Want to grow your business faster?…without paying crazy amounts on paid advertising?

Organic marketing is the answer. (Keep reading for my secrets).  

My name is Connor Gillivan. I’ve been an Entrepreneur for 12+ years scaling multiple businesses to 6, 7, and 8 figures w/ an exit in 2019. Today, I run marketing for my portfolio of 4 businesses. 

The majority of my success in business has been through organic marketing. 

In this article, I’ll share my top 7 organic marketing strategies.

1. SEO
2. Partnerships
3. Podcast interviews
4. Social media
5. Content marketing
6. CRO
7. Email marketing

By the end, you’ll have a headful of ideas to execute for growing your business. 

Let’s dive into it! 

My 7 Organic Marketing Strategies

In this section, I’ll define the 7 organic marketing strategies that I mentioned and give examples of each so that you can fully understand how they can help grow your business. 

1. SEO

SEO is the act of creating content on your website (pages & blog articles) that rank for specific keywords your ideal customer is searching for on Google and other search engines. 

For example, let’s say that you run an eCommerce business selling baby clothes. Your baby clothes are organic, custom-made, sourced from the US, and fashionable. 

With SEO, you’d want to rank for keywords like: 

• “Organic baby clothing”
• “Baby clothes made in the US”
• “Fashionable baby clothing” 

By investing in SEO, you can optimize your website, pages, and content with the goal of ranking on the 1st page of search results. 

This will drive traffic to your website where you can convert users into email subscribers and customers. 

2. Partnerships

Partnerships is a marketing strategy where you team up with other companies in your industry where you’re not competing with one another, but you’re targeting the same ideal customer profile (ICP). 

For example, one of my companies is AccountsBalance, a monthly bookkeeping service for agencies, service providers, & SAAS companies. 

We have a Partner Program where we partner with 100s of other digital service providers, softwares, tools, and influencers. 

To start, we add each other to our Partner pages (exchanging backlinks), we feature each other in our newsletters (brand awareness & lead generation), then we find other ways to send leads both ways on a quarterly basis.  

Relationship building turns into brand awareness, visitors to your website, referrals, leads, & customers. 

3. Podcast Interviews

Most people know podcasts for listening to them, but there’s another side to it that is extremely beneficial for organic marketing. 

When I say “podcast interviews”, I’m referring to the marketing practice of getting interviewed on podcasts within your industry where you can share your expertise, establish yourself as a thought leader, and attract new customers to your business. 

For example, my business partner, Nathan Hirsch, has been interviewed on 500+ podcasts in the past 5 years. We have a system where we research top podcasts in our niches where our ideal customers are reading then we reach out and pitch them to interview Nathan. He goes on the podcast & drives leads to our businesses. 

When you do this consistently for months, you create a lot of “buzz” around you and your business. 

That “buzz” turns into new website traffic, leads, and customers. 

4. Social Media

Yes, we all know what social media is, but there’s a specific way to do it for organic marketing that can drive lots of interested customers to your business. 

I encourage you to look at social media as a platform where you can establish yourself as a subject matter expert (SME), build a following, and turn followers into paying customers. 

Here’s an example. I own and run marketing for 4 businesses and I use LinkedIn as a social media channel to establish myself as an SEO expert & entrepreneur, which drives customers to our companies. 

My ideal customer spends time on LinkedIn. I build trust with them through my daily posts & teaching them the SEO & marketing methods that are working best for me. 

It takes time, consistency, a good process, and dedication, but social media is an amazing place to reach your ideal customer.

5. Content Marketing

Content marketing is the organic marketing practice of creating high value content that speaks directly to your ideal customer and pulls them into your email list so that you can continue “talking” to them. 

Here’s some examples of content marketing: 

• Infographics
• Ebooks
• Checklists
• White papers
• Webinars
• Free trainings

Content marketing helps to “pull” your ideal customer into your business so they know you’re an option as they look to solve different problems they have. 

6. CRO

CRO stands for conversion rate optimization.

CRO is the act of optimizing your website and all of its pages for converting as many website visitors as possible into email subscribers or paying customers. 

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Let’s look at an example. You figure out the first 5 organic marketing channels and you start driving 1,000s of visitors to your website every month. Congrats on that first of all! But does it really matter if none of those people convert into email subscribers or customers? 

That’s where CRO comes in. You dive into the design, content, and performance of each page on your website to see how you can convert more visitors into subscribers and customers. 

7. Email Marketing

Last, but certainly not least is email marketing. Email marketing is building an owned email list of people that are interested in your business, you, and the products/services that you offer. Then regularly communicating with those people through a newsletter and automated email campaigns to convert them into paying customers. 

It’s great to get people to sign up for your email list or newsletter, but if you’re not communicating with them, it’s worthless. You need an email marketing strategy where you’re communicating with them, getting to know them better, answering their questions, and building trust with them. 

