5 Ways to Use Tiktok to Promote Your Business

If you think of Tiktok as a platform for teens and Gen Zs sharing their dance routines, funny lip-syncing videos or cute animal videos, think again. The truth is, there is a wide variety of content niches and communities within the platform, which allows you to reach a diverse audience.

No matter what type of business you have, there’s a space for your brand to make its mark on the platform. In fact, it is now seen as one of the biggest marketing machines for businesses of all sizes.

Tiktok has over 1 billion monthly active users, and the numbers seem to be rising day by day. It looks like Tiktok is here and doesn’t seem to be going anywhere

Looking to start using Tiktok to promote your brand? Here are 5 tips to help you get started.

Have fun!

Tiktok’s nature is fun, playful, and casual. So if there’s one thing you shouldn’t do on the platform, it’s being boring.

Most people are on the app to discover new and exciting content. So show off your brand personality and have fun with your content. If people see that you’re enjoying creating your content, chances are they’ll enjoy watching your videos too.

Tiktok is a great platform to test out new ideas and a different side of you. Feel free to explore different content formats until you find one that resonates with your audience. Once you do, keep replicating it to build on your success.

Post often

Let’s face it. Growing your brand on Tiktok can be exhausting, especially when you’re just starting out. Sure, it only takes one video to go viral to make a mark on this billion-dollar platform. But most of the time, success doesn’t happen overnight.

There are millions of videos that are being published on a platform everyday, and it can be quite difficult the capture the attention of your audience. If there’s one thing successful Tiktokers have in common, it’s consistency. They post content every single day; sometimes more.

So if you find yourself getting frustrated and you’re still not seeing the results you want, be patient. Post often and consistently.

Watch out for trends

One of the best ways to get more views is to create videos on trending topics. Keep in mind, though, that trends come and go. So if you want to capture the attention of your audience, you’ll have to keep up with the trends and keep your content new and refreshing.

Most users are actually searching and watching content about trending topics, so your videos will be shown to a wider audience.

With Tiktok, you’ll never run out of ideas for your content. Just do a quick search of the most trending hashtags, watch some videos on the platform and you’ll have a long list of ideas for your content.

Social media challenges 

Social media challenges are a big hit on the platform. Some videos even go viral. So if you’re looking to increase brand awareness and grow your following on Tiktok, you might want to consider joining in trending challenges.

But if you’d like to take it a step further, you can also create your own challenges and encourage people to join in on the fun. It has to be fun and easy for your target audience to complete. Otherwise, people may not be interested to participate.

It’s also a good idea to create a branded hashtag for the challenge. Be sure to do some research before creating a hashtag to make sure that it’s hasn’t been taken yet.

Run Tiktok ads

For your ads to work, your target audience must be fully engaged within the platform. And that’s one of the biggest benefits of Tiktok. Users can’t get enough of it.

In fact, the usage of Tiktok is on an upward trend, with the average users spending at least an hour a day watching, sharing, and creating videos on the platform.

The more time users spend on the platform, the higher the chance that they’ll see your ads. The more engaged they are, the better your ads will perform. This makes advertising on Tiktok more worthwhile.

Final thoughts

A lot of businesses have found success on Tiktok. It’s not just because of the fun, entertainment, and creativity it offers. But because the exposure is truly next level. In fact, it opens a whole new connection with your target audience.

If you find Tiktok intimidating or you think it’s already too late to get in, it’s not. Tiktok is new enough for you to get in, yet huge enough to ensure that you’ll be able to reach a wide audience.

5 Ways to Use Tiktok to Promote Your Business

5 Ways to Use Tiktok to Promote Your Business5 Ways to Use Tiktok to Promote Your Business

How to Create the Best Infographic for Pinterest

One of the best visual tools to use on Pinterest is Infographics. Over the past few years, infographics have become a big deal. They are a great way to visually explain data to people. Not only are they easy to follow and digest, but they are also a powerful tool for capturing the attention of your target audience, teaching them some tips and tricks, and sticking with them long after they’re out of sight. 

