Five foundations of a winning social media strategy
A strong social media presence is never an accident. Like anything in life, it will help to have good timing and good luck, but it’s funny how timing and luck seem to favor those who work hard and are strategic about their efforts. So, how do you develop a winning strategy? Below are five foundational steps that will ensure you’re headed in the right direction.
1. Hone your skills on one social media channel first before branching out to others
Social media can be overwhelming and confusing, so making things simple and straightforward at the outset gives you the best chance of success. If you are a small organization or if you are new to social media (or both), start with the channel or platform that you’re most comfortable with and focus on growing your following and engagement levels there. You can always add platforms once you’ve achieved a comfortable level of success on your original platform. Having said that, you should set up social media profiles for your organization on multiple social media channels even if you don’t use them yet. This helps with search engine optimization, and it claims your handle on those other channels if you ever do decide to use them.
2. Tell people who you are and what you do
This might be the most important step of all. Don’t assume people know who your organization is, what it does or what makes it unique. The whole point of being on social media is to know and be known. Tell people about yourself. This should be front and center in your profile and your social media interactions should always tie back to your identity.
3. Identify your target audience(s), but don’t stop there
Create a persona of your target audience members. Ask yourself what they look like, what they do for a living, what they wear, what music they listen to, what books they read, what they do in their free time, what they do with their money, what offends them and what excites them. Create an image and a concept of an individual audience member and then think through how this person would react to the things you post. Think about this person (or people) every time you post something.
4. Set clear goals
Ideally, your goals would be measurable, but that’s not always feasible. The most important thing is you need to know where your social media efforts should be focused. Some examples of clear goals include increasing your followers, increasing your interactions/engagements, raising awareness of your organization, raising awareness of specific issues or educating your followers.
5. Be consistent
Social media algorithms are sensitive to consistency and patterns. For this reason, you should set aside time to plan a social media calendar, to create content ahead of time and to schedule it to post with regularity. This doesn’t preclude you from posting and interacting more often (you definitely should do that), but it does ensure a consistent social media presence for those times when you are unable to interact in real time.
For more information on developing social media strategies, contact Minick Public Relations, LLC at Info@minickpr.com.
Mandy Minick is the principal and founder of Minick Public Relations, LLC. She is the immediate past chief communications officer for the Ohio Department of Education and has 20 years of public relations and entrepreneurial experience. Find Minick Public Relations on LinkedIn.