For example, one of my companies, Outsource School, is focused on teaching business owners how to hire and scale their business with virtual assistants and freelancers from the Philippines. We run a weekly newsletter that provides free advice and strategies on outsourcing to 5,000+ potential customers. We build additional trust with them each week and over time many of them become members. 

How to Get Started (w/ Each) 

Now that you know the 7 organic marketing strategies that you can use to grow your business faster, let’s talk about some simple, actionable steps you can take to get them started. 

1. SEO

Ideas to get started: 

• Build a Blog page on your website. 
• Commit to writing & publishing 1 new blog each week. 
• Target 1 keyword with each blog. 
• Make your keywords what your ideal customer would search to find you. 
• Make all of your content high quality & value for your customer. 

2. Partnerships

Ideas to get started: 

• Open a new Google Sheet or Trello board.
• Make a Partner 100. Your top 100 ideal partners. 
• Find contact information for all 100. (Or have a VA do it) 
• Reach out to them on social media & email. 
• Work to build a relationship with them.
• Run content exchanges together. 

3. Podcast Interviews

Ideas to get started: 

• Similar to the Partner 100, make a Podcast 100. 
• Research 100 top podcasts where your ideal customer is listening. 
• List out your areas of expertise & value you could add to the podcast. 
• Reach out and pitch hosts to interview you. 
• Record the interview with the host. 
• Improve your interviewing skills as you practice. 

4. Social Media

Ideas to get started: 

• Choose 1 channel to start with. 
• If looking for B2B customers, use Twitter or LinkedIn. 
• If for B2C customers, Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook. 
• Post 1x per day
• Reply to comments that people leave. 
• Build a personal brand around your expertise. 

5. Content Marketing

Ideas to get started: 

• Brainstorm a list of 5 lead magnets your ideal customer would like. 
• Over 6-12 months, make the 5 lead magnets.
• Feature them on your site. 
• Post about them on your social media. 
• Ask your partners to share them.

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6. CRO

Ideas to get started: 

• Once you have website traffic, set up tracking with Google Analytics. 
• Measure how many visitors you’re converting to email subscribers. 
• Once you have a baseline, make a list of improvements you could make. 
• Implement them and repeat this every quarter. 

7. Email Marketing

Ideas to get started: 

• Choose an email marketing software to use: Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, Constant Contact, etc. 
• Start a weekly newsletter that you send out. Same day, same time each week. 
• Build a content calendar and get ahead of the schedule. 
• Schedule newsletters and get feedback from your subscribers. 

Take Action

Organic marketing is a valid and proven way to drive potential customers to your website that you can then work to convert into paying customers. 

I’ve been using organic marketing strategies for scaling my businesses for the past 10 years and I continue to be a huge proponent of them today. 

You don’t need huge marketing budgets to grow your business. All you need is proven processes, consistency, and the drive to keep at it for months on end. 

TL;DR:

1. SEO

2. Partnerships

3. Podcast Interviews

4. Social Media

5. Content Marketing

6. CRO

7. Email Marketing

Sit down and plan out how you’ll get these started for your business.

Take 1 at a time, perfect a process for it, delegate, and then move onto adding another. 

By the end of 1-2 years, you’ll have a fully running organic marketing machine that is driving 1,000s of leads to your business every single month. 
Have question? Follow me on LinkedIn and DM me with questions!

The post 7 Organic Marketing Strategies to Scale Faster in 2023 appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

Building a powerful and talented team is the most essential step to creating a successful business.

Hiring the right people is the most important part of that process.

But there’s one huge dilemma in finding the right new employees: All the great ones are already hired, and more often than not valued in their companies, simply because they are awesome.

How to find them and lure them to join your brand?

If there’s one thing I’ve noticed about a successful hiring strategy, it’s that they tend to be super organized. Disciplined too.

Here are a few new tactics and trends to help you attract the right talent:

Using Social to Proactively Recruit

However, something else has been happening for ages too. Over a period of decades, headhunters have carefully nurtured their networks and positioned themselves to proactively approach candidates when the mandate is right. 

This allowed them to reach out to a hand-picked shortlist of candidates – and so put forward for consideration candidates that companies missed when relying on recruitment advertising alone.

One of the less talked-about aspects of social recruiting is the degree to which social media and social networking sites have made it possible for ANY recruiter to now source candidates this way. So in this article, I want to share with you 3 things you ought to investigate if you have any aspirations of attracting the right people to your company:

• Using Twitter lists to create targeted candidate pools
• Making use of LinkedIn contacts as your comprehensive recruiting database

Using Twitter Lists To Create Targeted Candidate Pools

Twitter lists have always been a powerful way of organizing the people you want to engage with. But for the purposes of recruiting, they’ve always been limited by the restriction of only being allowed 20 lists and a maximum of 500 Twitter accounts on each list.

