There are more than 3 billion people around the world using social media monthly, according to 2018 research from We Are Social and Hootsuite. So if you’re not leveraging this massive audience for your business, you could be missing out on huge growth opportunities.
There are hundreds of platforms you can use for your own digital marketing strategy, from giants like Facebook to niche sites like BizSugar and Growth Hackers. Every business needs to carefully consider their own strengths, communication style, and target audience to choose their best possible combination. But there’s a good chance you’ll want to include at least one or two of the most popular social media channels in your strategy. Here are eight options for businesses to consider, in no particular order.
LinkedIn is a social network that’s made specifically for businesses and professionals. As such, it’s going to be especially helpful for B2B businesses and those who want to become thought leaders in a particular industry. You can set up a personal profile and/or a company page. And you can also share content and publish articles directly on the platform, allowing it to serve as a sort of blog for your brand.
Twitter is an important channel for networking with customers, suppliers and partners, and for establishing thought leadership in your industry. Relevant tweets may also appear at the top of search results, increasing your potential for organic reach.
As social media influencer Neal Schaffer shared on Everyone Social, Twitter can be an especially powerful tool for building an audience because of its reciprocity and engagement features. You have the ability to follow people in your community or industry, start conversations with nearly anyone, and even participate in Twitter chats.
Facebook has more than 2 billion monthly active users, making it by far the most popular social media channel. In addition to the number of users, Pew Research also found that Facebook users are more likely than users of other social networks to log in daily. It’s especially useful for consumer-facing businesses, but can also work for B2B. And the platform offers a variety of targeted and cost-effective advertising options to help you reach your ideal audience.
Pinterest is a social media platform that lets users bookmark (pin) image based content. It’s especially relevant for brands with strong visuals, including designers, bloggers, photographers and ecommerce businesses. There’s even a buyable pins option that shows the price and other relevant information of specific products so users can essentially shop directly on Pinterest. It can also be useful for B2B companies that create infographics or share other relevant visuals in their content.
Instagram is a mobile platform for sharing photographs and videos. It’s an option for consumer-facing businesses that create striking images, like fashion designers, interior decorators and handmade makers. It’s also especially popular with teens and young adults, showing the largest growth of any social media channel in that demographic (aside from Snapchat) last year, according to Forrester Research. So brands that target young people should strongly consider creating an Instagram account. Finally, the platform recently added Stories and livestreaming features for brands that want to showcase “behind the scenes” type content.
Snapchat
Snapchat is a mobile app that allows users to send photos, videos and other media to friends or to broadcast it to their network. There’s also a map feature that offers unique opportunities for local businesses to create buzz. It has more than 186 million users worldwide and is mostly popular with young mobile users. Though it isn’t growing quite to the degree that it has in recent years, it should still be on the radar of businesses that target millennials or Gen Z.
YouTube
YouTube is the largest video platform on the planet. The platform has more than 1.8 billion active monthly users. And you can also embed videos to your website or other forms of content. According to Think with Google, the most popular types of videos on YouTube include comedy, music, pop culture and “how to” videos. So if you can teach something useful or create funny or entertaining video content, YouTube could serve as a useful part of your strategy.
Slideshare
Slideshare allows users to upload and share presentations and documents. It’s owned by LinkedIn, so it’s easy to connect your account or share presentations with your audience there. Like LinkedIn, it’s mostly relevant for B2B companies or those who want to es
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