It’s becoming harder and harder to find anyone who isn’t active on at least one social network—and like it or not, that has implications for your business. Companies need to go where their customers are, and more and more that means setting up shop on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, or any number of other social platforms. Social media presence was long a competitive advantage for business owners, but these days it is more or less a necessity.

Why Social Media Matters

Social media is important to your brand for a number of reasons. It is unlikely that you’re going to be closing a lot of sales or moving a lot of merchandise directly from a company Facebook page or Twitter account, but social media does serve as a critical tool for marketing your website. One of the best ways to drive traffic is to build a community through social networking, and then direct that traffic to your company site—and thus, further into your sales funnel.

Social media is key for content marketing, as well. As we noted in our last post, valuable content helps educate your customers and prepare them to purchase the products or services they really need—but the best content in the world is meaningless if it goes unseen. To make content marketing worthwhile, you have to deploy your content through a channel people care about—and that means you should at least consider social networking.

Above all, social media is about brand-building. Chances are your customers spend a lot of time on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, or another social channel—so to keep your brand visible, you’ve got to spend time there as well.

Two Caveats About Social Media Marketing

Now, there are a couple of key disclaimers about social media. The first is that social is not a silver bullet or a recipe for overnight success. Building a community and bolstering brand loyalty happens over time, and those expecting immediate and direct ROI may be disappointed. Make sure you approach social media with reasonable expectations.

Also noteworthy: Not every company needs to be on every social channel. Your customers may all be using Facebook, and none of them may be on LinkedIn—which means you’re probably better off narrowing your focus rather than wasting media dollars on a non-optimal social channel. Be thoughtful and do some research before opting for specific social platforms.

Social Strategies for Your Brand

And indeed, there are some best practices that can make your social media use more effective:

• Remember to focus on valuable content, not just around-the-clock promotion.
• Update with consistency; stagnant social media profiles lose followers fast.
• You may have to spend money on social media in order for it to be effective—meaning paid ads and promotions—though this hinges on what exactly you’re trying to accomplish on social media.
• With that said, paid ads and promotions won’t work unless you pair them with value-adding content and strong calls to action.

Social media is part of a more integrative marketing approach that centers on your company website and also encompasses paid ads and more—which means that, in order to get the best mileage out of it, it’s ideal to ally with a strategic agency partner, who can help you bring all the pieces together into a unified marketing strategy.

Check out the other posts in our Bringing in More Business series:

POST 1 – Digital Outreach Starts with Website Building
POST 2 – Why Content is Still King 
POST 3 – Why Your Website Needs Marketing
POST 4 – Why Your Business Needs to Get Social
POST 5 – Why Website Marketing is Integrative