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How to create a Social Media Marketing strategy in 2024

Catarina Alves de Sousa
Social Media Manager & Content Writer

Social media marketing is an essential component of modern communication. By using platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, TikTok, and others, companies can reach a wide and diverse audience, promote their products or services, and build lasting relationships with customers.

Catarina Alves de Sousa
Social Media Manager & Content Writer

Social media marketing is an essential component of modern communication. By using platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, TikTok, and others, companies can reach a wide and diverse audience, promote their products or services, and build lasting relationships with customers.

One of the main benefits of social media marketing is its ability to reach a wide and diverse audience. With over 4 billion active social media users worldwide, there is a significant opportunity to connect with potential customers, regardless of their location or demographic. Social media platforms also offer advanced targeting options, allowing companies to reach specific groups of people based on factors such as age, location, interests, and behaviors.

Source: Pexels

One of the main benefits of social media marketing is its ability to reach a wide and diverse audience. With over 4 billion active social media users worldwide, there is a significant opportunity to connect with potential customers, regardless of their location or demographic. Social media platforms also offer advanced targeting options, allowing companies to reach specific groups of people based on factors such as age, location, interests, and behaviors.

In this article, you’ll find a short, concise guide to how Social Media Marketing works and how to devise your strategy.

Social media marketing: how does it work?

Social media marketing involves creating and sharing content on social media platforms to achieve branding and marketing objectives. This includes text posts, images, videos, and other content that drives user engagement, as well as paid advertising.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Social Media Marketing

Source: Pexels

Although it’s a necessity for practically any company or brand today, that doesn’t mean that Social Media Marketing doesn’t have its advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages of Social Media Marketing:

  • Broad reach: Social Media Marketing is extremely powerful for companies because of its ability to reach a wide and diverse global audience. Social media allows companies to communicate directly with a wide range of potential customers from all geographical locations. In addition, social media platforms offer advanced targeting options, allowing companies to direct their ads and content to specific groups of people based on interests, behaviors, demographics, and much more. This increases the relevance and effectiveness of campaigns, making social media marketing not only comprehensive but also precisely targeted;
  • Cost-effective: compared to traditional advertising methods, Social Media Marketing can be less expensive and offer a high return on investment. Companies can reach a large number of people at a relatively low cost, taking advantage of the platforms to connect directly with customers, receive feedback in real-time, build relationships, and build customer loyalty through meaningful interactions. What’s more, content on social media can go viral quickly, which means that brand messages can be amplified exponentially, increasing visibility and brand recognition significantly.

To help you create a social media strategy with a limited budget, we recommend reading the article “Digital marketing strategies for small businesses: how to make the most of a limited budget“.

  • Direct engagement: companies can reach a large number of people at a relatively low cost, taking advantage of platforms to create engagement directly with customers, receive feedback in real time, build relationships and build customer loyalty through meaningful interactions. What’s more, content on social networks can quickly go viral, which means that brand messages can be amplified exponentially, increasing visibility and brand recognition significantly.

Disadvantages of Social Media Marketing:

  • Reputation: gmanaging a crisis can be challenging and damaging to a company’s/brand’s reputation;
  • Constant change: platforms are constantly changing, requiring frequent adaptations, meaning that the process of learning how social media works never ends;
  • Limited visibility: algorithms can limit the reach of posts, no matter how good the content is.

How to design a Social Media Marketing Strategy

The Social Media Marketing strategy consists of a detailed plan that guides how a company or brand interacts with its audience, promotes products or services, and achieves its business goals through social networks. It consists of a series of carefully planned steps and methods, based on understanding the target audience, choosing the most appropriate platforms, and creating content that resonates with that audience. Here are the essential elements of a social media marketing strategy and the importance of having one (and applying it):

  • Define your objectives: swhether it’s increasing brand awareness, sales, or engagement;
  • Know your audience: identify who your customers are and what they want;
  • Choose the right platforms: not all social networks are suitable for all businesses
  • Create relevant and attractive content: ccreating relevant and attractive content that resonates with your audience is one of the most important pillars of Social Media Marketing. This means developing messages, images, videos, and other types of media that capture the public’s attention, encourage engagement, and reinforce the brand’s image;
  • Monitor and adjust: use analysis tools to measure performance and adjust strategies as necessary.