The good news is, Twitter increased these limits, enabling you to create 1,000 lists and add up to 5,000 Twitter accounts to each list. That’s a massive change – and one that empowers you to really use Twitter as a proactive recruiting tool.

In all likelihood, there are specific companies that your company would ideally like to poach staff from. Imagine now that you can create lists of potential candidates for each and every specific skill/location/ company combination you might want to target in the future. By using a tool that searches Twitter users’ bios, you can quickly find and add candidates to relevant candidate lists. 

There are many out there, Followerwonk is one that I’ve been having a lot of joy using. By searching to find who’s been tweeting niche content in your sector, you’ll be able to add many more who don’t have this information in their bios but who you then come to learn about (and can populate the missing data by researching elsewhere). 

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You could also have lists of people who have expressed an interest in working at your company with particular skills/locations/company profiles.

Twitter lists also allow you to better target your daily engagements. You can create lists for niche experts that you really need in your team, and engage with them daily.

Just like with general branding, employer branding can take a lot of touchpoints before your dream candidate remembers your brand and starts considering it as a possible future workplace. You can also slowly but surely make them aware of your company culture and milestones.

You can also share your Twitter list with your current employees and let them interact with those experts as well. Not only will it help them to better understand your niche, but it will also demonstrate to your dream candidates that your whole company works as a team.

There are quite a few business phone apps and productivity apps that make this type of cross-team collaboration possible.

In your day-to-day Twitter activities, you now have a means of filtering who you’re engaging with and prioritizing those you can see your business is most likely to be targeting in the coming months. But now imagine that each time you start a new assignment, you can dig into your Twitter lists to identify candidates you’d like to approach.

Some you may see also appear on your lists of people who want to work at your company. Bingo! Others you can approach knowing already that they’re in your prime target market.

With 1,000 lists to play with, the possibilities here are huge. So if you’ve made Twitter part of your social recruiting activities, start getting organized with Twitter lists and position yourself to be ready to pounce as new requirements land on your desk.

Making Use of LinkedIn Contacts As Your Comprehensive Recruiting Database

Have you ever wished that you’d been organized enough that every candidate and client you’ve ever come into email contact with you’d added as a LinkedIn connection? Just think how powerful a database of headhunting contacts (and client prospects) that would be! Well with the new LinkedIn Contacts, this dream is in part fulfilled.

Alongside your existing LinkedIn connections, you can now import anyone whose email address you have. They’ll then appear as searchable contacts on LinkedIn, with their name and current occupational details populated from their LinkedIn profile. 

This is immensely powerful (and free!). Whereas your candidate database and Outlook address book are full of out-of-date candidate information, by importing those contacts into LinkedIn Contacts you now have a database – searchable by Company, Job Title, and Location – which references their very latest details. If their LinkedIn profiles are up to date, so too is your candidate database. It’s therefore more comprehensive than anything you could maintain in-house.

From within LinkedIn Contacts, you can track your activity with those candidates (or clients), plus set yourself reminders for when you should next contact them. So it’s also great as a candidate relationship management tool. The potential is immense for any recruiter wanting to more proactively source candidates in the future.

Another tool that consolidates several social media networks to help you participate in relevant discussions and find the right people is called Ddevi which is a browser extension that scans your Linkedin feed, Facebook Groups, Reddit, and Twitter discussions for your keywords to generate one consolidated feed for you to engage with.

You can then use the built-in AI writer to post replies to relevant discussions. This is a great way to build stronger relationships with niche experts who you hope will join your team.

Concluding Remarks

A lot of the current media focus has understandably been on the visible side of what can be achieved with social media. How to engage, how to interact, whose messages are being best received, and so on. Hopefully, with this article, I’ve awoken you to the fact that there’s a whole other side to social networking. 

A side that – through preparation and organization now – can position you to proactively source candidates in the coming months. Good luck!

The post How to Use Social Media to Find and Hire the Right Talent appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

Excerpt from the TikTok Ad Masterclass

Creating effective ad creative is crucial for successful marketing campaigns on different social media platforms. While it may seem convenient to transfer Facebook creative directly to TikTok, this approach often leads to failure.

TikTok requires a unique strategy and tailored content to maximize return on investment (ROI). By understanding and implementing these elements, businesses can optimize their TikTok ad campaigns and connect with their target audience more effectively.

Ad Creative

The biggest mistake taken is when coming from Facebook, people will take their Facebook creative and just copy it over to TikTok, this includes the size ratio and trends – this fails. If you focus your efforts on cracking TikTok ad creative, the ROI on that creative is substantially higher than if we focus just on Facebook creative. It’s a one way street, not a two way street.

Ad Fatigue

Ads on Facebook tend to last longer whereas TikTok creatives fatigue significantly faster. With TikTok you’ll need to dramatically increase your creative output and produce way more ad creative. A way to fail on TikTok is simply by not making enough creative and giving up.

