the danger of leads meeting the same criteria being marked not qualified by one person while being marked qualified by another.
You’ve Got This…
Social Media management can feel a bit overwhelming. Winning at social media takes time, patience, and a lot of work. Stay focused on your goals, be consistent with your content delivery, and be methodical in your approach to tracking and reporting, and you’ll be seeing results in no time.