To better adapt your social media strategy, be sure to read the article “How to create and define your target audience on social media?“.

Examples of Social Media Marketing Strategies

Source: Pexels

In the dynamic world of social media marketing, companies have a variety of strategies at their disposal to increase reach, engage audiences, and boost sales. Choosing the right strategy depends on several factors, including the brand’s objectives, the target audience, the type of product or service offered, and the budget available.

Below we’ve listed some examples of effective social media marketing strategies that have helped companies build a solid online presence, create a community, and convert followers into customers. These strategies are adaptable and can be customized to meet each company’s specific needs and objectives.

  • Influencer campaigns: partnerships with influencers to reach new audiences.
  • User-generated content: encourage customers to share their own experiences with the brand;
  • Competitions and sweepstakes: engage your audience with interactive activities;
  • Paid advertising: invest in targeted adverts to increase reach.

Essential Tips for Maintaining a Social Media Marketing Strategy

Maintaining an effective Social Media Marketing strategy requires not only the implementation of initial tactics but also continuous monitoring and adjustment.

Here are some essential tips that all companies should consider to ensure that their social media presence is productive and aligned with their long-term business objectives.

  • Consistency: maintain a regular and coherent presence;
  • Active listening: monitor what is said about your brand and respond appropriately;
  • Adaptation: be ready to change strategy according to market trends and consumer behavior;
  • Measurement: define clear metrics to evaluate the success of your initiatives;

By considering these aspects, companies can harness the power of social networks to improve visibility, interact with customers, and drive growth. It’s crucial to stay up to date on the latest trends and technologies, as the field of digital marketing is constantly evolving.

Start 2024 on a high note on social media

Source: Pexels

As we’ve already mentioned a few times in this article, the world of social media is always changing; whether due to the way algorithms work or as a result of the introduction (or disappearance) of certain features. This means that for your strategy to “succeed” on social media, you’ll have to stay alert and informed about changes, yes, but also trends.

For 2024, if you haven’t already started, consider exploring video marketing as the preferred content to share on your social networks, and don’t forget to integrate Influencer Marketing as required into your strategy, as it shows no signs of slowing down in effectiveness and popularity next year.

If you need professional and experienced help in creating your social media marketing strategy, you can count on Scallent and its talent pool to serve your brand.

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How to create and define your target audience on social networks?

Sandra Caravana
Copywriter

When we study marketing, there is one word present in every module: strategy.

Strategy, strategy, strategy. Keywords with more relevance and with more reach. At every point, on every front, digital or sales plate, you need a strategy. Which is like saying: you do nothing without well-defined goals. Nothing. 

But does strategy walk the streets of marketing alone? No. 

It walks, of course, hand in hand with the objectives and the target audience. 

Do we want to sell to all the people that exist on planet earth? 

We want to sell to our target audience. But who is the target audience?

Sandra Caravana
Copywriter

When we study marketing, there is one word present in every module: strategy.

Strategy, strategy, strategy. Keywords with more relevance and with more reach. At every point, on every front, digital or sales plate, you need a strategy. Which is like saying: you do nothing without well-defined goals. Nothing. 

But does strategy walk the streets of marketing alone? No. 

It walks, of course, hand in hand with the objectives and the target audience. 

Do we want to sell to all the people that exist on planet earth? 

We want to sell to our target audience. But who is the target audience?

