How small businesses are using social media

Social media has become a massive part of our everyday lives, so it’s no surprise that it’s an important tool for all businesses - even small ones! This week during Small Business Month, we're discussing how small businesses are using social media to help you build a successful strategy - keep reading!

Increase brand awareness

Most businesses' objectives when it comes to social media likely includes increasing brand awareness and if you want to do this,  you need a few things. For starters, you’ll need a social media strategy, of course you’ll need at least 1 social media account, and you’ll need to be consistent. Beyond these, you can use social media to increase brand awareness in a variety of ways. For example, you can host a giveaway, use hashtags to increase your reach (you can even create your own branded hashtag), engage with other users (more on that below), and more.

Learn more about finding and selecting hashtags here: How to find Instagram hashtags that rank well

Connect

Social media is a fantastic way to connect with others - from other business owners to customers, and more. It’s called social media for a reason, so make sure you’re actually being social. Like and share posts, comment on posts, participate in relevant conversations, and more. 

While using social media to connect with your target customers may seem like a no brainer, you may be wondering how and why you should be connecting with other small businesses, potentially even your competition.

While it’s important to look at your competition on social media, there’s also room for connecting, collaborating, and creating a community with other small businesses. Check out another of our blogs for 5 reasons we need community over competition in entrepreneurship.

Customer service

Customer service on social media has become increasingly important and customers value not only that businesses reply to their concerns and questions, but also how quickly they do so. There are more ways you can use social media for customer service - we have 3 examples and some tips here.

Generate sales

Of course, small businesses are also using social media to generate sales - in fact, it’s probably one of your top objectives along with increasing brand awareness. There are many ways to drive sales on social media, if you’re interested in learning more, check out our blog here.

Learn more

Social media is a great way for business owners to learn more - whether that’s more about their target audience, their competitors, or about business and marketing in general! 

Here are some examples of ways you can use social media to learn more…

• Target audience - Take a peek at what your target audience is saying about your business (or even your industry) online. How do they feel? What do they think? And how can you use that to understand their likes, dislikes, and how you can improve?

• Competitors - Learning more about your competitors and their social media presence can certainly help you when it comes to your own business. Look at what platforms they’re on, what their audience is saying about and to them, and more.

• Business and marketing - There are tons of business and marketing experts out there and many of them are sharing their expertise with their followers. Does that mean everything they suggest will work for your business? Of course not, but it’s still a great way for you to learn more, apply what you’ve learned, and grow.

If you’re a small business who has not quite launched their business on social media yet, we suggest checking out a few of our blogs first:

• 4 Things to think about before doing digital marketing for your small business

• 5 things entrepreneurs should know before starting on social media

Alternatively, you can also check out our Social Media Starter Kit to learn how SongBird can help set you up for success.