Content Type

It’s important to know the content types that work well and that don’t work for each platform. Where images and animations may work on Facebook, that will not always convert the same success on TikTok. You want to make sure you’re as native as possible with your ad content.

Screen Real-Estate

Many mistakes happen you you don’t leverage the 9:16 ratio on TikTok. Avoid this mistake by taking the extra time to convert the content properly into TikTok as not to keep the black bars on top and bottom of your ad, that’s a missed opportunity for ad space. TikTok is giving you the full screen, use it!

Sound

Sound is not top of mind when scrolling through Facebook, with TikTok, sound is a huge component on connecting with your audience. Audio is part of the culture of the app and can make or break your content.

Length of Content

Understanding the importance of content length will also determine your success with the platform. What may work for Facebook will not always translate and work on TikTok. The culture of content is different on each platform so shooting accordingly will make a difference.

The post TikTok vs. Facebook Advertising: Which One is Right for Your Business? [VIDEO] appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

In today’s overcrowded social media world, learning how to create viral short videos is a great idea.

Viral marketing videos spread fast online and get millions of likes, shares, comments, and views.

And that’s not all.

Short-form video is dubbed the most engaging type of in-feed social content by 66% of marketers.

No wonder, 33% of marketers plan to invest more in short-form video content than any other type of social media strategy in 2023.

Granted, short-form video is captivating, engaging, and boosts conversions.

However, learning how to create viral short videos that resonate well with your target audience is never an easy task.

Fret not, we’ll show you how to go about it and win big on social media.

But before that, here are a few things you need to understand.

What Makes a Video Go Viral on Social Media?

Creating viral videos on social media is the dream of every marketer—a powerful way to generate marketing leads.

Generally, videos go viral on social media when they connect with their audience, make them laugh, inform, teach, and persuade them.

Here are a few key elements of viral videos:

• They tell a story
• They aren’t promotional
• They connect with the emotions of your audience 
• They are relevant
• They make people laugh

How to Create Viral Short Videos for Social Media Step by Step

Follow these simple techniques to create short-form videos that generate more views in a shorter period.

1. Understand Your Target Viewers

Knowing your audience, including what they want (or don’t want) is vital when planning to create viral short videos for your social media marketing strategy.

In fact, understanding what resonates with them and motivates them to share your video can help to increase the number of views on your videos.

Start by creating a comprehensive avatar that represents your target audience. It’ll help you identify who your target viewers are, which social media platforms they use, what they do for fun, etc.

Here are some tips to help you:

• Create well-rounded social media personas
• Examine your social media analytics
• Use Google Analytics
• Engage with your audience to understand what video content they’d want to see 
• See the types of viral videos your competitors are creating 
• Analyze data from your customer service tool understand customer preferences and interests

Gathering all this information will help you understand what grabs your viewers’ attention and what video content they are searching for on social media.

Once you have this information, you’ll find it much easier to find viral content ideas.

2. Determine Your Video Marketing Goals

Learning how to create viral short videos for social media isn’t enough for a successful social media video marketing strategy. You also need to determine why you want your videos to go viral.

Even if your videos go viral, if you aren’t achieving anything with them, you’re wasting resources.Here are 5 goals you can accomplish with social media video marketing according to Sprout Social.

Of course, you could have different goals you want to achieve with your viral short videos including:

• Boosting brand awareness
• Increasing revenue and sales
• Sharing knowledge and educating your viewers
• Introducing the latest products
• Boosting customer service and loyalty 
• Increase your online following

Each goal will require you to create specific kinds of short videos for your audience.

Most importantly, your goals should align with your overall business goals.

3. Draft a Creative Video Content Brief

Prepare a thorough video content brief and storyboard. 

It’ll help you pin down the message you want to pass to your audience, the tone and length of your video, as well as the distribution channel. This will help you stay aligned with your goals. 

Here are important elements to include in your video content brief:

• Video title: The topic of your video. For instance, you could share event planning tips to market your event planning and management brand.
• Description: What you want to cover in the video.
• Vital items to include: Include anything specific you need to add to the video.
• Related content: List any related content you intend to include or use as reference for your videos.
• Competitors: The types of video content your competitors are creating that you want to outshine.
• Social media platforms: What channels do you plan to post your videos on—and what version is best for each channel?
• Video format: What video format do you intend to use?
• Keywords: To improve your video rankings on social media, you need to identify what keywords to target.
• Hashtags to include: They help to make your video discoverable by your audience.
• Call to action: What action do you want your audience to take after watching your videos?

4. Create a Compelling Concept

To create viral videos for social media, draft a top-notch, compelling video script to grab your viewers’ attention and ultimately achieve your goals.

You also need to brainstorm compelling content ideas to include in your script.

This will give your video a logical flow.

Remember that your video needs to cover your message in the shortest time possible.

