How Entrepreneurs and Small Business Owners Can Make the Most of Social Media
Updated: Mar 14, 2022
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he more general approach to social media is often overlooked in all of the details for small businesses and entrepreneurs. What are long-term topics that businesses can feel good about investing in?
For entrepreneurs and small business owners, social media offer significant advantages in this highly digitalized world. Social media has freed entrepreneurs from the shackles of expensive traditional advertising platforms. With the right strategy and consistent execution, any entrepreneur can make the most of social media now.
With the right strategy and consistent execution, any entrepreneur can make the most of social media now.
Before we get into how do entrepreneurs use social media, let’s address why they do it. Why social media marketing is important? Social media can provide entrepreneurs and small business owners with the audience and the tools to reach them. Whether it’s to create brand awareness, acquire or retain customers, launch sales offers, or increase audience engagement, social media can do it all.
If as a small business owner you’ve ever wondered how do entrepreneurs use social media successfully, here’s everything you need to know. This is our quick and concise guide to using social media, based on our experience helping entrepreneurs across categories grow their businesses.
1. Identify your target audience
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The first step is to know who you’re talking to. That will increase the efficiency of your social media outreach. You need to create a buyer persona that will reveal the demographics and psychographics of your audience. Rule number one in selecting target groups is to be as specific as possible.
Rule number one in selecting target groups is to be as specific as possible.
Instead of saying suburban women, can you specify their age groups and interests? Are you looking to market to health-conscious women between the ages of 30 and 45?
Instead of defining them as landlords, can you be more specific about where they live and the kind of properties they have?
Instead of targeting all travelers, should you be talking to hikers, trekkers, solo travelers, campers, international tourists, etc.?
What if you’ve never done it before? Here are three quick ways to help you find your buyer persona:
Facebook groups: Look for the groups where your consumers are likely to hang out. Find out what they’re talking about, their pain points, and the solutions they seek. Watch out for the words and phrases they use.
Your network: You may find your ideal customer among your family, friends, or colleagues. When you find them, think about their other interests and what they usually talk about.
Competitors: Who are your competitors’ followers on social media? What kind of content do they engage with the most? What do they most comment on?
2. Identify the right social media platforms
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Your business and your target audience will help you find the right social media platform. Broadly, Facebook and Instagram are ideal for those selling directly to consumers and LinkedIn is suited for those targeting other businesses.
Certain categories also have a bias for some platforms. For travel, Instagram and YouTube are the places to be. If you offer educational content, Facebook should be your focus. If you’re selling IT services to offices, LinkedIn and Facebook could be your primary platforms.
The platform you choose will also depend on whether you’re a location-based business or if you’re into e-commerce. Importantly, choose just one or two social media platforms, to begin with. Don’t spread yourself too thin.
Before you set up social media accounts for your small business, here’s something to remember. You’ll have to go where your audience is, irrespective of your familiarity with the platform.
If you’re selling a fashion brand or interior design services, you’ll necessarily have to learn how to use Instagram. Whether you’re good at taking photos or videos is irrelevant because that’s where your audience is and if you don’t go there, your competitors will.
Also, remember that efficiency comes with usage.
3. Create social media content
After you decide which platform to focus on, it’s time to start creating content. There are three things to remember as you start generating content for your small business social media accounts.
You can do it: You don’t need to be a writer or designer. Start small and write about what your business plans to solve. Share photos and videos. Don’t worry if it looks amateurish. In fact, that will make it look credible. Don’t have images? Try Unsplash.
Be consistent: Consistency beats intensity. Social media platforms reward users who post regularly. Once you start with a social media calendar, it’s easy to know what to post next. You will grow your audience as you become diligent about posting.
Mix it up: Write a blog post, make videos, share images of your products or even multi-images, office, or colleagues, show behind-the-scenes snippets, conduct polls, and even talk about your failures. You can also repurpose your content. Turning your blogs into social media content will give you more to post.
4. Batch and use schedulers
Use a social media management app to batch and schedule
How do entrepreneurs use social media for their startups even when they’re busy? Through automation.
You should create content for several weeks in one batch and then use a social media management app like Hookle. You can plan, publish, and schedule posts to multiple social media channels with just one app. It will save you time and free you from the need to hire a specialized team.
Additionally, you can save even more time by setting your posts to be repeated automatically using the recurring posts feature provided by Hookle as well.
5. Have a purpose
Consumers expect brands to be aware of the larger socioeconomic challenges and align with them. Even the smallest of businesses can and should share their support for progressive and inclusive programs. Social media shouldn’t be merely about marketing. It should be a conversation about the world we live in and the events and issues that affect us all.
In short
You don’t need hundreds of thousands of dollars to spend on marketing. Social media offers one of the most functional and cost-effective ways for entrepreneurs to build brands and engage with audiences. With a bit of practice and commitment, small business owners can make social media pages their customer acquisition channels.
Need a hand with boosting your social media presence as a small business owner? Take a look of Hookle - your personal social media assistant app or book a demo with us today, and our team will be happy to help you!
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