Any new startup company looking to expand their presence and position their brand properly will need to use social media to even think about competing in today’s business environment. Ideally, you may even want to consider hiring a professional with experience helping startups get their social media presence up and running. Unfortunately, it may be the case that a new business does not have that much initial capital to invest in a specific social media manager in the very beginning. Depending on the size of the startup, you may be the only one available to be the acting social media manager until business allows for bringing on new talent. Not to worry, by reading this article, you may be able to start to provide yourself with the knowledge necessary to help your business get its social media presence up and running.
Here are some effective tips for any new startup trying to get its social media presence up and running.
- Market research is critical: When a new business is getting ready to launch a product or service or to launch the business itself, they always should conduct their market research. Who is the target market? Age demographics, income level, geographic location, etc. are all things examined in addition to a magnitude of other statistics about the market. Competitors, potential market share, just to name a few more. When you are ready to create your social media profiles, you may want to do the same types of research, only with social media as the focus.
- Determine your platforms: Once you have completed your market research, you should have a better idea of your intended audience. Now, what platforms does that audience tend to engage in the most online? That is where you will want to spend your time, money, and energy.
- Make sure your brand is the same across all platforms: Make sure you have a brand and a social media profile that is the same through every platform that you utilize. You do not want to create any unnecessary confusion, and you want to make it easy for your audience to find you on multiple platforms.
- Have a marketing strategy: You may want to consider creating a social media marketing strategy with goals that are defined. They can be weekly or monthly goals. They can be about expanding your followers or about the number of ad buys you make. In the beginning, you may want to have more broad goals, and as you expand, make them more and more specific.
- Do not spread yourself too thin: Make sure you do not try to take on too many platforms at once. Focusing on one or two platforms where you know your audience will be is better to make sure you are being as effective as possible on those platforms.
- Position your brand: You want to be clear in your social media posts what your brand is all about and how you want your brand to look to your audience. Mixed or unclear messages can do more harm than good.
- Be consistent: Make sure to make posts consistently and not overflood your social media accounts with too many posts that begin to annoy your followers. It is better to have one solid post weekly, than three water-downed posts per day.
- Research what social media tools are available to you: There are several social media tools available to you that can help you automate posts and manage multiple accounts across several platforms all from one dashboard. Later in the article, we will discuss some of the best social media tools available on the market right now.
Any startup is going to be stretched thin when it comes to roles that individuals play within the young business. Until there is enough capital to hire new talent, you or someone in your organization may have to take on the social media manager role in addition to all their normal duties. It does not have to be stressful. By remembering these effective tips, you can at least get a good start on your social media presence while your business is in its infant stage.
Why is social media management for startups important?
Social media management for startups is important because when a business is first starting out, social media is the cheapest form of marketing that they can access. Hiring marketing firms and/or creating an in-house marketing department that can create and purchase ad space for your business is expensive. Unless you have an angel investor or a giant war chest of funds available from venture capitalists, you are most likely not going to be able to make extensive investments in marketing and advertising when your business is new. By using social media, you can reach millions of potential customers for a fraction of the cost.
The number of people on social media is astounding. It is estimated that there were around 3.6 billion active social media users in 2020, and that number is expected to continue to grow. Some estimates put that figure at around 4.41 billion sometime before the year 2025. Many of these social media users actually use their social media accounts to research products, new restaurants, and entertainment venues, and to gauge their peer’s opinions about specific products or services. This fact alone, in combination with the sheer volume of social media users and the cost-effectiveness of using social media as a marketing platform, makes social media management a crucial component of any new startup.
Do startups need social media?
The two biggest marketing mistakes that any new startup can make is to not have a social media presence or to have a presence, but to use it ineffectively. Although it is not a requirement of any new business starting out, you would be hindering your business’s potential growth from the very beginning.
How do I manage my startup social media?
As you grow your business, your general marketing strategy may take on new complexities, but in the beginning, focusing on social media is a great start.
- Create social media profiles: When you are creating your social media profiles, remember to have a clear brand position and to be consistent with your brand’s image across all platforms.
- Content strategy: How many posts do you want to create? Who are the posts geared towards? How many new followers do you want to reach each week? Having a clear content strategy with defined goals is critical to social media marketing success.
- Engage with your audience: Make sure your content is engaging for your intended audience. Your content should define your brand, make a clear statement, and be entertaining. Also, do not fall into the trap of flooding your followers with too much content that they become tired of your presence on their feeds.
Tools to help you manage your social media
Remember, you are not alone when it comes to managing your social media presence for your startup. There are many tools out there designed to help take some of the workload off your plate so you can focus on other aspects of your new business. Here are some of our favorites.
- Buffer Publish
- HootSuite
- Zoho
- MeetEdgar
- Loomly
- Sendible
- Iconosquare
- Tailwind
- Later
These social media management apps are useful for many and various purposes. You may want to use one or more of these tools to help you manage your social media accounts and the content you choose to share on those platforms.
Conclusion
Social media can help drive traffic and grow sales. As your sales begin to grow, you will need to stock more inventory. Most startups struggle with cash flow which can affect their ability to keep inventory in stock. If you’re in need of inventory financing, create a business account on Kickfurther today.
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