Let’s face it. Infographics just look at home on Pinterest. Be in on mobile or desktop, there is no denying that they fit perfectly on the Pinterest feed. And now, you’ll find thousands and thousands of infographics on the platform. So if you’re on those people or brands that are sharing infographics on Pinterest, then you’ll have to find a way to stand out. Otherwise, yours will be lost in the sea of content.   

People can get too caught up in making an infographic, what data do you use, where do you find that data, how do you create the image, what colors do you use, etc. The list goes on and on.

We have created a 5 step system for you to follow to create the
BEST infographics for Pinterest!

  • 1 – Picking the right topic
    • Does it relate to your business?
    • What topics in your industry do people find interesting?
    • Is this topic something you are passionate about?
    • What data do you want people to receive?
    • Can you tell a story within the graphic?
  • 2 – Be creative, funny, or useful
    • Can you get a reaction out of people?
    • Explain something to your audience that will resonate with them
    • Explain the data you want them to learn on their level
    • Will your image be shareable?
  • 3 – Keep it simple
    • Have a simple and clean image
    • Keep your infographic to 3-5 points
    • Using text and images within your infographic
    • Have a good Call-to-action within the graphic, don’t give it all away in one image
  • 4 – Look and feel
    • Make sure you are using clear fonts that your audience can read
    • Tie your infographic into your brand colors only use 2-3 colors per image
    • Put your sources on the bottom and your logo
    • Keep your infographic consistent with your brand
  • 5 – Sizes and dimensions
    • Vertical is the way to go in terms of pins. Make your image longer rather than wider
    • The best dimensions for infographic Pins on Pinterest are 1000 x 3000 with a Pinterest Pin ratio of 1:3
    • Infographic pins should be no larger than 600 x 2400 pixels. Otherwise, they’ll get cut off.

Wonderful, now you know how to create your infographic, what it needs to look like, the things you should have and shouldn’t have, but now the BIG question is where do you get all the data?? I know as an entrepreneur I am always looking at infographics on Pinterest for our company and for our clients, I say WOW that is awesome, I want to create something like that. BUT where did they get the data, how do they know the key points they want to talk about??

As you can see there is a lot that goes into making just ONE image, right? This is a process. It’s really about finding that perfect topic that you really want to share with the world and being able to explain it in such a way that everyone gets it! You have to do your research with each infographic, make the process fun. As you think of these ideas for your infographics, keep a journal or word doc to start collecting your data. 

Lastly, you may also want to consider Pinterest SEO. Not only will it help you drive more traffic to your website, but it will also help you improve your reach and ensure your pins are getting maximum results.

Conclusion

Remember you are always going to analyze your data and try to create a story with that data. Once you have your data, story, and image complete you can craft together a successful launch. Where will you place this image first? Each infographic needs to have your call-to-action, visually appealing, and clearly branded. Here are a few steps we recommend for a successful launch:

  • Write a blog post about your Infographic with the image within the blog content
  • Share to Pinterest, Google, Facebook
  • Make another image that is the correct size for Instagram and share it on Instagram

When you follow these steps to create the best infographics and implement our techniques in your data and design process you will be able to deliver an infographic that will resonate with your audience. An image that they will want to share and will build your brand.

If you need a hand in creating Pinterest infographics that stand out or need help with Pinterest marketing, please feel free to schedule a free 30-minute consultation call with us.

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Pinterest SEO: 5 Tips to Make Pinterest Work For You

Pinterest is a visual social network, so you might think that SEO doesn’t play much of a role here. I mean, nobody actually comes to Pinterest to search for content, right? After all, pinning stuff is what Pinterest is all about! But it turns out that Pinterest has a lot of SEO potential.

In fact, Pinterest users love to share links! When creating compelling boards and pinning tons of great stuff, you’re also sending traffic to your website.

Tons of businesses use Pinterest to drive more traffic to their website, but it’s not just about pinning pretty pictures. If you want your Pinterest pins to rank well in search engines, you need to make sure you’re doing SEO correctly.

So how can you use Pinterest for SEO? Read on!

Do keyword research to give you an idea of what users are looking for 

Using the right keywords can help your content reach the right people. So before you get started, it is essential to do keyword research. Create a list of the top keywords in your niche, and use them to inspire your content calendar.