Here are key pointers for creating viral short videos:

• Start with a hook: Grab your audience’s attention with a catchy opening. Here, you can use an interesting fact, joke, or memorable statement.
• Use effective video editing tools: Outstanding video edits are what will grab your audience’s attention. Use powerful video editing tools. Here is a post on video editing software by Attrock.
• Video additions: Include images, emojis, or other components that help to attract viewers.
• Keep the video short and to the point: According to a recent Vidyard Video in Business Benchmark Report, 62% of viewers say they will watch the whole business’ video if it’s less than 60 seconds long.

5. Tell a Story

Stories drive people to take action.

Besides, telling a story in your video is beneficial in many ways including:

• It humanizes your brand
• It makes your audience remember you
• It helps to build a community that resonates with your brand
• Stories sell better

Tell a compelling story in the shortest time possible by finding a universal context for your concept. This is a great starting point to grab attention.

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The good news is that you can come up with your stories and use AI text-to-video generators to transform them into a series of captivating short video clips.

6. Pay Attention to Popular Trends

To create viral short videos for social media marketing, you need to understand what’s trending on the platforms you intend to use.

Remember that in some platforms like TikTok, new trends come up constantly.

To make your video go viral, you need to jump on a trend the moment it comes up. This will make your audience see you as a trendsetter.

Search for trending songs, hashtags, sounds and other elements that appear at the top of your Reels feed, TikTok trends, Twitter trending topics, etc.

Be sure to put your own spin on a trend in your content to remain unique.

Pro tip: Ensure your brand’s social media page has a professional profile picture that showcases your expertise and brand identity. You can use a profile picture maker to create stunning profile photos effortlessly.

Due to the benefits of going viral on social media, every marketer wants to create viral short videos. However, this is not an easy task to accomplish.

While there is no guarantee that your videos will go viral on social media, following these tips and guidelines can increase your chances.

The post 6 Tips on How to Create Viral Short Videos for Social Media appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

Social media has become an indispensable tool for businesses in today’s digital age. You need it to connect with your target audience, boost your brand’s visibility, and drive sales.

But most businesses and even beginner marketers don’t fully understand how to use social media for ecommerce.

If you’re one of them, we’ve got you covered.

Whether you’re new to social media or looking to enhance your existing social media strategy for ecommerce, this blog is here to help.

We’ve compiled ten effective social media ecommerce strategies that can propel your brand to new heights. So, grab your favorite snack, sit back, and get ready to unlock the potential of social media for your ecommerce business.

Let’s get started!

What is Ecommerce Social Media Marketing?

Ecommerce social media marketing refers to the strategic use of social media platforms to promote, sell, engage, and support customers in the context of ecommerce.

Some of the most common ways brands use social media for ecommerce marketing include:

• Setting up online shops and selling products directly on social platforms (this is known as social commerce)
• Promoting brands on social media accounts and driving traffic to online stores (ecommerce websites)
• Replying to customer queries and engaging with potential customers to build trust
• Offering customer support before and after sales
• Using customer insights and data to revamp marketing strategies

But why do brands do all of this? What’s the benefit of having a social media presence? Let’s try to understand.

What Are the Benefits of Using Social Media for Ecommerce?

Social media is a game-changer for ecommerce businesses, offering a wide array of benefits, such as:

1. Increasing Website Traffic & Generating Leads
2. To Build Brand Awareness
3. Building Customer Loyalty & Trust
4. Acquiring New Customers
5. Creating Opportunities for User-Generated Content (UGC)
6. Improving Customer Service
7. Engaging with Target Audiences in Real-Time
8. Enhancing SEO Efforts & Search Rankings

Fact: Did you know that online stores leveraging social media networks drive 32% more sales than those that don’t? (WPForms)

This stat alone should get you excited about crafting an effective social media strategy for your ecommerce business!

So, now that you know what ecommerce social media marketing is and the benefits it offers let’s look at how to use it.

10 Powerful Social Media Ecommerce Strategies

Here are ten powerful social media ecommerce strategies you can employ to drive sales for your brand:

1. Set Clear Goals

Setting clear and measurable goals should be the first step in your social media ecommerce strategy. Goals will provide you with direction, help measure success, and hold you accountable.

But what kind of goals should you set?

The most common ones can be:

• Drive Sales on Your Social Profile
• Drive Traffic to Your Ecommerce Store
• Get More Customer Queries/Leads

Other than these, you might want people to subscribe to your newsletter or loyalty programs.

These and other similar targets could all be part of your e-commerce social media goals.

But the important thing here is to decide whether you want to do social selling, social commerce, or social media ecommerce marketing.

Social Selling vs. Social Commerce vs. Social Media Ecommerce: What’s the Difference?

Social selling is the practice of using social media to attract your target audience, engage with them, and nurture your relationship with them.

You don’t actually sell them anything but make them remember and trust your brand or business. So, when they’re in the buying mode, they know who they’d be calling – that’s social selling!

