Is Social Video Marketing Right for Your Business?

In a word, YES. With astonishingly few exceptions. Whether your business is online or offline, whether your target audience is consumers, business owners, or academics, whether your audience is limited to one city, one country or is international, you can use social video marketing to increase your sales, your reach, your brand awareness, and your profits.

It doesn’t matter if your annual sales are five, six, seven figures, or more. It doesn’t matter if you have one employee or one thousand employees. If you are selling to a customer, you can use the viral power of social video to enhance your business.

The keys to making an effective video marketing campaign are to grab the interest of the viewer, hold on to that interest until your message is delivered, and strive to make the video interesting or quirky enough that they feel compelled to share it. You don’t need to have Hollywood-style production values to make a successful video. Many of the most successful marketing videos are simply a person talking in front of a whiteboard. If you are shy and don’t want to appear in your video, you can have animated whiteboard videos made for you; these are proven effective in engaging the viewer and retaining their interest.

Now, from all these examples, it may seem as though social video can do anything. Well, almost. Even as magical as social video can be, it does have its limitations. You can’t really send out samples through video, nor can you have potential customers smell or taste anything. But with well-chosen video and carefully crafted copy, you can get around these limitations to deliver a knockout punch of a sales message through video. And the customer interaction doesn’t necessarily stop when the video ends, either. As the above example, you could include a strong Call To Action to nudge them in the direction of requesting a sample, or other appropriate action.

Video even works for local offline businesses – think restaurants or landscaping companies. A restaurant can show their best dishes, and the ambiance of the dinner service; possibly mini-interviews with satisfied diners. Anything that a television commercial (remember those?) can do, social video can do and probably better, with the specific targeting available on most ad platforms.

The new wave of marketing is social video-video that not only sells, informs, and educates, but begs to be shared and shown to friends, family and acquaintances.

Using social media to promote your business can be lucrative if you know what to do to make the most of it. You have to remember that social media is not a short-term game. It takes time and commitment as well as a specific goal in mind.

* Complete Your Profiles – Fill out your profiles completely, using keywords that your audience as well as search engines would use to find you. Show your personality, link to your online real estate, and make sure people can connect with you easily.

* Post Quality Content – When you post anything on social media, take the time to consider whether the content is relevant, has quality components and will give your audience a reason to want to keep following you.

* Play the Long Game – Social media marketing results don’t happen overnight. It can take months of consistent and focused activity to get the outcomes that you want. Don’t expect it to happen straight away.

* Engage Influencers – Use the search function on all social media networks to find movers and shakers within your industry so that you can engage with them. Getting their attention in a good way will help increase your influence too.

* Avoid Time Wasters – When you get on social media it’s very tempting to start looking at memes, talk to your friends and family, play Farmville, and pretend you’re working.

* Do Unto Others – If you want people to comment and share your information, be sure that you do the same for other people. The best course of action is if someone markets to your same audience but is not direct competition. Work together to promote each other.

* Pay for Promotion – When you are trying to get a more likes, followers or newsletter sign-ups, it’s a good idea to pay for promotion. On Facebook you can pay to promote particular posts, or run a pay-per-click ad relatively inexpensively.

* Add Value – Don’t just like and tweet things without adding something to the conversation that is important. The more value you can add to social media discussions, the more people will want to get to know you and follow, friend and like you.

Using social media to promote your business is a great way to get more visitors to your website and make more sales. But, you have to be willing to be committed to taking the time to do what it takes to reach your goals. Avoid pretending to “work” on social media while you’re really just socializing. Set specific goals, develop tactics to reach the goals, and you will be successful.

One thing to do on social media is to write posts. Posts are what keep your social media active and your audience engaged. However, it’s imperative that you have a strategy so that you can get the most out of your social media interactions. For the most part, your social media strategy should involve building your email list or sending them to your website so that they can become customers.

* Understand Your Customers – You need to know who your target audience is so that you can recognize what type of posts will get more traction with them. For example, some audience members will be insulted by certain types of comedy. Others will respond very well to it. Know who they are so that your posts can be targeted.