Recipes are a huge hit on Pinterest. Let’s say you’re a nutritionist or a blogger who focuses on healthy living. You might want to create recipes related to the keywords you found.

If you’re a fashion blogger or a clothing retailer, take note of the keywords related to your niche and then create different boards and pins for each season.

Optimize your Pinterest boards

You can optimize your boards by making sure they’re relevant to your blog content or business. So that when someone searches a particular topic, they will find you.

When optimizing your boards, be sure to use keywords that people would search for to find the pins associated with them. Also, make sure you have at least three boards with lots of pins on them. The more boards you have, the more traffic you will get from Pinterest.

Write thoughtful pin descriptions

Including detailed descriptions can help your pins perform better. This, in turn, can help improve your reach and improve your pins’ SEO rankings.

If your Pinterest content isn’t optimized for pinner’s searches, then you’re missing out. You have 500 characters for your descriptions, so make the most out of it. Provide some helpful information about your pin. Give your audience a preview of what they’ll get from your content: what they’ll learn, how it would benefit them, and a call to action. These small bits of information may be just what they need to click through to your site.

If possible, include long-tail keywords in your description. They perform better than single or 2-word keywords since they describe what people are looking for. Just be careful not to overdo it. Google hates it when you stuff keywords into your descriptions, and you’ll likely be penalized for it in search engine rankings.

Use keywords as hashtags

Even though hashtags are optional on Pinterest, they are still considered beneficial. For one, they help users quickly find the content they are looking for. Plus, it helps you quickly get your pins to the top of the search results page.

Only include relevant words and phrases that describe the content in the pin. Avoid using popular but irrelevant hashtags to get people’s attention.

While Pinterest allows users to use more than 20 hashtags per pin, we advise that you limit your hashtags between 2 and 8. Having too many hashtags will make your pins look spammy.

Optimize your website for Pinterest SEO

Linking your website to your Pinterest account is an excellent step towards a better SEO performance.

You can use Pinterest tags to determine what types of Pinterest content deliver the most traffic to your website and what kind of content isn’t working. Plus, it gives you an idea of what people are doing on your website after interacting with your pins. The data is collected and sent back to your Pinterest account, so you can use it to adjust your strategy accordingly.

It’s also a good idea to add share buttons to your product pages. This allows visitors to pin items from your website to their boards.

Final thoughts

Pinterest is a great way to connect with your target audience. It’s visual and social, so it lends itself well to highlighting your content or promoting your products. Whether you’re a blogger, an artist, or a retailer, you can use the platform to drive traffic back to your website and gain followers in the process.

Pinterest may seem intimidating at first, but once you get the hang of it, you’ll realize that it’s easy to navigate. If you need help with Pinterest marketing, please schedule a free 30-minute consultation call with us. We’ll help you leverage Pinterest SEO to ensure your pins are getting maximum results.

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Wondering if Pinterest is worth your time as a blogger

It’s important to think of Pinterest as a search engine, not just a social media platform. This means that people use Pinterest to find things they’re interested in, like your blog posts. Similar to a search on Google.

Pinterest is a great way to drive traffic back to your website and grow your blog’s brand.

Here are 5 reasons how using Pinterest as a blogger can help improve your blog’s SEO, bring in more traffic, and grow your audience.

  1. Pinterest is a visual search engine –

    People visit with the goal of reading and saving pins in mind. When you pin something from your blog, make sure to add keywords in the title and description so pinners can easily find it. For example, if you write about travel tips, you could use keywords like “travel tips” and “vacation ideas” when you pin. Also, remember to use hashtags, this helps tell Pinterest what that pin is about and allows pinners to find pins. Consistency is key. It’s important to be consistent with your pins. If you only pin a few times a month, people will lose interest and won’t follow you. Try to pin at least once or twice a day to see the best results. You can create templates in Canva where you can easily swap out the text and the images while staying consistent with your brand. This allows you to use those keywords and tips at the text overlay and have eye-grabbing images that make your audience want to click on your image and go to your website.

