Grow Your Business with Social Media

Guest Contributor: Zoe Adams-Jones, CBA, of JAZ Trading in Queensland, Australia

There are 3 billion of us active on social media every day. That’s a huge marketplace where 75% of users make purchasing decisions based upon what they read. We post, tweet, snap, and share all day long. But, as a business owner, do you OWN your market space?

Before getting into the details of how to best use social media, let’s look at who is using social media and when they are most active.

How to Use Social Media For Your Business

With the who and when in mind, here are a few top tips to make social media work for you.  

Develop a social media strategy.  

• Focus on the top two to three platforms that best suit your business. To avoid becoming overwhelmed, master one before expanding to the next.
• Make a calendar and outline messages for days you will post. Scheduling posts on Facebook makes it easy to plan your content in advance.
• Assign a team member as your social media manager. Making social media a primary responsibility for one person ensures that it will be a priority.

Be authentic and be consistent. 

• Build credibility and your reputation just by being yourself. Customers want to see behind the scenes and relate to you as a person rather than a business.
• Be honest and don’t worry about being perfect. Your slight imperfections make you human and relatable.
• Share your expertise. You are the balloon and party expert. Demonstrate that knowledge and your customers will think of you first when it comes time for their next celebration.
• Post 4-5 times a week, every week, across all platforms. If you don’t post consistently, no one will have a reason to follow you.

Use Insights to Guide Your Content Creation

By using Facebook and Instagram Insights you can see exactly which posts are working best for you.

Facebook Insights

Facebook Insights used to be a minefield… too overwhelming for most. Facebook did a revamp and now it is geared towards YOU, the small business owner.

Facebook Insights offer business pages loads of data that display the demographics of your fans, when they are online and what posts are working for you. You can even compare your posts to other pages! Use this function to benchmark your posts against some of your social media idols and even your competitors!

Instagram Insights

Instagram Insights are very easy to read and are accessed directly from the app on your mobile device. Remember, you must have a business profile on Instagram for insights to be available to you. Because Instagram is based on first impressions, be selective of the work you post; only share the great photos.

You don’t have to be a professional photographer to create meaningful, gorgeous posts that will generate hundreds of likes. Zoe’s top performing post on Instagram (shown below) was shot and edited using an iPhone then polished off using Canva.

Visit The Very Best™ Balloon Blog for a full tutorial on how to use Canva for your business.

Creating Engaging Content

We asked Zoe to provide her top performing posts from 2018. The results provided insight into the type of content her followers enjoy.

The top post on the JAZ Trading Facebook page is a candid photo of the JAZ team, enjoying a team lunch for ‘Wear Your Tackiest Christmas Shirt Day.’ “Authenticity speaks volumes about you and touches people in a way spin cannot,” explains Zoe.

Another top Facebook post for Jaz Trading was a photo of custom color pastel balloons combined with florals. The post was at the peak of springtime in Australia and was taken at the biggest horse racing carnival of the year where flowers dominate. The photo featured pastel colors, which were in the height of their popularity. It was a very simple image and message with three key, underlying points that made it very relevant at the time.

The top performing post for Jaz Trading on Instagram was a Chrome™ Christmas tree. Not only did it perform well on the business page, it was shared by multiple channels and created engagement by way of many direct messages. It created a wonderful opportunity to showcase products and communicate personally with customers.

Post, Assess and Edit

Now that you know the tips and tricks of making social media work for you, get posting! As you do, remember how critical it is to monitor the insights and make adjustments along the way. Being flexible and responsive will definitely set you apart and get you noticed!

QBN Exclusive:  Social Media E-Book by Zoe Adams-Jones, CBA