Social Media Branding: 10 Actionable Tips

Introduction

Social media offers many opportunities to businesses, including brand recognition and forging a consumer-brand relationship. If you are using social media to promote your business , you cannot expect to work with only one social media platform. A strategic branding using social media entails juggling multiple social media channels. This is to ensure that you get to widen your reach and really get to “socialize” with your target market.

The problem with having multiple social media accounts is that it can be a struggle to maintain a brand image across different platforms. Sizing requirements, image content, and other pertinent details vary, and not being able to properly maintain the accounts would lead to inconsistencies. This would, in turn, lead to customer confusion, hurting your chance of building a solid recognition and relationship.

In order to polish this brand strategy, we must cover the basics first and understand what social media branding is and how you can use it to strengthen your branding and brand marketing efforts.

What is Social Media Branding?

Brand awareness is a top priority among marketers and social media branding is simply using social media platforms to ensure that the audience is able to perceive your brand the way you want it to be perceived. It is more than just having a logo to introduce your brand. It is all about creating a consistent method to make the audience aware of your brand and be able to engage with them on these social media platforms.

A strategic branding using social media entails juggling multiple social media channels. This is to ensure that you get to widen your reach and really get to “socialize” with your target market.

Why is Social Media Branding Important?

Basically, the purpose of social media branding is to boost brand awareness. By leveraging its power, it will help build a robust network of followers who are not only loyal to the brand but will also buy your products and services.

Both personal brands and businesses use social media to grow awareness. This is an important aspect to look into if you are after generating a long-term business. It is necessary to get it right if you are establishing a solid relationship with the consumers. With social media branding, it will be easier to get people into your sales funnel once you are able to make them trust your brand.

How to Establish a Good Social Media Branding Foundation?

The best part about using social media for brand marketing is that it can benefit both established and new businesses. Establishing a good foundation for your social media branding will make the process of brand exposure and customer retention more efficient. To do this, you need to:

1. Be Consistent. Inconsistent branding can be confusing. Use your brand style in all your social media posts. This means injecting brand colors, fonts, product images, logos, etc. into your social media marketing materials.
2. Build a Relevant Following. If you want to achieve success with social media marketing; you have to pinpoint exactly who your audiences are. This group has to engage with your posts in order for them to count as relevant. Social media is a conversation and it has to go in both ways. It would be such a waste to start with a campaign with no audience, or with an audience that does not connect.
3. Ask Questions. One way to connect with the audience is by asking questions related to your brand. Consider this as your market research where you have to identify what their needs are in order for you to provide them. Asking questions will let you know the audience to a deeper level and this will be very valuable for future campaigns.
4. Listen. The most effective way to strengthen your branding foundation is by listening to the audience. You need to show that you value what they think and say about the brand by putting into action your brand promises and considering their suggestions and opinions. As simple as acknowledging their participation in conversations will already make a huge difference in making them feel valued as a loyal customer.

10 In-Depth, Actionable Tips on Social Media?Branding

Here are 10 ten tips in order to improve your social media branding game:

1. Fully Update Your Social Media Account Profiles (Consistently)

One of the purposes of having social media accounts is to keep the consumers updated about what is happening with your brand. Let them know that there is a person behind your social media account who really engages with the audience. This can be done simply by consistently updating your profiles for any changes or updates. By doing this, you are able to maintain relevance and keep a strong brand presence on their feeds.

2. Set SMART?Goals

Goal setting is one of the ways to increase the likelihood of success. Setting SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-specific) goals will propel your strategy forward and give you defined metrics to measure your progress. These goals will help align your social media activities together because you get to keep track of performance indicators more accurately. It will help you identify whether you need to adjust your strategy or keep your winning formula as is.

3. Identify Your Target Audience.

Not knowing who your audience is makes any of your campaigns pointless. Your subject matter needs to be tailored in order to fit the profile of your target audience. This is to ensure that you get to deliver content that is memorable and has more impact. Knowing your audience will also guide you on what type of content to post next. It will help set the tone of your content since you are aware of their specific interests.

