11 Actionable Tips to Manage Social Media for your Business (Like a Boss!)

Have you ever felt that you need to get a handle on your social media management but just couldn't figure out how and just decided to sweep it under the rug?

I hear ya!

But the truth is social media has taken over the world with billions of daily active users. So much so that Social Media Manager positions are now on the rise with more and more companies having a high demand to create effective social media marketing to reach their audience, drive sales and scale their business.

With 2.5 billion users stretching across the world, social media optimization is key in interacting with your customers, gathering analytics, and understanding what your market is after.

That number is just way too high to ignore... you gotta get a piece of that social media action, but how?

Here are the best and easy tips on how to manage your social media for your business.

1) KNOW WHO YOUR AUDIENCE IS

It is absolutely critical to know who your target market is! The more concise you are the better. Once you truly hone in on a very specific audience, you'll be able to:

• Set clear social media objectives

• Create concrete goals

• Deliver content that's relevant to them

• Increase your social media engagement with your target

If you're sporadic and unintentional with your audience, it will be transpired with the content that you're delivering.

So for example, way back when I had just started out my henna business I had no clear objectives or goals. I was just happy if anyone booked me. That was because I wasn't clear on who I was providing for or selling to.

I deliberately took the time to write out the qualities of my ideal client.

DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP!

This little exercise will allow you to be ahead of the game and set the very foundation of your business.

So my description looked a little like this:

Notice, I not only pinpoint the demographic (i.e. gender, age, etc.) but I was extremely detailed in including more psychological factors in there as well (such as an appreciation to tradition & values her family/fiancee).

This is extremely methodical in being able to deliver content that matches your ideal client to reel them in.

You can also check this article that highlights 10 questions you should ask yourself before establishing your target market.

Once you pinpoint who your audience is, you'll be able to see which social media platforms they mainly hang out at and where you can find them.

Since I'm a henna artist and my target is South Asian Brides, it became easier for me to know which social media platforms they're utilizing.

Brides heavily use Instagram and Pinterest to get inspiration from, which is why I created pinterest boards that targets them and made sure to include more bridal mehndi oriented photos on instagram.

2) FOCUS ON SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS THAT WORK!

We all easily fall in the trap of wanting to be on as many social media platforms as possible.

But throwing spaghetti on the wall and hoping it sticks does not work - nor is it strategic in any way or form.

You need to be very intentional with which social media platforms work for you and give it your ALL!

If you spread yourself way too thin by promoting on all social media outlets, you'll get overwhelmed and burned out, and that's not what we want - DO WE?

Truth be told, it's not going to be effective either, especially if you're doing it all yourself.

That's why I've devoted social media strategies to help enhance my instagram and pinterest, seeing those are the most effective tools for my business.

So if your business falls under any of the categories, here are the social media platforms I recommend you use :)

3) PROVIDE FREE VALUE BEFORE YOU SELL

You need to be adding value to your potential customers or clients. You need to give them a reason to follow you on any of your social media channels. Constantly promoting yourself or your work is a sure way to lose followers and decrease your engagement.

The best tactic here is to use an 80/20 approach. Meaning offer value 80% of the time and self promote for the remaining 20%.

You can do this in a number of ways. Either by:

• Including free guides they can download

• Writing blog posts that are relevant to them

• Add visuals they'll like to see

• Create a story behind what you're posting

People engage with the lifestyle behind your product/service more than anything else.

So get in the head of a consumer rather than a content creator or seller.

Think about it this way, what has opted you to follow an account?

When you put your mindset the way your ideal client would think, you'll become so much more effective in your overall social media strategy.

This is exactly why I created specifically catered pinterest boards that targets South Asian Brides through: Indian wedding sarees (aka bridal lehengas), South Asian wedding decor, and henna wedding invitations.

While none of these are specifically henna, it's content that is relevant to my audience which will make them so much more likely to follow and engage with my social media channel.

