Lesson 3: Best practices for using social media for business
There’s nearly infinite content on social media, and most potential customers don’t have a lot of time when scrolling. In this lesson, we’ll cover best practices for how to post in engaging ways that will help you get the most out of your social media—leading to sales, brand loyalty, and fun! Let’s talk about why, when, and what to post on your business social accounts.
Why should you post
Your main reasons for posting should be to engage with your customers, build trust and familiarity, build loyal followers–and have free advertisements for your business. You can do this by posting about products, specials, contests, and events. You can also post content that helps communicate your brand story and your values to get customers to connect with your Why.
Encourage customers to interact with you by sharing or commenting on your posts to get more exposure for your business, but make sure you are responding. Consistent and meaningful interaction over social media helps build rapport with your customers.
PRO-TIP
Encourage people to comment and share to reach new customers. For example, you can have your followers enter a contest by tagging a friend in a comment or you can advertise a deal and encourage people to share the news.
The average person has 250-500 friends on social media, and every “share” and “comment” helps put your post into the feed of all of their friends. This is how you can get in front of people beyond your followers for free!
When to post
You may be excited to share all about your business with your social media following, but limit yourself to about 2 to 3 quality posts a week so you don’t overwhelm your followers. This is frequent enough for you to remain active and relevant. Also, be aware of the timing and post when your customers are active. We’ve collected some resources for you on best timing for social media posting below.
Master your social media post timing
- The best times to post on social media in 2020
Algorithms for social media have changed over time, learn how to stay up to date. - How COVID-19 has changed social media engagement
COVID-19 has brought a lot of changes, here’s how it’s impacted social media engagement. - Best times to post on social media right now
Find the best times to post to best engage with your customers.
What to post
To help meet your goals of getting found, building loyal customers, and advertising your business, you should post three main types of posts: Updates/Information, Specials & Events, and Feel-Good posts. You can update and inform about anything you’re excited about, whether it’s a new product or a cool story about your staff or business.
To boost sales, post about specials, featured products, discounts, or even special events. Your feel-good posts could include things like customer stories, cool facts about your industry, or questions to connect with your audience over.
Case study: Jeremiah Rosenthal, Green Bin
One great thing to share with your social media followers is the story of how you started your business. Take Jeremiah for example. Years ago, Jeremiah came to realize how much waste packing and moving created when he was moving in with his wife, who was his girlfriend then. In 2018, Jeremiah founded Green Bin, a company that rents eco-friendly moving boxes that are cheaper than cardboard and don’t require assembly or tape. Learn more about Jeremiah’s story here.
Now that you know key tips for why, when, and what to post, let’s learn more about how to post more engaging and consistent content in the next lesson.