Digital marketing is like a large machine, it has many small parts that all work together to make the machine work properly and smoothly. A lot of these small parts are essential; without them the machine that is digital marketing would fail to work. While lacking a good social media campaign may not break the entire machine, it will make what the machine does less effective. Social media is another way to engage people, get them reading and clicking on links, and eventually trying to capture them as leads.
A lot of people assume the idea behind a company having a social media campaign is to simply get the company or brand more recognition by promoting on social sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. Though this is a good thing, the real importance of social media in digital marketing comes from the clicks. Yeah, itâ??s great if your Twitter gains a follower or your Facebook status gets a few hundred likes and shares. But, what good is that really doing you if nobody ends up on your website buying your product or service because of your status updates or tweets?
Studies show that when companies focus on likes, followers, shares, and +1â??s in social media rather than actual engagement only about 3%-5% of the people who see, like, or share their social media posts actually make it to their website. When you create a social media campaign you need to have this goal in mind: Getting people to your companyâ??s website where they can be introduced to your products and services and driven into your sales funnel. Of course you donâ??t want your entire social media campaign to consist of links to your website, that wouldn’t work any more than using social media just to get likes and shares. You have to have a balance of the different types of social media posts.
Social media is essentially another way to drive traffic to your website, capture leads, build your brand name, and interact with your potential customers. Though social media essentially does the same thing as many other aspects of digital marketing, it differs because of how people view it. If you and your company are on social media sites interacting with potential customers, engaging them in conversation, and showing them valuable information it will make them feel more connected to you. Social media can take information that you could have relayed in a blog post and makes it more personal. This is because so many of us communicate over these sites so often that we view it as near actual interaction, seeing your posts in real time and having the option to respond to what you say will give potential customers the feeling that they know you. When potential customers have this feeling they are much more likely to turn into leads and even repeat buyers. Youâ??d rather buy something off someone you know or feel like you know than a complete stranger, right?
The importance of social media in digital marketing lies in the personable nature of it, the signal boost it gives you and your company, and the easy access so many people have to it. Someone may not feel like going to your blog and reading the 2,000 word piece you wrote on the new software your coming out with next year, but theyâ??ll have no trouble logging into twitter and seeing your sentence and a half about it there, complete with a link that goes right to a description of said software and maybe even a place to order it. Social media can be used as bait. People are already going to be on their Facebooks, so posting a link to your blog with a witty sentence about how interesting it is will probably get you more reads than posting it on your blog and waiting for people to stumble across it. Social media can help amplify any digital marketing efforts youâ??re making and that is the basis of why it really is so important. It may not be essential to the machine running, but it does enhance the machines performance by quite a lot.
Need to start your own social media campaign, but aren’t quite sure how? Contact us for a free consultation and we’ll get you on the right track!
