If you are anything like us, you built your business offline (first). And then somewhere along the way you realized you had to make changes. In order to keep up with the time – you had to adopt social media into your marketing efforts. We chose to call it new school marketing in this post – for the sole purpose that it is exactly what it felt like to use a few years ago.
It wasn’t that we were blind to things changing, it’s just we had never had to build a business online. Instead it was a place we shared our family or funnies. And guess what? It still is! The hybrid we found was learning how to bridge the 2. It didn’t have to mean walking away from where we had always been strong – it simply meant adding new school marketing to our arsenal.
And, we want that for you too!
Social Media 101 | New School Marketing
Like us, you probably aren’t new to the social media world, but you might be new to how social media plays a part in your business, right?
We like to think of Facebook as the primary social media platform. With an active Facebook Page, you can start sharing your content, building your audience, and encouraging engagement. Later down the line, you can target with ads (if that’s in your plan). But, we’ll talk about setting up a Facebook Business Page and ads management account down the road because it’s a more advanced strategy.
In the mean time, be sure you are pumping out regular, valuable and authentic content. Engage with your audience, participate in Facebook Groups – even hop on a live video and teach something! Facebook in our opinion, should be the place to start.
As a marketer or entrepreneur, Pinterest is a must-use resource in our opinion. We love using it for our business because when you pin a blog post or product image, it never goes away and could be driving traffic to your website even 2 years from now. It basically makes all of your images timeless. But, you do need to set it up correctly so that your images continue to link back to the website you’d like them to.
Business accounts (are free) on Pinterest have added bonuses like analytics, which is super helpful for your marketing strategies. Make sure that even when you are playing around with the platform that you are set to a business account. Pinterest, like other platforms do also have an ad spend capability. So, keep this in mind as you build your boards there – as a business account your analytics will come in super helpful later! Trust us!
Like Facebook and the new school marketing, people click through to your Pinterest profile to check out what you’re all about. Therefor, make sure to use your image as the profile picture and fill in the about you section based on what you’re about.
The fun part? Creating boards! Boards showcase different themes your site may have. As you create boards, make sure you’re strategic about them. This is something you can create over time, but be intentional with the names of them and what content you will include.
If you’re unsure how Instagram will help you grow your business, it might be time to reconsider. Over 70% of all US business are already on the platform and successfully cultivating a community of brand ambassadors. This platform broke the mold when it came to new school marketing.
Brand lovers (they exist!) will be the ones that are eating up all of your content and purchasing all of your products. (Ideally of course)
So, all you need to do to get started on the there is download the app from your smartphone and follow the quick start instructions. Like we mentioned above, use the image from your profile photo and make sure your bio is filled out!
Now onto the fun part of sharing. We love Insta-stories because it is so quick and easy (similar to Facebook stories) For your photo grid, you’ll want to share images that all reflect back to who you are and use #hashtags to reach new audiences.
Lastly, make sure you switch your Instagram account to a business account and get access to analytics similar to that of Pinterest.
In summary, make sure at the very least you have a presence on these platforms. Which ones are you playing on? Are we connected? Let us know!
