Top 14 Benefits Of Social Media To Grow Your Business
The benefits of social media to grow your business cannot be underplayed today. Social Media Marketing refers to all the techniques that business houses employ to derive benefits from promoting their brands and services on Social Media. The advantages that are obtained from social media marketing are innumerable. Therefore, it is an absolute necessity for business enterprises to use the several benefits of social media to boost their business considerably.
Social media marketing isn’t just limited to increasing sales but also to develop strong goodwill. According to forbes.com, 97% of marketers use social media and 78% of the sales personnel outsell their competition by using the benefits of social media.
To understand just how social media benefits business houses we need to delve a little deeper and look at some of the mindboggling statistics involving social media. This alone will prove the efficacy of investing your time and money on the various social media platforms to derive its advantages.
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Let’s Look At Some Data Available To Reinforce Our Points
According to reports by Brandwatch(May 2019)
The average daily time spent on social is 142 minutes a day which is roughly 2.36 hours a day.
There are 3.499 active social media users. Social media users grew by 202 million between April 2018-April 2019.
When asked, a mighty 81% of teenagers felt social media has a positive effect on their lives. 74 billion dollars were spent on social network advertising in 2018.
There are approximately 60 million active business pages on Facebook. There are around 800 million monthly active users on Instagram which is due to increase in the coming years.
From all the above statistics you can estimate the potential of social media marketing for business houses and more so for small and medium business organizations.
Below Is a list of the benefits of social media:
Benefits of social media – Brand Awareness
Brand awareness is the recall value of your business and its products or services. It is regarded as one of the greatest assets of any business large or small. According to studies, more than 3 billion people are on social media all over the world. Now imagine the kind of visibility your product would get if you start promulgating your brand on different social media platforms.
Brand awareness gets you leads which in turn gets you conversions. The more the level of consumer consciousness of your business the more you are likely to get noticed. Social media ensures that you have the resources that enable you to reach out to the public on these different platforms. It comes with features like share, comment, like, and repost buttons.
Creating a social media page is an absolutely positive step towards creating your brand’s unique identity in the long run. Marketers today rely on social media for their business growth to a very large extent.
Over 91% say that it gives them tremendous exposure and as a result, more and more people have become aware of their products and/or services. Another feature of social media marketing that if used properly can yield excellent results is the time factor for every platform.
For example for Pinterest, the best time to pin according to statistics is Saturday from 8-11 pm. For Instagram, the timings are: Sunday from 10 AM-2 PM, Monday 11 A.M- 5 P.M, and so on. if you can tap on to this advantage of using social media at the correct time you can boost profits to a huge extent.
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Benefits of social media marketing – High conversion rates
Social Media has helped business enterprises increase their conversion rates manifold. Social media channels give enterprises visibility and reach. With increased visibility comes greater chances of conversion.
The human element to your social media campaigns helps to get you noticed. The different ways in which you engage with your consumers help to establish a rapport with your customers and your leads. The better your efforts are at engaging the more the conversion rates. You are going to be on their minds when they are going to make a purchasing decision.
Not just your existing consumers, with social media the chances of interaction are increased greatly. Your customers might mention you to their connections and you might just get the opportunity of gaining leads in that manner. 66% of marketers saw lead generation benefits by putting in a measly 6hours per week on social media marketing efforts( Social Media Examiner).
This speaks of the terrific prospects of social media for generating profits for your brand. If you consistently interact and apprise your customers of the developments, keep them updated they will automatically trust your business. Give them their due. Make them feel important. They are what makes or breaks you. The credibility factor comes to great help for a positive online reputation.
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Benefits of social media – Better search engine rankings
Social Media is a great avenue to increase organic traffic to your website and increase your SERP ranking. It greatly helps business enterprises to gain better SEO on their websites.
Suppose you already have a loyal customer base. Now if you venture out to Social media platforms and promote your distinctive features there, the reach and amount of visibility you get will attract even more leads to your website. Your business page on any social media is the means of connecting a user with your website or blog. When you post compelling content that moves the reader they will choose to visit your website to know more about your business and the work you do. That is organic inbound traffic to your webpage which solves your ultimate goal- to attract more consumers and get noticed. Thus, social media opens up your business to innumerable new opportunities.
According to Social Media Examiner, 58% of marketers who incorporate social media marketing in their inbound marketing mix experience an improves search engine ranking. The relationship is a little complex to understand initially since social media doesn’t directly influence your SERP ranking.
What happens is, when you write high-grade content that includes target keywords that your prospective customer generally types in on Google, you link them to your social media site. Over the period, your writing garners a fan following and you get backlinks from industry influencers to your website. That increases your SERP rankings. Remember to integrate great copy with target keywords. You will see the result in a very short span.
