Sponsored Social Posts
Having a great social media presence is a prerequisite for this one. If you’re already writing brilliant content that shows off what your brand is all about, paying to promote posts can get those posts into the news feeds of people who aren’t following you – yet.
You’ll want to find the social networks that your target audience uses. For example, if you find that 80% of your target audience is active daily on Instagram, you’ll want to focus your social media energy on your Instagram channel.
Here are the top social media channels laid out, but depending on your audience, they may be using more niche social networks.
- Users: 2.2 billion
- Audience: Generation X and millennials
- Industry impact: B2C
- Best for: Brand awareness; advertising
- Users: 335 billion
- Audience: Primarily millennials
- Industry impact: B2B and B2C
- Best for: Public relations; customer service
- Users: One billion
- Audience: Primarily millennials
- Industry impact: B2C
- Best for: Natural-looking media, behind-the-scenes, and user-generated content; advertising
YouTube
- Users: 1.9 billion
- Audience: Millennials, closely followed by Generation Z
- Industry impact: B2C
- Best for: Brand awareness; entertainment, and how-to videos
- Users: 645 million
- Audience: Baby boomers, Generation X, and millennials
- Industry impact: B2B
- Best for: B2B relationships, business development, and employment marketing
Snapchat
- Users: 300 million
- Audience: Primarily Generation Z
- Industry impact: B2C
- Best for: Brand awareness; advertising
- Users: 250 million
- Audience: Primarily older millennials and younger baby boomers
- Industry impact: B2C
- Best for: Visual advertising; inspiration
Getting started with Sponsored Social Posts
- Choose the social network where your buyer personas are, and always optimise and test your content
- You may want to create a post around a new offer or simply word it to attract users to your page.
- Do a ‘dry run’ – try out your offer or call to action as an ordinary post and see what style and wording attract the most likes, shares, and comments before putting money behind them.
- Start with a simple image or video posts and track how many clicks and follows you get, before moving into the more complex and expensive formats, like a multi-image carousel or canvas ads.
- Check out Canva’s post for non-designers on creating beautiful social images.
Pro Tips for Sponsored Social Posts
Cheap – cost per click can start at as little as 5 cents
Effective – Facebook ads can have a click-through rate up to nine times higher than banner ads on other sites
Easy – you can have a campaign up and running in a couple of clicks
Community management – you need to be prepared to deal with comments and bear in mind that some users can find business messaging in social spaces annoying. So your content will need to be respectful of that difference.
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