* Watch Your Competition – It’s always a good idea to check out what your competition is doing in regard to social media posts. Don’t just copy what they are doing. Instead, observe whether or not the competition is getting a result or not from their actions, and note how you can do it better or differently.

* Know the Goal of the Post – What action do you want your customers to take when they read the post? Do you want them to click through to read more? Do you want them to like, follow and share? You need to be clear about what you want them to do in order to get action.

* Add a Relevant Image – People respond best to relevant images on social media. You can make memes and infographic using free software like Canva.com for your social media posts. A nice image, watermarked with a relevant quote will do wonders.

* Write a Blurb that Gets Attention – When you share a meme or a blog post or other type of post on social media write a blurb about it, and what you want your readers to do about it.

* Link to the Rest of the Story – Don’t just post most of your updates without linking to the rest of the blog post, more information about the meme, a newsletter sign up, or your website.

* Ask Your Audience to Share – Never forget to ask your audience to share your posts. You can also invite them to take memes and infographics off your website to share. Just set up a new page that lists all the watermarked images that your audience can share.

* Respond to Comments – Don’t just ignore the interaction that is happening on your social media pages. Always respond, and add comments to the discussion. Answer questions, and be kind. Even if someone is rude, don’t respond rudely. If you have to, delete the rude comment and let it go.

Writing social media posts that get a discussion going and inspire people to share and interact is an art. You’ll need to try different tactics to see what works with your particular audience. But, be sure to always have a call to action on the post so that your audience knows what to do. Remember that your goal is to get them on your email list so that you can market to them on an ongoing basis.

No matter what industry you’re part of, there is a social site that is made for it. You’ve likely heard the saying that “It’s not what you know, but who you know.” That’s why networking on industry-specific social sites is so important. In addition, it will help you keep up with, and even stay ahead of, fads within your industry. To take advantage of industry-specific social sites, it’s important to consider the following.

1. Follow the Rules – Each social site will have its own rules and they are important to follow. You don’t want to go into any social site, no matter where it is hosted, and immediately start promoting yourself and posting links. Read the rules, follow the rules and you’ll soon find that you’re an accepted member.

2. Craft an Outstanding Profile – If you are able to create a specific profile for the social site, make it great. You want your profile to be like a mini, toned-down sales page so that when someone clicks to read, they want to click through to your website too.

3. Upload a Professional Headshot – Today people are quite informal online but when you are part of a professional industry, get a headshot that fits. Some industries are more casual than others. Fit the image that the industry has, but also allow your personality to show through. Most of all, be tasteful.

4. Take Time to Observe Members – Before jumping in, observe how the members interact. There are some cases where you’ll realize you don’t want to be part of the group due to something that is going on. Other times you’ll realize you’ve hit the jackpot of informed industry leaders and experts that you can engage with. The idea is to get to know who the movers and shakers are in the group.

5. Get to Know Members – As you start identifying members that you want to get to know, reach out and do an introduction post. Start commenting on the movers’ and shakers’ posts and activities. Ask questions and attend meetings. Participate in as much as you can. The more you get to know the members of the group, the more you can help each other.

6. Engage High Ranking Members – High ranking members get a lot of comments on any posts they make, and they participate more than other people. With some casual observations you’ll be able to see who is a leader in a group or even who runs the group. When you do figure out who they are, make it a point to engage with them.

7. Freely Give Advice in Your Area of Expertise – Eventually, you can start offering your own advice when people ask questions. If the industry social site offers webinars, Google Hangouts or other “live” events, volunteer to be an expert and share as much as you can with the others about what you know.

8. Get Content Ideas – A really excellent way to take advantage of industry-specific social sites is to use the questions, articles, and other information as ideas for content that you will write or have written for your website.

9. Share, Like, and Congratulate Others – Be sure to take part in activities that don’t involve self-promotion but involves the promotion of others. When you are selfless, people will return the favor when they have something to share too.

10. Become the Go-To Expert – It may take a while, but with enough professional answers and participation on your part, the people in the social site will start to see you as an industry expert and will want to come directly to you for answers. They will also send their friends and family to you.