Social commerce involves marketing and selling your product (or service) directly on social media platforms.

Social media users can stay on their social profiles, read about the product/service, and buy it — all of this without leaving the platform.

Facebook, TikTok, Instagram Shops and Pinterest Product Pins are typical examples of social commerce being executed.

Social media ecommerce marketing is what we’re studying in the blog right now: marketing your product, generating leads, and helping future prospects on social media but then driving them to your online stores.

So, first, decide what it’s gonna be for you and then move forward.

2. Build Your Social Media Strategy for Ecommerce

After you’ve set your goals, build a comprehensive ecommerce social media marketing strategy that helps you achieve them.

Your strategy should include the following:

Define Your Target Audiences

• Who are your potential customers?
• Are they millennials or Gen Z?
• What do they like and dislike?
• What interests them?

These insights will help you create relevant content, campaigns, and offers.

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Create Relevant Content

• Research the type of content that resonates best with your target audiences — blogs, videos, images?
• Study your target market and see what kind of content attracts them.
• Use this knowledge to create content that will help you engage with them.

But before you can do any of this, there’s an even more important decision to make: “What platforms should you choose?”

3. Choose Your Preferred Social Media Channels

Which social media platforms should your business have an active presence on?

This largely depends on who you’re targeting. For example, Gen Zee tends to be more active on TikTok and Instagram, while millennials prefer Facebook and Twitter.

But don’t depend on our or somebody else’s opinion. Study your target audience and see what the data suggests.

For instance, if your target audience primarily comprises women, it might be a good idea to have a Pinterest profile. Why? Because women make up 60% of all Pinterest users!

Similarly, you can study age demographic stats and see where your audience spends the most time and choose a platform accordingly.

Besides your target audience, also consider each platform’s features and ROI. It doesn’t make sense to invest heavily in a channel that won’t give you the desired results.

So, think carefully and choose wisely!

4. Optimize Your Profiles

Once you’ve chosen the platform(s), it’s time to optimize your profile.

Make sure that all your social media profiles have the necessary information about your brand and products, such as its logo, contact details, website URL, etc.

This will help customers get to know your business better and trust you more.

Also, don’t forget to do proper keyword research. It will help you figure out the best words to use in your descriptions and hashtags to use in your posts to get more people interested.

5. Have a “Mobile-First” Approach

Out of 4.48 billion social media users, 99% access the websites or apps through a mobile device – backlinko.

What does it tell you?

You must adapt your ecommerce strategy accordingly and make sure that all content looks great on small screens too.

Here are some tips to optimize your social media accounts:

• Invest in creating high-quality visuals that look great on small screens.
• Make sure your website is mobile responsive, and the checkout process is easy to complete.
• Utilize mobile advertising tools like Facebook Ads, Instagram Ads, etc.
• Use shorter hashtags and URLs to make them easier to tap or type on mobile keyboards.
• Use a clear call-to-action in your posts so that users can take action right away.

Important: Having a responsive and easy-to-navigate ecommerce website is super important – don’t sleep on it!

6. Employ Chatbots

Chatbots are like your brand’s trusty sidekick in the world of social media ecommerce!

Did you know that around 50% of people are totally on board with making a purchase through a website’s chatbot using conversational marketing? That’s right! These friendly virtual assistants can offer personalized and real-time assistance to your customers, making their shopping experience a breeze.

Need product recommendations? Chatbot’s got you covered!

Have a question about shipping? Chatbot’s got the answer!

By having chatbots as part of your social media ecommerce strategy, you can provide instant support, boost engagement, and, most importantly, drive those all-important sales.

So, why not harness the power of chatbots and make your customers’ journey even more enjoyable?

7. Leverage UGC (User-Generated Content)

UGC refers to content created by your customers, such as reviews, testimonials, photos, and videos featuring your products.

It’s one of the most powerful tools for driving engagement and boosting sales.

Why?

• It’s like having an army of brand advocates who are eager to spread the word about your offerings.
• UGC showcases real-life experiences and authentic customer interactions with your brand.
• It builds trust and credibility among your target audience as it comes from real customers.

Plus, it’s not just about showing off your products – it’s about making customers feel part of a community. It shows that you value their input and recognize their contribution to the brand.

So, why not include UGC in your social media ecommerce strategy?

Encourage your followers to post pictures with their purchases, use relevant hashtags, and provide incentives for doing so.

8. Publish Short-Form Content

Today, short-form content reigns supreme! With dwindling attention spans, social media users prefer watching short, 30sec-1min videos instead of reading text.

This is exactly what brands need to capitalize on and capture their audience’s interest quickly and effectively.

But what kind of short-form content can you create to engage your social media followers? Here are some ideas for short-form content:

1. Tips & Tricks: Share bite-sized advice and hacks relevant to your industry.
2. How-Tos: Break down complex processes into step-by-step guides.
3. Behind the Scenes: Offer glimpses into your brand’s inner workings.
4. Quick Product Demos: Showcase your products’ features and benefits in short videos.
5. Inspiring Stories: Share stories that evoke emotions and inspire action.

