Social Media Marketing – Basic Principles | SiteMap 25

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Hello everyone, here we are back for another SiteMap, your guide to digital marketing, and today we open a new chapter with the first of a series of 4 programs about social media marketing.

Let's start by explaining the concept. In short, social media marketing is the use of platforms such as Facebook , Instagram , Twitter and YouTube , among others, to promote content that increases the awareness of the brand and its products or services, fosters reputation and directs traffic to the website or online store, with a view to capturing leads and/or increasing sales.

However, these marketing objectives are associated with another operational objective that is essential for them to be achieved – involvement or engagement.

THE “SOCIAL” IN “SOCIAL MEDIA”
Social networks are the meeting point of contemporary cryptocurrency data societies, where everyone can be simultaneously a receiver and a source of information, another link in an uninterrupted and amplifying chain of information, word of mouth, creating buzz and promoting virality … the Holy Grail of social media marketing.

This “social” component of social networks is truly fundamental and this requires that companies’ communication adapt to the environment and the expectations of their users. Companies that use social networks as a mere repository of content for promotional purposes will hardly be successful and may even harm their image.

On social media, communication must be closer and more conversational; companies must have a voice and a face, and become more human. Following these and other principles enhances the benefits of a presence on social media, a list of which is already promised for the next SiteMap .

THREE ADDITIONAL POINTS TO CONSIDER
In addition to ensuring that social media communication is aligned with the nature of social media and what users expect from brands, companies should take into account 3 additional basic principles:

1. Likes/followers aren't everything
In addition to not being able to serve only for publishing commercial content, social media marketing is also not about demanding likes. Having 5,000 likes on Facebook does not mean that your posts will be seen by 5,000 people , even if they are online at the time the post is published. The truth is that those who do not interact frequently with a brand's posts will stop seeing them. And the reach of Facebook posts, in fact, has been decreasing sharply in recent years, forcing companies to invest in advertising – which, it must be said, is excellent and can be very useful for SMEs.

2. Choose where to be present
Companies don't have to be present on every social network. The important thing is to understand where it makes sense to be, taking into account the type of business , the target audience and the objectives to be achieved .

3. Don't undervalue social media
The last point is that, contrary to the assessment that many SMEs still make, social media marketing is a very serious matter that requires skills from a wide range of areas and cannot be left to an intern or to someone in their spare time . It is the company's reputation that is at stake with each post, so it is not a good idea to play around with that.