Benefits of social media – Surge In Brand Loyalty
The main purpose of promoting your products and services through different marketing channels is to create the element of cognizance for your brand as well as to create a loyal consumer base who has a positive perception of your brand. This can be achieved by social media marketing to a huge extent.
Interacting and engaging with customers are prime factors for brand loyalty. Social Media has the perfect ambiance and features to connect with your customers to educate, inform and inspire. They yield far better results than any form of outbound marketing. The more care you take to prioritize your customers the more loyal they are to your brand.
Do not persuade, rather make efforts to add value to their lives. That builds a strong foundation for a long relationship with your customers and they endorse your products. This leads to a better impact of your business on your prospective customers as well. They know you are reliable and can be reached out to in case of any doubts or questions.
Reports claim that 62% of customers are staunch loyalists of brands who interact with them on social media platforms. All of these factors strongly recommend having a social media presence for your business. It augments your growth and creates a great reputation for your brand.
Benefits of social media- Brand Authority
We are pretty familiar with the term “Brand Authority”. In marketing parlance, it is a major component for the success of all your marketing efforts. But what exactly do we mean by brand Authority?
Brand Authority or thought leadership is the intangible asset that gets reflected on your Returns on Investment. When you earn the trust of your consumers so much so that they believe you are the skilled specialist in that genre or topic you are known to have brand authority. It’s an edge over your competition. You become an accomplished expert in that field.
There are many examples of Brand authority. Nike is a leading sports brand that has been around for a long time now. Did you know Nike enjoys 87.1 million followers on Instagram? That’s a stark example of Brand authority on social media.
When purposeful marketing and constant engagement with its consumers, Nike has been able to build a brand authority which has further improved with their social media marketing initiatives. The same goes for Lacoste, Starbucks, Dove, etc.
Benefits of social media – Cost effective
Sound Social Media is extremely cost-effective in nature. Start a business account on any social media platform like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Instagram and start implementing your social media strategy. Initially, you can start small and promote your business free through organic content. For any marketing strategy content is supreme. Great organic content may be able to give you the desired results. Even if you plan to invest in marketing on these platforms, the cost is far less compared to other mediums of marketing. Additionally, you will get far greater ROI from social media platforms.
For example, when you go for paid promotions on Facebook or Twitter, these platforms involuntarily display the ads to the users who are your leads. For example, if you are a Public Relations Company and promote your company your prospective leads will get to see your ads on these social media platforms. These are some of the important benefits of social media.
Benefits of social media – Retargeting
Retargeting is the method of connecting with your target consumers on a different platform than the one you connected with them initially moat probably your website. When you go through a website viewing, adding, or simply buying something the website drops a cookie. This cookie helps to display the product on a social media platform like Instagram or Facebook or any other app when your target customers visit these apps.
Have you ever noticed a social media app displaying an item you had earlier considered buying but chose out of it? That is called retargeting on social media. Social media allows for advanced retargeting that drives more purchasing decisions and targets customers with near-perfect precision.
Customized retargeting enables businesses to target focus groups who follow certain products on your website. For example, if a customer views a watch from a merchandise company but doesn’t go through the apparel section, social media will help your business to reconnect with the individual by displaying that watch as an ad on their platform. Social media helps to make conversions easier by tracking the habits and behaviors of a prospective customer and generating a report on the same. This accelerates the process of creating more conversions in very little time.
Benefits of social media – Better insights
Social media enables you to have a more accurate understanding of your target group as well as consumers. After all, what is a more convenient way to garner reviews on your product than a one-to-one interaction with your consumers? This is perhaps the best way to gain consumer opinions about your product. Based on the reviews you can work on the weak points if any and continue with the positive results.
The activity on your business profiles gives you a fair idea about the tastes, preferences, and needs of your focus group. Another advantage is that you can monitor the performance of your competition on these platforms. That helps in better gauging the demands of the focus group.
Furthermore, you get a better understanding of the intricate details of the industry you are working in. You can assess which content is getting more views, which is creating a stir, and syndicate content based on the research. For example, let us say that a certain story on your product is making a better impression. Then concentrate on that particular content and work your strategy around it.
Benefits of social media – Real-time analysis
Social Media analytics has completely revolutionized the way we approach inbound marketing initiatives. Social media is an integral part of humans today. As a result, it is a necessary medium of online marketing for business houses no matter small, medium, or big.
Since most of the clients are found in one or several social media platforms, therefore, it is a fundamental duty of brands to comprehend the demands of their focus group through the different metrics available. Social media analytics provide bus comprehension reports on teg attitude, needs, preferences of our prospective as well as existing customers. This, in turn, helps in tailoring your content and your brand to cater to customer satisfaction.
Competitor analysis, on the other hand, helps you to keep a close eye on how they are branding their product, where are your gaps. Social media analysis also helps to develop means of better customer service, mirroring your existing customers, curating effective content. It also helps in A/B testing your pages for better readability as well as for a better impact on the traffic on your website.
