Want to Try Social Media Marketing for Your Business? Here is a Brilliant First Step

Social media is an excellent way to find and connect with customers to grow your business. 77% of Americans have a social media profile (www.statista.com).  Social media for small business does not have to be scary or too big to take on.  Start with an easy tool called Social Media Listening.  Social Media Listening is using the internet to learn about customers.  Find out where your customers are, what they are talking about and how you can help them.

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Hootsuite is a great place to start your social listening, plus it is free (well.. to get the most out of it you may want to pay for the advanced version but it’s not expensive).  Open a Hootsuite account here - Hootsuite Account.  They will walk you through adding streams and networks.  Be sure to search the following;

• Your business name/brand name/industry/website
• Product or service being offered
• Your competitors’ names and product
• Search terms a customer might type in google when looking for your product or service

 
Hootsuite is great, but also start a spreadsheet or other tracking tool to take notes and keep track of your research.  You want to find out what keywords your customers are using on the internet, what problems they have, what content they are interacting with, what platforms are they on, what competitors are doing and any information that is relevant to your business. 
Once you have Hootsuite set up you can use the resources below to add to your social listening.

1. Go to https://buzzsumo.com/  record your findings in hootsuite and your spreadsheet
2. Use https://trends.google.com/trends/?geo=US record your findings in hootsuite and your spreadsheet
3. Use the search box on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and twitter to do searches keep track of all ofyour research.

 
Below is an excellent overview of the demographics on each platform if you are not sure where to start.  Click here for more platform data. Think about the demographics of your business.
 
Once you have started your social media listening you will be in a great position to develop a Social Media Marketing Strategy.

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