Do you know which Social Media platform is best to showcase your SME?
Hello, I’m Lauren. I have recently joined BCRS to help make us a viral sensation (fun part) along with trying to keep up with the ever-changing digital landscape (not so fun mind-boggling part). As a digital marketing assistant, my primary responsibility is updating our social media platforms to aid further awareness of how we, BCRS Business Loans, can support businesses to grow and prosper with affordable finance.
Following a recent social media training session, that I had the pleasure of attending, I thought I would share some knowledge on how to choose the best social media platform for you and your business. Here are some tips and guidance to get you going.
We are told that it is important to use social media as a marketing tool for businesses but how do you know which platform is right for your audience i.e. customers? Are you targeting business-to-business (B2B) or business-to-consumer (B2C)? Or maybe both? This is the first question to ask yourself before establishing the right social media platform for your business.
When operating B2B or B2C you have to consider the platform that your potential audiences are using. This can be done by trial and error of each platform and a large amount of research on where your customers are and which platforms they use.
Well lucky for you, some of this research has been done for you… by me!
If you are operating in B2B then LinkedIn is your ‘best friend’ to grow a large professional network. Having a business page on LinkedIn as well as a personal account for every member of the business enables a larger reach and an integrated business network to share your business with.
Twitter is another ‘business friendly’ network where other SMEs are actively searching for professionals. It also has an ‘open networking’ layout to enable your business to be found easily without a direct search which could be a great for gaining initial contacts.
Similar to Twitter is Instagram. This again operates in an ‘open networking’ layout, however, ensure your business page is ‘public’ not ‘private’ to maximise your visibility. Deciding on Twitter or Instagram depends solely on your target audience research findings.
Twitter is also useful for B2C as it enables direct interaction with customers and is the most prominent platform for B2C marketing. Instagram has entered the mix as another popular platform for B2C businesses especially relevant to sectors such as fashion, lifestyle and food. However, *60% of users discover products on Instagram so its worth creating a profile no matter what sector you operate within.
How far do your posts reach?
The amount of reach a LinkedIn post will have depends on how many contacts/followers you have. Lets’ take a small business with *500 followers and 20 employees each having 50 contacts. Assuming every employee has shared your post with their LinkedIn contacts the average reach is 2500. Twitter reach averages at less than *2% per post and Instagram has an average reach of *2.2%.
Looking at these statistics LinkedIn has the best reach for B2B marketing with Instagram comes in as top for B2C.
There is no harm in trying all platforms simultaneously to assess which gives you the best success to reach your desired audience and KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators). Afterall too many platforms are better than overlooking potential customer engaging platforms as long as you have the capacity to do so.
So, now you have your social media page/pages up and running please come back to the BCRS Blog next week (Thursdays at 3pm) to see when, how and what to post on social media to best engage your newly found audience.
Sources *
https://blog.hootsuite.com/instagram-statistics/
https://www.smallbusinesscan.com/use-best-social-media-platforms-b2c-business/
https://www.cision.com/us/2014/12/how-far-do-social-posts-reach/