Remember to keep your content visually appealing, concise, and shareable.

Try different formats like Reels, Stories, or TikTok-style videos to maximize engagement and captivate your audience instantly!

9. Collaborate with Influencers

Did you know that a whopping 72% of Gen Z and Millennials are avid followers of influencers on social media? That’s right!

Influencer marketing has taken the digital world by storm, and it’s an incredible opportunity for ecommerce brands like yours to connect with your target audience in a meaningful way.

Here’s how you can incorporate influencer marketing into your ecommerce marketing plan:

• Find Relevant Influencers: Look for influencers who align with your brand values and target audience.
• Set Clear Objectives: Define your goals for the influencer campaign to guide your strategy.
• Prioritize Authenticity: Encourage influencers to create genuine content that resonates with their audience.
• Foster Creative Collaboration: Involve influencers in the creative process to showcase your products in their unique style.
• Track Performance: Measure the success of your campaigns using tracking tools and unique discount codes.
• Consider Long-term Partnerships: Build strong relationships with influencers for ongoing brand integration and audience connection.

By collaborating with influencers, you can amplify your brand’s reach, enhance credibility, and drive meaningful results in the competitive ecommerce landscape.

10 . Track Progress & Evolve

Tracking and analyzing the results of your social media ecommerce strategies is vital for ongoing success.

Analytics tools can give you valuable insights into audience demographics, reach, and engagement.

Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter provide built-in analytics dashboards to assess post performance. Use them to understand audience behavior and analyze what’s working for you.

Similarly, monitoring ad performance is especially important if you’re selling directly on social media. Tracking metrics such as click-through rates, conversion rates, and sales will help you assess the effectiveness of your ads and make data-driven decisions.

Besides analyzing your social media posts, keep a close on your website analytics (Google Analytics) to measure the impact of your social media campaigns. See which platform gets you the most traffic and which one’s not doing the job.

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But remember, tracking progress isn’t just about numbers; it’s about understanding your audience and their preferences.

Use the data to identify patterns, trends, and customer behaviors that can shape your future strategies. Adapt and evolve your approach based on these insights to ensure continued success in the dynamic world of social media.

Supercharge Your Ecommerce Journey with Social Media

So, this is it — use this 10-step strategy to build an effective ecommerce marketing plan on social media and drive real results for your brand.

If you find tracking progress and analyzing data challenging, consider completing Digital Marketer’s Social Media Certificate.

This short but in-depth program can help you master the art of creating an effective social media strategy for ecommerce to drive engagement and revenue for your business.

Sounds like too much work? Mongoose Media is an award-winning, modern digital marketing agency. They can develop & execute effective strategies to maximize your brand’s online presence and drive sales.

Don’t hesitate to reach out and take your ecommerce business to new heights!

The post 10 Strategies to Mastering Social Media for Ecommerce appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

If you’ve read any of the statistics about the success of Instagram marketing, you’re likely looking for ways to get started. Instagram is an incredible marketing tool that can help you establish a brand identity, grow your customer base, and increase sales.

Before you jump in, it’s essential to create an effective Instagram marketing strategy, so you can experience the results everyone’s talking about.

Why Instagram Is Such an Important Platform for Your Business

With about two billion users, Instagram is a key social media platform for growing your brand and attracting new customers. If that’s not enough to get you to focus on the visual social media outlet, consider these statistics: 

• According to their own data, 60% of people learn about products or services on Instagram. Users are open to being marketed to and have come to expect it. By marketing on Instagram, you’re putting your business in front of people who are curious about new products.
• Again according to Instagram, 90% of Instagrammers follow a business. Many users don’t mind seeing posts from businesses they’re interested in. They may even like it and follow brands they adore.
• 44% of people use Instagram to shop, according to the platform’s research. Features like shoppable posts and the ability to save payment information within the app is driving more people to shop on Instagram. You can take advantage of this by highlighting product features and offering discounts to new subscribers.
• Instagram’s advertising reach grew by almost 21% last year, compared to Facebook’s less than 7%. This amount varies by demographic, so it’s essential to understand your target audience before you map out your content strategy.
• The Instagram app is the second most downloaded app in the world, making Instagram marketing a good investment of your time and resources wherever you may be.
• Instagram beats Tiktok, Twitter, and Snapchat for number of users. If your goal is to reach the most people possible, Instagram is the way to go.

Benefits of an Instagram-Centered Marketing Strategy

A successful Instagram marketing strategy takes high investments of time and resources. So why should you center your marketing around Instagram and not another platform? 

