In the digital age businesses would be crazy not to utilise the power of social media to build and grow their brand. With 15,000,000 monthly active Australian users on Facebook it is the obvious first choice but with so many other platforms out there how do you choose where to invest your time and money?
Well, first you need to consider three things:
Audience: How old is your target audience? How old are the audience of the site you’re considering? Do they match up? Consider the same questions for location, gender etc and evaluate if your target market can be found on that platform, and if not – then it’s a no go.
Content: What kind of content are you going to be producing? Is this going to change in the near future? Which platform Is the best for this type of content? EG: Pinterest is not the place for video but on Facebook or Insta you can have yourself a video party!
Industry: Lets be honest, some platforms work better for certain industries and that’s just how it is. If brands in your industry are killing it on Snapchat then go right ahead. But If video content isn’t your jam and millennials aren’t your target market then put the iPhone down.
Facebook s your chance to reach out to your customer everyday, and based on the fact that more than 60% of Australians are actively using Facebook and 50% logging in daily It’s pretty much a no brainer.
I’m sure you’ve heard about Facebook making changes to their News Feed algorithm and this means marketers and biz owners need to adapt their strategies to reflect the new newsfeed. How you ask? Create and encourage conversation! Posts that encourage people to tag their friends or family and have conversations in the comments will be seen as more valuable and therefore shown to more people. Ergo more engagement and brand awareness for you!
A Sprout Social study from 2016 shows that the most active Facebook users are in the 18-29 age bracket but the below graphic shows that it’s pretty high across the board!
The types of content you have to work with on Facebook are the most varied of all the platforms so let’s go through the list – Text, images, videos, check-ins, recommendations, polls, discounts and special offers and the paid advertising options!
Because of the wide demographic there’s not many (if any) businesses that can’t use Facebook to build their brand – no matter what the industry. Facebook success purely depends on finding what type of content works best for your target audience and what is getting you the most engagement. Then you create more of it and give the people what they want! So basically, if you’re a business and you don’t have a Facebook page and post regularly then get to it!
Instagram is absolutely booming with 600 million active users worldwide! Its no wonder brands are taking advantage of the platform and all its great features.
Just like Facebook, there’s a slightly more female audience on Instagram – it seems us girls just can’t get enough of social media! And the typical age is between 18-29 so that’s a really important one to consider and compare with your target market.
Now I’m not saying that if your target market is out of this demographic don’t use Insta – that would be crazy! It just means that Instagram shouldn’t be the be all and end all of your social media efforts, mix it up a little with some other platforms too!
80% of users say they follow at least one business on Instagram and 30% say they’ve made a purchase form a company they first discovered on Instagram.
Instagram Content is made up of images and video either on the feed or in Instagram stories, and the introduction of Instagram advertising offers a huge advantage for businesses. To be successful on Instagram you should post regularly, learn to get over your video fear and post IG stories and take advantage of user generated content. People see user generated content as more authentic because its from real people just like them. So instead of always posting your images or opinion on your product or service, share content from your customers!
There are currently more than 8 million Instagram Business profiles, so why not add yours to the mix!
Now approximately 4,700,000 Monthly Active Australian Users sounds like a fair amount, but when you consider Australia’s population level, this accounts for just 18%.
You can see below that while the 18-29 age group accounts for most of the users the genders are pretty even. So there’s no real discrimination between male or female orientated products for marketers.
While statistics show 30% of adults who make over $75,000 use Twitter, only 18% of adults who make $30,000–$49,999 use Twitter. So you can see that depending on the price of the product or service you’re selling, twitter is may or may not be more likely to contain your target market based on the income level of users.
To be quite honest, I don’t feel the need to offer Twitter as an option to most of my clients because for their industry and target market there are far better platforms for us to spend time and money working on.
Youtube
Youtube actually has the same level of popularity as Facebook with 15,000,000 Unique Australian Visitors per month. This means that 60% of Aussies are watching a Youtube video at least once a month, and the numbers are this high for good reason – people love video. They love making it, they love sharing it, they love watching it.
Video can be one of the most engaging types of content, but it is something business owners often neglect. Whether it is because you or your staff are camera shy, you think you don’t have the video editing skills or its simply just too hard. But realistically, if you create content for Youtube, you can so easily re-purpose it for use on Facebook, Instagram and snapchat so technically your multitasking and saving yourself time!
With approximately 562 million users worldwide, LinkedIn is targeted towards a more professional audience who want to build networks and connections. This is perfect for company who has the capability to have customers or clients around the world because as they say, it’s not what you know – it’s who you know. Employees are your biggest advantage when it comes to getting your page off the ground, and when employees follow you and list you as their employer you can tap into a far wider network of their connections.
Even though it is a more professional platform, the best way to keep your LinkedIn audience engaged is to post various types of content – including video! Make sure you post daily if you want to establish a real connection with your audience and get your employees involved and share behind-the-scenes stories. This is key to building trust and growing your community.
LinkedIn Video is actually 5x more likely to than any other content type to start a conversation.
Note that if you don’t have an existing personal LinkedIn profile, you’ll need to set one up before creating a page for your company.
Social Media is your chance to get creative with your content and give people an insight into your business. Don’t forget that you shouldn’t go all out and try to be across every platform available. Start with one or two and work your way up from there!
Iconic Media 