Target VS Persona 

The target audience is the segment of users/consumers to whom you should direct your strategies. They are the people who are most likely to be interested in your product or services. They are the users/consumers who have something in common with your brand, and who identify with your voice. It is a group of potential customers. The definition of the target audience is the result of the market segmentation process, which identifies these groups of consumers with similar characteristics. 

A persona is the personification of the target audience. It is a fictional character that represents the ideal customer of your business. It is the avatar of your online store. It is Magdalena, 40 years old, mother of 4 children, and influencer by profession with a new house that needs a lot of construction.

Why is it important to distinguish between these two concepts?

Because when defining the strategy for the audience, we should not focus on the persona, although we cannot ignore it. The marketing strategy focuses on the target audience, whether we are talking about a physical store or social media, we are talking about sales, or building a community.

Take a sheet of paper, your physical or digital notepad, open an Excel… whatever you prefer. Write down the characteristics of your target audience. Write who you want to reach. Characterize your community. Talk about the people you would like to be your customers, and how you would like those customers to act in your store. 

To be even more specific: what is the ideal average cart size? Who will buy your store’s star product, or who will choose the basic service (the one that rarely makes a profit, but that you should always keep in mind to create a customer base)?

You can read more about persona here and here. Today, the focus is on the target audience and social media.

What social networks are we on?

All. Facebook, Youtube, WhatsApp, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter, Twitch, and TikTok. 

The We Are Social Digital 2023 Portugal study shows that the age group with the most social network users is 25-34 years old.

Source: We Are Social Digital 2023 Portugal 

What is the most used social network, right now, in Portugal? WhatsApp. It’s more of a platform than a network, but it fits well with the purpose of the social network: it’s not to share the newborn photo with the world but to get the photo to the family faster. WhatsApp has been able to update itself to the needs of the population by having a professional version. Recently, it made available the option to create communities, to have conversations with a larger number of users: good for businesses, and good for schools, and families. 

I was Fact: WhatsApp has the option to block sending messages – only the group administrator can write; the other members can view and react with emojis. Going back to the same example: great for when another baby is coming into the family.

Source: We Are Social Digital 2023 Portugal 

But is it the preferred social network? No. Here the winner is Instagram.

Source: We Are Social Digital 2023 Portugal 

Maybe because it has a nicer image? That’s subjective. Easy to use? Um… All networks invest in UX Design and Writing. Is it a matter of fashion? Is it a generational issue? I lean more toward the latter option. 

Facebook remains the social network with the most accounts in the world. The combined number of users of Meta products (Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp) surpasses any other future combination. Facebook is not dead, especially for business. Proof of this was the rise of lives in times of confinement, causing many SMEs in the area of commerce to survive during the pandemic.

Why should you define your target audience?

The truth is that each network has a different audience with different objectives. And so, if having a social media presence is part of your business strategy, don’t waste time creating a profile on all the above-mentioned networks.

Lesson #1: Your business doesn’t need to be on every social network. 

CMTV Alert? No. Can it be controversial? Maybe. 

To the advocates of being everywhere: if you want to be everywhere, be creative in the content you post.

Content is king

Or queen. 

Content is everything in social media. It is the most important thing and without good content, there are no networks. But the same content does not fit all networks, even with the paradigm shift giving more emphasis and reach to video content. Content must be adjusted and adapted for each social network. 

Whether it is video content, image content, or text-only content, the choice of content also depends on the voice of your brand and your audience. And it doesn’t have to be linear and forever: you can change it over time, gradually, or by rebranding – an investment that has shown good results. It repositions your brand and brings it closer to your customers. Sometimes all it takes is a change of logo to get the update you wanted.

Source: Neil Patel Blog
Tell me what the Instagram logo was when you installed the app on your smartphone and I will tell you what generation you are from:Source: Walterman

Know your audience

Audience? Weren’t we talking about the audience?

Yes, but in digital marketing, we use the term audience: we are creating content for views, to create leads. Different nomenclature, but with logic.