A snapshot of one of my pinterest boards intended for South Asian couples

Aerie does an amazing job at this! All their social media is intended to ADD VALUE to women's overall attitude towards positive body image, even though at the end of the day, Aerie is a retail for clothes.

By adding value to their intended audience, they create content that elevates their social media a ten fold.

See how their photos are images of REAL WOMEN, none of those over edited models. This adds value to their audience by creating a message that they'll resonate with.

They even created a hashtag on Instagram #AerieReal to encourage women to post images of themselves in their rawest and most natural.

This is nothing short of genius, because it gives them user generated content that they can repost and use with very little work on their end to be done.

4) OPTIMIZE YOUR POST TIMES

Now you've created your content and you're ready to post.

HURRAY!

But hold on, not so fast.

Posting your content on social media at 3 am in the morning on a weekday will not necessarily get eyes on your posts.

You have to be deliberate in your posting times to optimize your social media as best as you can and gain the reach that you're after.

Your most optimized times will rely on what social media channel you're using and your audience, so there's no size fits all technique here.

But the good news is that you'll find researches online that dictate the best times to post on which platform.

You also need to factor in time difference if you're not just a local business.

A good general rule of thumb is that people are likely to be on social media during vacant times (such as on their commute or lunch break).

According to Huff Post, here are the best generalized times:

• Instagram: 5 pm and 2 am. Highest level of engagement is reported on Wednesdays.

• Twitter: 12 pm, 5 pm and 6 pm

• Facebook: Thursdays & Fridays at 1 pm and 3 pm.

• LinkedIn: Tuesdays through Thursdays during work hours. Peak times are on Tuesday at 10 am and 11 am.

You can also download apps that tells you the most ideal posting times.

I use When to Post for Instagram and Tailwind for Pinterest.

5) KEEP TRACK OF YOUR ANALYTICS

This perfectly compliments the prior point (which is to schedule your social media posts). But by tracking your social media analytics, you'll have an even stronger frame of reference to:

• Knowing which social media channels are generating well and therefore need your redirected focus

• Give you an idea of further optimal times to post

• Which content is working best with your audience

Keeping track of your analytics is easier than ever, since it's already built in with whatever social media platform you're on.

Your analytics are super easy to access since social media channels make it a point for you to see what's performing well, when and who it's reaching.

If you can't access your analytics on Instagram, it's probably because you're using a personal account so I highly recommend you switch to a business account instead.

**The fact that being a personal account enhances your organic reach is a total rumour, so don't believe everything you hear :)

6) CREATE A SOCIAL MEDIA CALENDAR

After you've researched your optimal post times, be sure to integrate it in a clear social media calendar that you create for yourself.

Being intentional and creating deliberate content that you know will be scheduled out at specific times will keep you on track and allow you to grow on that platform.

For example, my social media calendar looks like this:

I was able to create this calendar when I was strategic in knowing what the optimal post times were depending on my:

• Social media channel

• When my audience was most active

• The specific time in my local region

7) AUTOMATE YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA

I'm going to assume you're a busy person, but even if you're not, this is still an essential strategy to keep your sanity afloat.

You don't want to tire yourself out by the burden of having to manually post everything on social media yourself.

Which is why I introduce to you the power of automation.

Automizing your social media will give you more time to create quality content and even interact with your audience who are commenting or following.

The good news is there are a ton of social media automation softwares out there that will push out the content for you.

All you need to do is to feed it in, and because I'm a true believer of batching your work, I'd advise on devoting an entire evening or day to just automize your content for social media

BELIEVE ME IT PAYS OFF AND SAVES YOU A HELL LOT OF TIME!

So there are free version softwares and paid ones with more premium options, but for the sake of this post, I'll stick with the free options (cause we all love to save a buck).

You can use Hootsuite to automate all your social media posts by synchronizing it to its platform.

You queue it to a scheduling time and it pushes that content out for you without you having to do it manually yourself.