Benefits of social media – Accurate Positioning
Social Media is a great tool for the effective positioning of a product or service. The tracking features on the social media platforms allow for personalized content recommendations as well as powerful positioning of your product. For example, a company that specializes in products for pets and animals alike can display ads to people who choose to view pets and pet animals on Instagram.
Satisfied consumers will always spread the word around about your product or service. You might see sponsored ads on different social media channels like Twitter, Instagram or Facebook, Pinterest.
They position your product based on several factors starting from demographics to the taste and preferences based on the posts they view and choose to respond to. Social media is one of the best platforms to position your product carefully to augment your business growth and make it cognizable as a brand leader in your industry. Geo-targeting is a real thing in social media. It involves marketers targeting focus groups within a certain radius of their business location.
This enables more competent targeting and efficient conversions. The different data available on social media gives marketers a clear indication of the nature and pattern of consumers taking an interest in your product. When you have an array of products social media helps to segment the audience and to better position your product based on the analysis of data. Thus positioning on social media plays a major role in connecting businesses with their target audience.
Lends a human element to your Brand
Social Media allows you to automate your message and share your brand’s story, mission, and objectives organically. Share interesting stories about your experiences, how your brand affects and would affect the lives of people. A well-crafted message with a powerful message can impact your consumers and leads in a great way.
The greatest element is communicating the value of your brand and its features to your consumers. Why should they invest in your product? What do they have to gain from it? Answer these primary questions in a conversational manner and tone. A friendly informal interaction/conversation goes a long way to keep your brand in the consumers’ minds.
Foster your relationship by leveraging the benefits that social media provides you to tell your story. Post a video, post a slideshow with testimonials, and a brief detail about your clients. Post a brief story replete with elements that resonate with your target audience. Connect it with your brand and see the results. You should be a niche leader. Make the efforts of creating a brand message that humanizes your brand, which makes your consumers feel you are a part of them. How you started your journey, how you hired an employee are all stories that strike a chord with the audience.
Networking
Social Media helps you in connecting, communicating, and forming a relationship with key influencers from your industry. According to a study, 53% of customers who follow certain brands’ social media have kore faith in the said brand. (Convince&Convert Report)
Now, in social media, you get all kinds of opportunities to connect with influencers who can help in garnering a whole set of a new focus group. When you have a very prominent singer endorsing your brand of guitars and other musical instruments, that will have a huge boost in your sales as well as the traffic on your site.
Also, it helps you communicate with businesses with complementary brands. You can always team up with such brands and get access to their set of target audiences. Take for example Uber and Spotify. They are not exactly complementary businesses but they have a common factor. Consumers, the people who take cabs and who love listening to music.
As soon as you get in the car you can start listening to a playlist from Spotify that you created earlier for this ride. That is a great example of co-branding. Social media allows you to assess your profitability when making such a joint venture. It opens up new areas of exploring your potential. Sharing audiences and promoting giveaways are other great ways in which networking in social media helps to boost businesses.
Focused Customer Service
Since Social Media is an interactive platform, brands can easily communicate with their clients and reach out to a new set of leads. The customers’ grievances can be addressed in Real-time as well as new developments can be communicated through an announcement on social media. This overall improves the quality of customer support. It allows for a more focused and thorough customer care service.
Help for your cause to go viral
Social media is a blessing if you can put it to correct use. One of the elements of Social media is Viral content. Social Media has a huge influence on users now. Viral ads get a lot of attention invariably bringing in money and awareness about a product or service. For example, a campaign was started in support of acid attack victims.
The hashtag #EndAcidSale Advertising Campaign went on to win the Gold award at the 63rd Cannes Lions Ad Festival for an outstanding message. This was an important social cause that was able to make a mark due to successful social media campaigning. There are many such unique examples. Don’tLetDreamsWait promoting education, ComaCoffee by Levista- an initiative for coffee lovers which went on to become a huge hit.
Now, whenever we hear viral content, most of the time it has a negative connotation. And the perception is true to some extent.
The viral content on the internet is sometimes completely useless giving undue exposure to undesired content. If used properly, the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. You can use the different elements of social media to create viral content. Viral Content, if it is made for a good cause is one of the best things that to achieve through Social Media. Several social awareness campaigns have been very successfully carried out by making content viral on Social Media. Social Media Ads have the potential to make a great impact on your consumers.
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Benefits of Social Media concluding thoughts
Social Media has innumerable good qualities that can be used effectively to grow a business. It comes with advanced features, ease of use, and helps to interact and meet with new people all the time. Be sure to make a sound social media marketing strategy that covers all the important areas. Then implement them on all the social media platforms for optimum results. You are sure to get great results and long-lasting goodwill for your business.
An effective and impactful process that helps brands to find the right data without having to conduct much effort and use that quality data to work on assisting clients better.