Social media is an ever-increasing reality in today’s business world. If done right, it can lead to delightful experiences for your fans, like Burger King did in January of 2019. But if used carelessly, it can spell disaster as well, like a simple tweet by Elon Musk in 2018 plummeted Tesla’s stock pricing by 6%.

In either case, Social media can make or break your business. If you are a business not using social media, you are seriously leaving a lot of money on the table. Here are some sure shot social media practices that can help your business sky-rocket!

INVEST IN FACEBOOK

You have the best chances of selling your product when you are in a room full of people. Facebook is that room, with over 2.2 billion people. As a platform built on data, you can target the right people at the right time to see your ads and purchase, at prices which are very low compared to traditional marketing, outdoor marketing and even Google! All you need is a Facebook page of your business, engaging content which shows your value proposition, and an advertising budget.

INSTAGRAM IS THE NEXT BIG THING IN 2019

Ever since Facebook acquired it, so many businesses have floundered on the power of this one platform. The reason being, it is a place to express yourself artistically. Brands get super creative with their messages and post consistent content for their brand. Additionally, with the rise of influencer marketing, where businesses collaborate with accounts with huge followings to generate sales and engagement, it needs to be a part of your content calendar.

From a purely generic perspective, Facebook and Instagram are the two major platforms that make your business look relevant with current time. Apart from that, it also has a network effect on your business. If one person likes your product, they send it to numerous others of their friends.

INVEST IN CONTENT

It is a fact that these platforms are all moving towards video content. They are better for engagement (and also for collecting customer data). But the content you create defines your brand before the world. As a business, you are surrounded by a ton of other similar brands. There is only one way you can differentiate and give your business a voice and a flavour of its own.Content!

Content creates brand, and brand generates sales. And never before has the creation and widespread distribution of content been easier than it is now. All you need is a phone and an Instagram page. As Gary Vaynerchuck himself says, “There is no reason to do anything other than act like a media company in today‘s digital age.“

STORYTELLING WILL GET YOU SALES

It is an agreed upon fact that when you tell a story around your product it sells. The best marketers in the history of the world have been the best storytellers as well. The behemoths of 20th century from Colgate to Disney, have a story around it.

Now there are platforms like Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook, have a feature called stories ( snaps on Snapchat), successful small businesses show off their day to day business, success, failures, learnings, one can basically tell the entire story about their brand on these platforms. How does this help in sales? It makes people familiar to your brand, they don’t feel like strangers to your products.

THE RISE OF PERSONAL BRANDING

Good business is a by-product of trust. I would gladly trust my local grocer, but I doubt I would trust any online portal that sells food. Why? I don’t know them. This is the very reason a lot of baby boomers, and even Generation X people don’t trust E-commerce platforms like Flipkart. This is where content and personal branding comes in. With a multitude of platforms to speak about your business, you develop a personal brandstrong enough, that even strangers want to do business with you. For this the four best platforms I would say are:

1. Speaking on niche specific Facebook groups (It literally gives me all my business)
2. Posting and engaging on LinkedIn (Has helped me put my points before a lot of accomplished people)
3. Podcasts (Give your business a literal voice)
4. Instagram (With over a billion users, you can build your personal brand)

PODCASTING IS A GROWING MEDIUM

What a lot of businesses struggle with when it comes to organic content is there is a lot of clutter. So it isn’t easy being seen. That is why podcasting is such a beautiful way to record your business day to day. “But people don’t listen to podcasts right now!”. Well, there was a time people didn’t post on Youtube as well. And those who started off in 2010 are huge celebs today. Get your piece of the cake today itself, as voice content is on the rise.

INVEST IN CHATBOTS

This will change the game, for all kind of businesses. Be it getting sales through e-commerce or generating leads chatbots automate all the conversations in a very natural way. It is slowly being adopted by Indian markets as well. The more conversations you have, the more sales you get. In an age when Email open rates average around 30% in their best days, Chatbots have an open rate of over 70%. The numbers speak for themselves, how much potential it has.

All these strategies, when applied in tandem, help a business build a brand and get enormous sales. Social media used to be a platform for conversations. The game has changed and businesses need to update themselves to stay on top.