Participating in industry-specific social sites is something you should take advantage of if you want to grow your business, become known as an expert, and stay ahead of the rest. Differentiating yourself among your peers will help you get more customers as well as help keep you educated and informed.

Successful social media experts know what it takes to make social media work for you. Aside from including regular updates, relevant posts, and stand-out content, make sure that you stay involved in each social media network in a personal way.

* Make Your Social Media Profiles Stand Out – Fill out your social media profiles in full, and learn what constitutes best practices for social media profiles on that particular network. Each network has its own personality that you should mind, but let your personality shine through too.

* Make the Right Connections – If you can connect with other experts and movers and shakers, you’ll be able to get more traction because if you can have a conversation with them, all their followers will see it.

* Make Your Business Pages Interactive and Informative – Don’t skimp on making your pages represent your business appropriately. On each social media network you can create pages that look awesome and get results.

* Share Relevant Industry Topics – If you want to quickly become a go-to expert, find relevant industry news and share it with your followers. Don’t worry; giving it away works.

* Join the Conversation – Don’t just be a robot by posting things without ever commenting and entering into discussions with others. You want to jump right in and talk to others just like you would if you were at a live social gathering.

* Learn to Use Hashtags Correctly – Hashtags help you organize and search for relevant content on social media. Always use the # before the word, use no punctuation, keep it as short as possible and use letters and numbers.

* Advertise Strategically – Running advertisements on social media is a great way to get the word out about a new product or service. However, be strategic when running an advertisement so that you know exactly what you expect to achieve with it.

* Use Sponsored Ads and Posts – When you have something important to get across to your audience, it’s important to use sponsored ads where many eyes are on the post. Mind your budget.

* Hire an Experienced Copywriter – For some of the posts, it’s imperative that you work with a copywriter who understands your business and your voice, to help you with many of the posts and get them right within the space needed.

* Be Yourself When You Post – When you are in a discussion on social media, outside of representing your business you are also representing yourself. Be who you are so that your social media presence has a personality.

You don’t have to reinvent the wheel when you get involved with social media marketing. Follow the experts and do what they are doing. Focus on differentiating yourself and being a real person with a unique voice that represents your business.

Social media marketing is a good way to get the word out about your business, products and/or services. But, there are times when you have to be cognizant of the fact that social media marketing has the potential to draw you in and become a major time sucker. If you want to ensure that social media is not controlling you, follow these tips.

* Have a Plan of Action – Don’t do anything without a plan. You need a GPS to get to your destination; you also need a plan to ensure that social media marketing will work well for your business.

* Create a Social Media Publication Calendar – Plan ahead according to the products and services you want to promote to craft posts and updates that have a purpose. If you have a calendar with pre-written posts, you can easily schedule them to work with your product launches.

* Avoid Time-Sucking Activities – You know it is simple to get sucked into yet another personality quiz or discussions about that delicious plate of pasta your friend just made, not to mention all the games – but don’t do it. It’s fine to have fun, but do it after your work is complete.

* Outsource Scheduling – Once you create a publication calendar that matches your promotions you can give the list of updates to someone else to schedule and monitor. However, don’t make that an excuse not to engage personally.

* Take Time to Comment and Engage – Even if you outsource parts of your social media marketing, be sure to personally comment and engage your followers so that they know you are a real person to trust and know.

* Do More of What Works – If you do something that works, do more of it and less of what doesn’t. Monitor the metrics of everything that you do so that you are positive about what is working and what is not working.

* Each Post Needs a Reason for Being – Don’t post something without a purpose. If you don’t know why you are posting it, don’t bother.

* Don’t Forget Your Call to Action – Everything you do should have a CTA. Whether it is to share, follow, or click, ensure clarity about what you want your audience members to do. If they know what you want them to do, they’re more likely to do it.

Using social media correctly to market your business is an essential element today in the world of advertising and marketing. Social media marketing can be very effective and inexpensive if you are careful not to waste time and effort on messing around and doing things that have no purpose.