• Boosts Brand Awareness and Trust. Instagram gives you another place to interact with your target audience. If you take full advantage of it, you can establish your brand image and build trust in the eyes of your audience.
• Reaches the Right People. Instagram’s algorithm cross-references information about the content itself (captions, hashtags, and locations) with information about user engagement to show users more of what they’re interested in. If you utilize hashtags, location tags, reels, and stories correctly, Instagram’s algorithm will help get your business in front of the right people. 
• Grows Product Sales. Instagram offers shoppable posts, product launch features, and the ability for users to save their payment information within the app. All of these features help to streamline the purchasing process and help you grow sales as a result.
• Fosters Customer Relationships. The ability to like, comment on, and share posts makes building customer relationships and a community around your product easy. These relationships help to build trust in your business and your products. 
• Drives Higher Retention Rates. Instagram’s retention rate measures the percentage of viewers who watch your stories until the last segment. Retention rates are one of the most important metrics to consider when evaluating your reach. However, it takes lots of time and resources to foster good engagement with your content, so it’s important to be consistent and do frequent content audits to see what you can improve. 

How to Create an Effective Instagram Marketing Strategy

Success in Instagram marketing means higher engagement rates, a bigger customer following, and increased sales. The following are best practices to help you see results.

Analyze Current and Past Data

Instagram Insights offers metrics that can help you evaluate the performance of your content. These include recent highlights, accounts reached, accounts engaged, and total followers. After reviewing this data, adjust your strategy as needed and release more content. It’s important to note that Instagram Insights is only available to business accounts, and you can only access it from the mobile app.

Identify Shortfalls

Take a look at underperforming content and compare it to your top-performing posts. Make adjustments as needed. Consider whether it’s to the structure of the content, the time of day released, or the type of hashtags used that you may need to alter. 

If you’re starting from scratch, look at what your competitors are doing and think about what you’d like to do differently. How will your brand stand out?

Set Realistic Goals

While it can be tempting to set lofty goals for your business, it’s better to start with small, manageable goals and build out from there. These goals should include the number of posts a week, response time for inquiries, number of likes or shares, and more. When setting your goals, think: What do you want from Instagram, and how can you best accomplish it?

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Research Successful Competitors

As with any other marketing strategy, you must know what your competitors are doing. Look at what your competitors do well and determine how to do it better or position yourself differently. Highlight what makes your brand different from your competitors and effectively communicate that to your audience.

Plan Your Posts

You obviously don’t need to know everything you’re going to post just to get started. But it’s good to have an idea of some of the content types you plan to use. When determining your content, consider:

• Content Pillars. Content pillars help make up the foundation of your content strategy. The different types include behind-the-scenes content, user-generated content, product demos, culture-focused (showing the human side of your company), and customer stories. Your content pillars contribute to your brand image, so it’s important to consider what you want it to be when planning your content.
• Generate a Style Guide. A style guide helps ensure consistency in the look of your Instagram posts and gives users an idea of what to expect. It should include composition, color palette, fonts, filters, captions, and hashtags. 
• Content Formats. Instagram offers reels, IG Live, stories, and visual-based posts as options for sharing content. Each of these has its own benefits, so consider your campaign’s goals and how you can mix the formats to accomplish them.

Utilize a Content Calendar

Consistent posting is vital to a successful Instagram marketing campaign. Content calendars can help you plan what type of content to share and when. Then you can create content for a month or more at a time and schedule it with a social scheduling tool like Buffer or Hootsuite.

Best Practices to Follow for Your Instagram Strategy

Remember some best practices to see the best results from your Instagram marketing strategy. These gold standard approaches include:

• Define Your Audience. The more you know about your audience, the better. Once you define your audience, be sure everything you post focuses on them.
• Solve Customer Problems or Address Needs. Users are more likely to interact with your content and follow you if they believe your profile solves their needs. Make sure to consider their needs and desires as you start producing content.
• Create a Clear Brand Image. This visual style contributes to brand awareness and associations. What do you want your customers to think of when they see your content? What are things you don’t want your brand associated with?
• Prioritize Engagement. Engaging with your audience and similar brands helps drive conversations about your products. It also helps to develop trust in your business.
• Post Actively. To get the most out of Instagram, you’ll probably want to post daily. Try out various times to determine when your audience is most responsive to your posts.
• Leverage the Professional Dashboard. This dashboard is Instagram’s central destination to track performance, utilize professional tools, and explore educational information. When used to its full potential, it can help you track your performance, grow your business, and stay informed.
• Optimize Your Profile. You can optimize your profile in various ways, including incorporating a keyword into your name or username, writing a clear and concise bio, and displaying a profile pic that best represents your brand. 

Use Proven Keywords for Hashtags. Hashtags are searchable keywords that help users connect with content they’re interested in. Using them in captions on your reels, stories, and posts can help increase your visibility and grow your audience.

The post The Ultimate Guide to An Effective Instagram Marketing Strategy appeared first on DigitalMarketer.