4. Apply Consistent Use of Brand Logo, Name, Voice, Tone, and?Message.

The shift to visual content is gaining popularity which is why you also need to keep up. Do remember, though, that in creating content , you have to maintain consistency with your brand image. From the logo, voice, tone, message, name, and other brand particulars. These are your visual identity that is a system of visual elements that are distinct to your brand. By keeping a consistent visual identity, your content looks unified and is more recognizable.

5. Plan Your Content?Calendar

A content calendar is like a layout of the whole social media strategy. This framework contains information that would support your long-term social media goals. It is an excellent way to keep on top of things and be able to complete all the tasks that are entailed in social media management.

A common mistake in social media marketing is focusing on quick posts and instant wins. This kind of strategy tends to be forgettable and does not meet the kind of engagement that you need to boost your branding. Content must be planned in advance and must be injected with user-generated content. This long-term strategy with timely and relevant content maximizes engagement.

By having a content calendar, you are assured to have a steady stream of high-quality content. It will give consistency to your strategy and will keep with the momentum in terms of engagement.

6. Post Consistently

Consistency is the key to keeping social media users engaged. Social media has a fast-paced nature that makes content become obsolete quickly. Regularly posting content will keep your brand memorable and make an impact. Remember that being consistent does not mean you have to overwhelm the audience with too many posts. A recommended formula is to post several times a week then observe the nature of engagement between posts. By doing this, you will be able to identify a posting cadence that suits your audience.

7. Engage With Your?Audience

All social media platforms that are used for marketing should have authentic social interactions. Without engagement, social media is merely a platform that publishes information. Social networks are developed in order for people to connect. In the case of marketing, these platforms are meant to connect the brands with the audience. Engaging with the audience is as simple as liking their comments on your posts. You can interact with them by replying back, especially if they are asking for information about your brand. It would also be great to encourage them to give out suggestions on how you can improve your brand and duly acknowledge their replies.

8. Collaborate With Influencers

Partnering with influencers is a great way to improve brand exposure. Influencer collaboration is an effective strategy to get the word about your brand out in the open. With today’s clamor for brand legitimacy, customers are more likely to trust a brand if there are social proof and recommendations from social influencers. These influencers are trusted by consumers because they appear real compared to manufactured advertisements. The key to achieving success with influencer collaboration is to find an influencer who shares the same values as your brand. This will help make the collaboration look and feel authentic.

9. Be Relatable, Human.

With the ongoing bouts of the COVID-19 pandemic, it can be difficult for brands to reach out to consumers, especially with the restrictions on personal interaction. This lack of human connection can severely affect your branding strategy so you have to show the audience that a real person is behind every social media post. Every social media channel has its own style of bringing the users virtually closer to each other. In Facebook and Instagram, for example, you can go live and let the audience see you and hear your voice. Connecting this way will give them a reason to build a meaningful relationship with your brand and eventually build their trust.

10. Build or Join and Connect with Communities

Social media communities are platforms where members are able to relate and discuss common experiences and interests. These online communities are so diverse, which makes them a great resource for more information about your audience. By building or joining a community, you can create conversations with your brand as the topic. You can find tidbits of information that will contribute to your quest of improving your content, products, and brand as a whole.

Be Identified With Your Social Media?Brand

It will be more effective to present your brand using your social media channels if you are able to cultivate a strong connection with the audience. As a marketer or the brand owner, it is expected of you to know your brand. You have to be able to convey the brand’s personality through your social media content. The tone of the voice that you use on posts, for example, must match the personality of your brand.

The clearer you are about your brand, the easier it will be for the audience to get a grasp of the message that you want them to understand. It is crucial that you are able to strengthen your identity through your social media brand by adjusting your messaging and marketing tactics.

It is a common goal to increase brand awareness through social media. But, in order to do this, you must execute strategies that will get you through the different obstacles towards achieving your goals. It can be a little tricky at first but you have all the means to buff up your strategies with the help of these tips. Improve your social media branding and you will slowly see a positive impact on your marketing efforts. Pay close attention to your actions and you will be rewarded with an audience that is more engaged and is more aware of your brand.

Originally published at https://www.namasteui.com on January 24, 2022.