Social media has become an essential tool that every business, small or large, should utilize. However, many newer businesses don’t know how to get started with social media. They ask, “What platforms do I use? What do I post?” To anyone looking for concrete answers to those questions, this blog post is dedicated to you. Here is a short explanation of the pros and cons of the four most popular social media sites: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Pros: With well over a billion users, Facebook has been a consistently strong platform for almost ten years. The users on Facebook encompass almost every generation, from preteens, to baby boomers, to your grandma. You can share a wide variety of content such as blog posts, website links, videos (both live (link to Kelsey’s Live Video Blog) and pre-recorded), and photos. What is also great about Facebook is its large post character limit (63,206 characters).
If you plan on spending advertising money this year, I highly recommend using some of it on Facebook. You can get very granular when choosing your audience, basing it on age, location, likes, gender, and much more. Once you have your audience carefully chosen, you can set spending limits based on performance, meaning you won’t overspend and can closely monitor your cost per click (CPC).
Cons: Facebook is, in some industries, already saturated with advertisers, which can make organic reach more difficult and increase the amount of money you have to spend on advertising. Content has to change constantly to keep users interested and engaged. However, if you have creative employees who love generating content, you can manage this easily.
Our suggestion: If you’re a fairly established business with multiple employees and clients whom you can engage and tag, an older audience base, or the capacity to create and integrate engaging video content, Facebook is for you!
Pros: Once a hub for all things political, Twitter has slowly become a place for consumers to seek customer service. It’s a great place to facilitate highly transparent service to customers, as you have the opportunity to interact directly with your audience through real-time engagement. That said, note that Twitter’s audience is particularly distinct. More than half of Twitter users are under 30, and the user base of tweeters tends to be more men than women.
Cons: If you are using it as a customer service platform, you must get back to your customers quickly. The other unfortunate side effect of Twitter being so fast and easy is that Tweets do not have a long lifespan on people’s home pages. If your company wants to be putting our marketing messages on Twitter, you must be tweeting several times a day, everyday, to make sure your content is seen and understood.
Our suggestion: If you have a community of businesses and committed consumers/followers who you have the capacity to be interacting with on a daily basis, Twitter is a perfect choice for marketing your company.
Pros: If you have a lot of photos and videos of your products, or artistic ways to conceptualize
your brand, Instagram is your new best friend. Instagram is made for artsy and fun pictures and videos. Instagram, like Twitter, is run by hashtags, which makes it easier for your posts to be seen by those that may not even be following you. In addition, it is usually more common for people to only post of their Instagram a few times a week, not everyday, so it is less posting you have to worry about.
There is also a huge potential for product-based advertising on Instagram. If you have a product or service and plan on spending advertising dollars online, you have to spend on Instagram. Like Facebook, ad rates are underpriced compared to the rest of the advertising channels.
Cons: Instagram is more helpful for companies with a physical product and strong capacity to take nice photos of that product. If you don’t have a physical product, you may need to establish a mascot or add your logo or branding colors in pictures so your brand is recognizable.
In addition, a lot of businesses have cracked the Instagram advertising code and are aggressively advertising here. Be sure you know your audience and have great photos/videos for your ads.
Our suggestion: If you love to take fun and artsy photos then Instagram is a natural fit. Channel your artistic talent into getting creative with your products and your company. You can take your marketing to the next level with social media and reach a whole new audience of consumers.
Pros: LinkedIn has started to enter the social media space in an increasingly accessible way in the past few years. In 2019, I foresee LinkedIn content marketing becoming a very lucrative way for service-based companies to gain new business. If you offer services, you should be looking at LinkedIn. Unlike Facebook and Instagram, it’s still newer to the game, thus there is more potential to stand out if you do a good job with posting content.
Cons: The one hurdle with LinkedIn is that you must reach employees of the businesses you would offer your services to. LinkedIn is almost strictly lucrative for B2B or professional consultants. Product based companies do not have as much of a place on LinkedIn. Recruiters are also on the hunt for talent on LinkedIn and may steal the attention of your potential customers. Make sure that your content outshines theirs.
Our suggestion: Work on your personal brand on LinkedIn, and learn its capabilities before you integrate it into your marketing plan. There is huge potential for companies and their leaders to write about their expertises to gain businesses—but it will take a solid plan.
Note that not every platform is for every business. Think about your audience, your message and your capacity. At the same time, social media is constantly evolving and the best way to see if a social media platform or tactic works for you is to just try it! So take some risks and get creative.