Different Social Media Platforms and How to Use Them
Within the wide scope of digital marketing, social media marketing has emerged over the last few years and become a cornerstone of modern marketing strategy. The rapid growth of popularity across all demographics has proven that social media is one of the best ways to generate leads while growing brand awareness and connecting with your target audience, which is the heart of all marketing.
With so many benefits to these marketing channels and such ubiquity across the world in this digital age, digital marketers do face some challenges. Not the least of which, is developing a balanced approach that integrates all key platforms. When we think of social media marketing strategy, consider the various platforms as different body parts of the same person. To maintain a strong, well-developed strategy, you will need to ensure that all parts are healthy and functioning properly. If you begin to favor one over the others too heavily, they grow weak and will eventually “shut down” and lead to lost customers and conversion.
While it seems like there’s a new platform every day, in this article we’ll cover the main ones and explain how to balance your strategy and execution. The primary social media platforms for marketing include:
- TikTok
Facebook Marketing Strategy
To continue with the metaphor of the human body representing a balanced social media marketing strategy, we’ll begin with Facebook. This is the heart of your strategy. One of the earliest and most subscribed platforms, Facebook incorporates aspects of all of the other platforms and spans across nearly all major demographics. There is essentially no limit to the marketing capabilities of this platform. Some of the best features include:
- Setting up a business page
- Sharing videos and pictures
- Running targeted ad campaigns
- Customer outreach through posts
- Surveys
- Running free ads through various types of posts
- Live streaming and stories
While these are just a few of the key features, it’s clear that Facebook provides a wide range of benefits to digital marketers, and this doesn’t even include the rapidly growing field of virtual reality and the metaverse which Facebook is helping pioneer. Facebook pumps life through your entire social media campaign and must be an integral part of your strategy.
Twitter Marketing Strategy
If Facebook is the heart, then Twitter would be the head. This is where awareness comes into play. Whether it be news, quick business updates, funny posts to improve branding, or utilizing polls and hashtags to gain consumer insights and increase engagement, Twitter is a proven platform to increase awareness and visibility across social media. Developing a strong following and community through Twitter enables you to open up your customer outreach and test new styles of messaging, which will then allow you to refine your overall marketing communication strategy. Quick and immediate feedback means quick and immediate insights if the right social media manager is running your campaign. The ability to instantly gauge the favorability of a post or campaign is invaluable. Twitter helps you think quickly and improve awareness, which is why this is the head.
Instagram Marketing Strategy
Owned by Facebook, Instagram offers many similar marketing tools with a few differences. Because of key features such as ads, product catalogs, and shopping, Instagram is the ideal platform for both e-commerce and brick and mortar businesses. Pair those with the ability to share pictures, live stories, polls and videos, it’s no wonder why so many businesses use Instagram to improve their branding and gain customers. Instagram brings your products and services to customers, which is why this platform is the legs of your social media marketing strategy.
LinkedIn Marketing Strategy
LinkedIn is the premier social media marketing platform for business professionals. While it is useful for some B2C (business to consumer) marketing goals, its primary focus is towards B2B (business to consumer). While sometimes overlooked by less experienced digital marketers, this is where business gets done and deals are made, making it the hands of your social media strategy (because you can hold a briefcase and shake on deals, try to stick with us- I promise we’re almost finished). LinkedIn serves many purposes and incorporates several unique functions such as a job searching and recruiting tool to help you grow your business. You can also add or consume courses from LinkedIn Learning which can help you gain knowledge of your industry or establish your brand as a thought leader. LinkedIn also offers ads and sponsored mail, which directly reaches out to leads in their inbox. Similar to Facebook and Instagram, you can also set up a business page and track key analytics to improve your reach and strategy.
TikTok Marketing Strategy
TikTok is the newest and most rapidly growing of the primary social media platforms and one that must be included in your strategy if you hope to capture the younger demographics. Whereas LinkedIn is the B2B focused platform and represents the handshake or briefcase, TikTok is almost strictly B2C and serves as the smartphone of the body- because at this point, phones have become a part of the human anatomy. It seems like teens and children are getting smartphones earlier and earlier in life, which has made these younger generations a fortified and highly sought-after demographic. And you may ask, what do these kids even do with their smartphones and the access to limitless knowledge and capabilities? They spend hours upon hours scrolling through TikTok. Simple as that. This platform fills a growing need in society for quick and seemingly endless content that can be consumed in an instant. As Twitter served to provide a quicker experience and more easily digestible content than long form content on Facebook, TikTok similarly has provided an alternative to long form content on YouTube. Your ability to capitalize on this market and gain the following of key demographics, you’ll need to be able to produce concise and compelling content that both entertains and informs consumers in just a few seconds. While this may seem challenging at first, remember that TikTok offers a wide range of features to help you improve your marketing reach. Targeted ads are a great way to focus your strategy on those who will most likely convert into sales. Utilizing hashtags can help your content go viral. Beyond that, setting up a business page and adding shopping capabilities is a great way to gain traffic and improve e-commerce revenue. While initially thought of as a fading trend, TikTok is here to stay, at least for a little while, so it’s an important part of your marketing strategy.
Contact Nxt Era Marketing
Developing and executing a well-balanced social media marketing is a challenging task, but one that must be accomplished to achieve success in digital marketing and business. The best way to achieve this task is to partner with an experienced social media management agency like Nxt Era Marketing. Our highly skilled team will create a customized social media strategy to help you capture all target audiences and demographics for your business and improve your branding and revenue. Contact us today and schedule your free consultation.
