As a business owner, you have to think of yourself like a pioneer. A pioneer on a quest to find the key to growing your business. Designing a marketing campaign for social media can act as your roadmap to success, especially if you know your target audience is active on social media.
Millennials and Generation Y are especially dependent on technology, so using social media to tap into these audiences is vital. However, that doesn’t mean that other age demographics are not present on social channels. Baby Boomers are more connected than ever before, and the majority of them live on Facebook. That being said, your first step in creating a campaign depends on your ability to pinpoint which channels your target market interacts with the most. How can you do that? Do some research! After all, you can find pretty much anything with Google. Uncover specific social network demographics and find which channels have characteristics that are similar to your ideal customer base. Concentrate on just a few of these networks at first. You don’t want to spread yourself too thin! Try starting with two or three.
Content calendars can look exactly like traditional calendars, but they are designed to help you map out your social media posts for the month across all of your channels.
Once you’ve decided which networks you want to use in your campaign, begin creating a content calendar. Content calendars can look exactly like traditional calendars, but they are designed to help you map out your social media posts for the month across all of your channels. This will really help you stay organized and know what has to be posted each day. It will also ensure your messaging remains fluid across all channels. There are tons of different templates to use, but it's also fine to just create a monthly calendar in Excel and add text, links or even ideas for photos that you want to post each day. If you’re super organized, your content calendar will be your best friend. But these calendars work for just about everyone.
Important events to include on social media content calendars:
- Holidays
- New product launches
- Sales
- Giveaways and contests
- Trending stories
- Upcoming events or partnerships
Contests and Giveaways on Social Channels
One of the best ways to generate buzz and bolster your brand awareness is through running a contest or a giveaway. Depending on your margins and your inventory, giving away one of your most popular products can be a great way to get your social media followers and fans engaged, interested, and thinking about your brand. It’s also a great way to facilitate reviews or positive customer posts to your page.Just remember, there are certain restrictions for promotions on each network.
If you have a very active Facebook audience, maybe ask them to submit a photo for a chance to win. If you have great pictures or funny images from a recent event, try a photo caption contest!
Popular types of contests:
- Like to win
- Comment to win
- Submit a photo to win (Facebook only)
- Create a caption to win
- Fill-in-the-Blank contest
- Multiple choice quiz contest
- Pin it to Win it (Pinterest only)
Just remember, there are certain restrictions for promotions on each network. Facebook, for instance, prohibits businesses from asking fans to share posts on their personal timelines to win something. If you’re curious about other restrictions for Facebook, check out the full list here and scroll down to Promotions.
Running Facebook Ads
Setting up social media ads is the last part of your quest to create a successful campaign! Because organic reach is continuing to plummet on social networks, especially Facebook, we highly encourage dedicating some of your budget to Facebook ads. It’s the best way to gain brand recognition, earn qualified traffic to your website and promote your sales or products. Ads or Boosted Posts should always be run in conjunction with your contests, giveaways or special offers.Social advertising allows you to target the people who matter most to your brand and increases your visibility in the social media landscape.
Social advertising allows you to target the people who matter most to your brand and increases your visibility in the social media landscape. For more information, check out our nifty tell-all guide on Facebook ads!
Monitoring Your Campaign
A pioneer’s quest never truly ends, and neither does managing your social media campaigns. Ads and posts should be monitored for effectiveness on a weekly basis. See what resonates with your audience by looking at click-through rates and engagement. Low numbers reflect ineffective messaging, imagery or disinterest in the general topic. Change your strategies based on what you find out when you dig into Facebook Insights, Pinterest Analytics or even Google Analytics.
However, if you use some of our tips (and the content calendar) you’ll surely be on your way to creating a successful social media campaign for your ecommerce business!
Have any burning social media questions? Ask them in the comments!social