How Content Marketing and Social Media Work Together

While social media and content marketing on social media marketing may seem to be two different things, they actually work in tandem. Brands can maximize the impact of a massive piece of content like a white paper or blog post by posting small portions of it on their social media channels.

A strategy can help you concentrate and optimize your efforts so that you get the most out of every piece of content. It also helps you avoid wasting time on vanity metrics and identify what matters to your business, like brand awareness or website traffic.

1. Identify Your Audience

Social media marketing is a great tool to build relationships with potential customers. However, before you create the right content for your audience, you need to understand who they are. This will enable you to design a strategy that is more likely to achieve your goals and increase your bottom line.

The best way to begin is to monitor who follows your company on social media and also who interacts with your posts. What are their preferences? What kinds of information do they look for and why? This information will enable you to target similar people across different social media platforms.

You can also gain insight into your target audience by studying the content of companies within your field. What kinds of posts are they creating and sharing? What kind of content is generating results for them? This will give you some insight into how to create your own content.

You can also reach out to your followers via social media platforms to find out what they'd like to know about you. ModCloth, for example often asks its customers to send in photos of them wearing its products. It then features these photos on its social media channels. This makes the brand feel closer to its followers and can boost engagement.

Once you've identified your target audience and devised a strategy for them then you can begin producing and sharing content. Remember to monitor your metrics, but only those that connect to your SMART goals and KPIs (which you set in step one). Be aware that not all of your content will be successful immediately - but you will eventually see results if you're consistent and follow your plan.

2. Create a Strategy

To see growth from social media, you must have a plan. The posting of random b2b content marketing without purpose or strategy is not likely to help you gain new followers or get people to visit your site or turn into a client or customer. Instead, you should create a written strategy for your content that you and your team follow. This will help you set SMART goals and develop and share regular content.

To create your social media content marketing strategy, start with your buyer personas for social (or fictional representations of your ideal clients). Then, consider the types of content they enjoy and the formats which resonate best on each platform. Instagram and TikTok for instance, are great platforms for visuals such as short videos and photos. Twitter, on the other hand, is a better choice for content that is text-based, such as links or posts.

Also think about how you can utilize each platform to promote your brand in different ways. For instance, Instagram is a great platform for fashion brands to highlight their unique designs and products. Stumptown Coffee Roasters also uses their Facebook page for highlighting events and locations across the country.

Another way to increase engagement on your social media profiles is to invite your followers to interact with you by including calls-to-actions within your posts. If you are running an event or have an announcement invite your followers to share the post, tag friends, or leave comments.

Don't forget that social media is a fantastic location to showcase testimonials from customers and reviews. They can be extremely effective in increasing the trust of your audience, especially if they come from social media users who use or recommend your product or service.

3. Create Content

You must create content that is relevant to your target audience to effectively market your company through social media. This can be accomplished using a variety methods such as blogging, video, podcasts, infographics and more. Additionally, it's important to think about the kind of content your target audience wants to see and share. Research shows that information and promotional content score lower on social media than personal and entertaining content.

Once you've identified your target audience and marketing goals, it's now time to determine the type of content marketer that you'd like to see. It is recommended to mix promotional posts with interesting, entertaining, or educational posts. This will help your customers get involved with your business and increase your chances of converting them into customers.

One method of creating content is to talk to experts in your field. This is a great way to learn about the latest trends and strategies in your niche and also gives you the chance to promote your business by sharing the article with the interviewed individuals' own social networks.

Other types of content include industry news updates, tips, tricks and hacks. Think about including images in your posts. This has been proven to be more effective in grabbing attention and increasing engagement.

It's important to track the performance of your content, and make any necessary changes. If a particular type of content is not performing well you might need to alter its subject or angle.

4. Share Your Content

If you've created a strategy and created interesting content, it's essential to share it on social media. This is a great opportunity to increase your reach and draw in new customers. Just make sure to keep your updates brief and make sure to use catchy titles. Also, don't forget to vary the type of content marketing strategies you post - images, videos text, links and text can all be good options.

It's also a good idea to try to generate interest in your content by putting it up on various platforms at different times of the day. This will help ensure that you're reaching the largest amount of people you can.

You might also consider working with influencers or even running a competition. This is a great way to drive traffic and generate buzz for your brand.

Once your audience starts to trust your credibility as an information source, they are more likely to read your content and convert to customers. It is crucial to place more emphasis on quality than quantity when it comes time to start implementing content marketing.

It is important to remember that if you're using a pillar strategy to content marketing, it's recommended to share links to your long-form content on social media. This will give your audience an idea of what to expect and will encourage them to go to the entire article or blog.

It's not always clear why a certain content is shared more frequently than other content. It's nevertheless worth looking into the psychology of sharing to find out what drives people to share specific pieces of content. This will allow you to develop a more effective marketing strategy in the near future.

5. Keep track of your results

It is essential to track the results after having created your content and then shared it. This is how you'll be able to tell if your strategy working or if it needs to be adjusted. It is possible that certain platforms or content types perform better than others, or some types of content are more engaging than others. You can use tools like Mention and Hootsuite to monitor your social media engagement and track how your content is performing.

It is also helpful to keep in mind that just because your content is performing well doesn't necessarily mean that you should continue sharing it across all platforms. Each platform has its own audience and own best practices, which is why it is essential to tailor your content for each platform. This way, you will avoid overdoing it and offending your audience.

When you are analyzing your results, make sure to look at all of the metrics that are important to you and your team. Select metrics that are in line with your SMART objectives as well as KPIs. Be sure to distinguish these metrics for each of the social media platforms you utilize.

With the appropriate strategy and tactics you can effectively integrate social media and content marketing to increase brand recognition, increase web traffic, boost leads, boost sales, establish authority and much more. For more information on how to implement a successful content marketing strategy, check out this free downloadable guide from DemandJump. It includes strategies, case studies and more from companies like yours that have beaten the algorithms and achieved success in content marketing. Join today to receive your copy today!