Learn what works and what doesn’t

Never forget: it is adults who buy children’s toys. Your company’s social media content is not for children, they are not the ones with buying power. Advertising can be done for children, using the traditional strategy of viewing times: in the breaks of cartoons, for example. The same happens with YouTube advertising, at the beginning of videos. The times change, and the channel changes, but the winning strategy remains.

Use and abuse each social network’s tools to get to know your audience. Instagram questions were created with that same purpose. Basic, easy-to-answer, direct-response questions:

  • What age range
  • What is your work schedule (traditional or shifts)
  • Sex and gender
  • With or without children
  • Which social network do you use most
  • Do you prefer video or photos
  • What are your reading habits?
  • Have you ever bought our brand?
  • Do you usually read our newsletter? 
  • Do you usually buy online? 

Instagram, being very visual, allows you to quickly conclude from this. 

Cross-reference this data with the characterization you have made of your target audience. It’s a match?

Yes, this is why many brands use this strategy. And well. Just like the typical suggestion to show behind the scenes. 

Do you have a vegetarian recipe page? Don’t just post the recipe. Make a video on shopping, explaining how and where to choose the products you used or will use in a recipe. 

This kind of content will give you data from your audience and create a sense of community. Don’t ignore interactions: they give you even more visibility and customers.

How to increase your audience?

The practice of sweepstakes has been standardized. As a general rule, the rules for participation are:

Follow the page

Like the post 

Identify two/three different friends

… and you can participate as many times as you want, as long as you identify different friends. 

If your goal is to increase the number of followers just for the sake of it, then the way to go is to run various sweepstakes and giveaways recurrently. If your goal is to create a quality audience, the path is another, quite different one. 

Sweepstakes bring in lots of followers. In fairness, they bring in those followers who have been identified. And winning a bracelet, a book or an eco-friendly cream kit is always good, it’s always positive. Giving something away is a great way to show off your brand – why do you think merchandising is so important? Do you have a pen there? I bet it’s from an SME where you live. 

The bad thing about sweepstakes is fake followers and bots: those profiles that have no photo, no friends, no posts, with the name mikepotter734982. Who has a good number of followers because they think it gives them more credibility? You can buy these profiles. But you are not creating an audience.

How to use sweepstakes to create a good (and real) audience?

Turn the raffle into a contest.

Is your publisher releasing a new book? Promote the name of the book and ask your followers to create a 50-word synopsis, even if they don’t know what the story is about. 

You will only comment on who is on your side, who relates to your brand, and who wants your product. You will meet those who read, who write, who imagine, who create. Your community will comment and share, even if this last action is not in your CTA – call to action.

Be Inspiring

… or pay someone to be.

An influencer is a profession. And it is here to stay. 

The trick is to choose the right influencer for your brand. Even here you have to experiment and do A/B tests, taking some risks. 

Invest in myopic influencers and evaluate the content they publish. Here, building the persona can be a benefit. Choose an influencer as similar as possible to the persona of your business.

Be a spitfire

Follow your competition. Every day. Plus: find out what your followers are saying about your competitors. 

Do a SWOT analysis of your company. Having this analysis always updated will help you not to miss opportunities and to be aware of the updates you should make.

The 6 steps, in brief, to creating and defining your social media audience are:

  1. Write about your target audience. 
  2. Choose the social networks where you want to be present. Choose the ideal platform. 
  3. Know your audience. 
  4. Create interaction to increase your audience.  
  5. Invest in influencers. 
  6. Analyze the competition.

This is one of the investments brands make to maintain their digital presence and several tools can help you with this arduous digital task. Uncle Google is very generous: you can create search results alerts and you can analyze keywords. Google Analytics is very thorough at monitoring your website data and it’s free. 

As for social networks, you can manage everything in one place, like Swonkie or E-goi – Portuguese companies with excellent customer service. 

If you have reached the end of this text and think your brand needs an update, have no fear: you can count on Jelly for your brand’s rebranding.