Do You Have an Effective Social Media Marketing Plan?
Social media marketing is the process of using various social media platforms to promote websites, products or services, and it is increasingly being used by online marketers and entrepreneurs to get free targeted traffic to their websites, increase online sales and build their own business brands.
But before you go ahead and decide to use this latest form of marketing for your own websites, products or services, just take a few minutes to pause for a moment and think: Do you have a plan to carry out such marketing in the first place? And more importantly, is the plan effective enough to ensure you get the best returns for your efforts? If you haven't quite thought about this area yet, then perhaps the following series of questions can be a starting point to help you come up with your own effective social media marketing plan: (1) Who do you want to reach out to and what are their demographics? Your target audience will decide on the type of marketing strategies you want to adopt.
(2) What exactly do you want to convey to your target audience? e.
g.
If you want to introduce a new product, then your strategies and actions would be very different from what you would do if you want to widen your customer base for an existing product.
(3) What are your other competitors doing online and how do you intend to keep track of what they are doing? This is essential if you want to continually stay a few steps ahead of them.
(4) What type of social media platforms do you intend to use to promote your products or services? (e.
g.
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Ning) And what types of tools do you plan to use? (e.
g.
videos, podcasts, blogs) (5) What type of resources would you need to keep track of and manage your marketing campaigns? (e.
g.
software to update your blogs, staff to create and upload new videos) How much resources would you need to invest in such campaigns and can you afford them on a short-term and long-term basis? (6) Finally, how do you intend to integrate your marketing strategies with your other online and offline marketing strategies? Are there any possible areas of conflict or duplication of efforts? Although the list above is not exhaustive, I hope that what I've given will act as a guide to help you start pondering about such things, and cause you to think about other related areas as part of your overall social media marketing plan.
As in all other forms of business marketing, it is always good to remember the old adage: If you fail to plan, then you plan to fail.
But before you go ahead and decide to use this latest form of marketing for your own websites, products or services, just take a few minutes to pause for a moment and think: Do you have a plan to carry out such marketing in the first place? And more importantly, is the plan effective enough to ensure you get the best returns for your efforts? If you haven't quite thought about this area yet, then perhaps the following series of questions can be a starting point to help you come up with your own effective social media marketing plan: (1) Who do you want to reach out to and what are their demographics? Your target audience will decide on the type of marketing strategies you want to adopt.
(2) What exactly do you want to convey to your target audience? e.
g.
If you want to introduce a new product, then your strategies and actions would be very different from what you would do if you want to widen your customer base for an existing product.
(3) What are your other competitors doing online and how do you intend to keep track of what they are doing? This is essential if you want to continually stay a few steps ahead of them.
(4) What type of social media platforms do you intend to use to promote your products or services? (e.
g.
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Ning) And what types of tools do you plan to use? (e.
g.
videos, podcasts, blogs) (5) What type of resources would you need to keep track of and manage your marketing campaigns? (e.
g.
software to update your blogs, staff to create and upload new videos) How much resources would you need to invest in such campaigns and can you afford them on a short-term and long-term basis? (6) Finally, how do you intend to integrate your marketing strategies with your other online and offline marketing strategies? Are there any possible areas of conflict or duplication of efforts? Although the list above is not exhaustive, I hope that what I've given will act as a guide to help you start pondering about such things, and cause you to think about other related areas as part of your overall social media marketing plan.
As in all other forms of business marketing, it is always good to remember the old adage: If you fail to plan, then you plan to fail.
