By now, most businesses have started social media marketing and are doing what they can to ensure they are getting the most out of it. While it is essential for a business to be found on all social media sites, how do you know if marketing efforts are really working? Are finding new customers, and are customer service efforts through social media really having a positive effect? Here are a few things to look at when determining whether or not your social media campaigns are really working.
Engagement
One of the top ways to know whether or not your customers are getting anything out of your social media posts is through observing their engagement with posts, according to Mobile Marketing Watch. Most people don’t comment on, like, or share posts, so if you are seeing those things and engagement with your posts, you know that you are reaching a larger audience than you see.
One way to get more engagement with your audience is to pose questions in your posts asking their opinion on articles or asking them to tell you about themselves. Part of the reason why social media is so important to people is that it gives them an outlet to be heard and a chance to talk about themselves. Give them that opportunity through your posts, and you’ll be getting their views as well as many of their friends’ views.
Followers
Of course, the number of people who are following your business is a big determining factor on whether or not you are having success. If your numbers are growing quickly, then you can be sure that you are having success.
One way to increase numbers very quickly is to have giveaways where people are asked to share their posts or tag their friends in order to get qualified into the giveaway. People who already love your product or service are going to share it with their friends and it is, essentially, free advertising. This has been one of the top ways for businesses to increase their following and get the word out about their products.
Website traffic
In theory, the better you are doing on social media, the more traffic you will have to your website. To determine whether or not it is working, you can check your analytics following social media posts to see if website traffic increased after you posted. Analytics can also tell you where your traffic is coming from, so you can see exactly which social media sites are giving you the most numbers based on the different types of content that are being posted to each site.
When communicating with your customers, it is important that they are able to contact you through social media, texting, phone calls, email, and other means possible. If they can’t find you on the internet or if it is difficult to get a hold of you, they will quickly switch to another company. So even though you’ll find more success with marketing if you are engaging with your customers through social media, just having it available as a source to your customers is going to be helpful for your business.