You can also use Tailwind to automate your pinterest pins for you.

This is stellar because it's encouraged to post as much pins as possible per day and even per hour.

So by automating your re-pins you don't have to devote so much time on that platform and let the software handle it for you.

8) KEEP YOUR CONTENT INTEGRATED

I can easily say this since I come from a marketing and graphic design background, but having an integrated marketing communications strategy through out your social media is crucial.

This is why...

You want all your social media channels to compliment one another by fixating on a single message.

That message should adhere to your:

• Vision

• Mission

• and Goals

A company like InkBox does an amazing job at this... their single message is "Make Temporary Bad Decisions" and it's communicated across their social media board.

Inkbox offers semi permanent tattoos that typically lasts 8 - 18 days and it broke records! (So far as appearing on Shark Tank).

So on their Instagram page, they show photos of the semi permanent tattoos.

Their YouTube channel has videos and tutorials on how to apply the tattoos.

Their Pinterest has an assortment of inspirations for various tattoo styles.

And their Twitter has user retweets that sticks with the "temporary bad decisions" theme.

All your communications needs to have ONE SOLE MESSAGE and all your content needs to be directed towards it.

9) ENGAGE WITH YOUR AUDIENCE

There's nothing more effective in growing your social media channels than engaging with your audience!

Social media platforms LOVES it when you engage with your audience and signals to them to push out your content to an even bigger reach.

When you interact with your audience, it allows them to feel that it's not just a standard business but there's a beating heart behind it.

This also becomes much more effective in understanding what they resonate with, their suggestions and their burning pains which can all be regenerated in your content.

Mehndi Joey does such an AMAZING job at this.

Even though she has a staggering 197K follower count on instagram, she responds to each and every single comment and every single DM herself!

And because she's responsive, her engagement is through the roof and signals to instagram that her content is in demand.

Which pushes her account in the 'Explore' page for more eyeballs to see.

10) BE VISUAL

Content that is visually appealing and aesthetically pleasing is far more impactful in grabbing someone's attention.

In fact...

Hubspot stated that if an image is paired with a piece of information, a user is likely to retain 65% of that information 3 days later.

When you embrace visual content, the rewards of it will speak for itself. It will bring in more engagement, leads and possibly even revenues.

Let's look at an example, shall we?

Which post are you more likely to click on?

THIS ONE?

OR THIS ONE?

I rest my case :)

In fact, Grace Mattei is notorious for being visual in her content!

Her instagram engagement is absolutely impressive gathering an average of 1,000 likes 200 comments per post!

And the thing is, she's actually just a graphic designer, but brings so much more to the table by being visually grabbing.

11) ADHERE TO THE SOCIAL MEDIA GUIDELINES

Not following the social media channel rules and guidelines is a guaranteed way to get your accounts flagged, limiting or tightening your reach scope.

But what I also mean by this point is that...

You should follow the recommended guidelines by said social media channel.

So for example, the real estate for Facebook is different than Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest.

When you come to post the same piece of content across all these social media channels, you need to make sure that it follows their recommended image size, number of characters, etc.

An amazing tool that you can use for this is Canva - a fool proof template builder for people with no graphic design background.

It's completely free and has a library of different themes and templates that you can choose from and customize according to your social media platform.

And there are your effective 11 tips to manage your social media for your business like the boss and artrepreneur that you are!

1. Know who your audience is

2. Focus on the social media platforms that work

3. Provide free value before you sell

4. Optimize your post times

5. Keep track of your analytics

6. Create a social media calendar

7. Automate your social media

8. Keep your content integrated

9. Engage with your audience

10. Be visual

11. Adhere to social media guidelines

NEED A SOCIAL MEDIA CALENDAR OF YOUR OWN?

DOWNLOAD THIS TEMPLATE HERE FILLED WITH TIPS, STRATEGIES AND A SAMPLE OF WHAT YOUR CALENDAR NEEDS TO LOOK LIKE...