  2. Utilizing Group Boards –

    You may join groups where you can share comparable material. Group boards are a great way to increase blog traffic because they allow your pins to be seen by more people. When you join a group board, make sure that the topics of the pins on the board fit with your blog content. If you have a travel blog, for example, it wouldn’t make sense to pin recipes on a group board about fashion. Be sure to follow the rules for each group board, most of the time you will find those rules in the notes section.

  3. Pinterest allows you to be creative with your pins –

    You may use your SEO abilities and hashtags to target people who are interested in your pins on Pinterest. When you’re creating pins, make sure they are eye-catching and include text overlays that describe what the image is about. This will help the pinner understand what your pin is about without having to click on it. For example, if you have a blog post about how to pack for a trip, you could create an image with the title. Pinterest also allows different types of pins, you can create animated video pins, video pins of you giving quick tips, or even pin your Instagram square images. Rich Pins make it easier for users to get information from a website by displaying metadata right on the Pin itself. When a user saves content with metadata on your site, it will become a Rich Pin. There are four different types of Rich Pins: app, article, product, and recipe Pins.

  4. Drives traffic to your website –

    When someone pins one of your blog posts to their board, they’re essentially sending people to your website. This is a great way to increase traffic and grow your audience. Make sure the images you pin are high-quality so pinners will want to click on them. Going back to the consistency, this is where a tool like Tailwind comes into play, this allows you to pin up to 200 images per week to your boards and even Tailwind Communities. Each pin you put up should have an SEO-friendly title and description with a link directly back to the blog post. You can then monitor your Pinterest Analytics and your Google Analytics to see where the traffic is coming from. For each blog you post on your website, you should create 10-15 images per blog to pin to Pinterest.

  5. Time Efficient Tools –

    Tailwind is a service that works with Pinterest to help you manage your time and drive more visitors to your website. I was hesitant about this purchase for some time. I expected to just look into the free trial and then cancel, but once I started using it, I couldn’t stop. Tailwind is a social media scheduling software that delivers real results in less time. Boost the effectiveness of your social media marketing efforts! Decide when to post on social media and how much engagement you want. A few bonus tips, you can use Tailwind to schedule to Instagram as well, you can also link your Instagram to Tailwind and post your images from Instagram to different boards on Pinterest. Tailwind will also allow you to create loop pins, these are great for your evergreen content that will always serve value to your audience, you put those pins in a certain loop that pins to the boards you want and over time it will automatically pin those out for you at the best times and days! This is a life-saving and time-saving tool! A must-have!

If you are ready to work with a team to do the leg work for you, meaning, create the images, pin them, write the description, and more, we are your team! We just launched a new blogger marketing program to help take items off your plate to give you as a blogger more time to write and less time worrying about creating images and social media strategy. Schedule a FREE 30-minute consultation today and let’s start increasing your website traffic!

Today, we will go through Pinterest, and we are going to do an audit on our account. So we have been working with Pinterest for a long time. We use Pinterest for many of our clients, driving traffic back to their website through a very strategic Pin strategy, posting to different boards, Tailwind communities, and different Pinterest groups, and also through promoted Pins. We were coming in to do this anyway to make sure we’re doing as we say to do. It’s one of those, “Do as we say, not as we do.” [chuckle] We want to make sure that what we’re doing with our clients, that we’re doing for ourselves as well. So as you’ll see, we are in our business Pinterest account. And when you come to your Pinterest account, you want to make sure that it is a business account. And you’ll see your home feed here. The reason why you want a business account is because of the analytics and the ads. So with a business account, there are also a few different Pins you can create. The analytics are very important because they will show you how many views you have each month on your Pinterest account. It will also show you what pins are being saved and have the most engagement, and your ads to promote those ads to drive more traffic back to your website.

Business Pinterest Account

We’re going to go to the business hub. And this is kind of the behind-the-scenes; this will tell you just a sneak peek of our analytics, which we’ll get to first. What our public profile looks like. So over here, on the right-hand side, you’ll see your logo. If this is a personal account you’ve been using, there should be an option that says “Switch to Business Account,” and that’s what you want to do. So a couple of things, you can change this header. You can have a specific header there as you have on your Facebook or your YouTube channel with your business name, what you do, your logo, things like that. We have it just set up to show our most recent Pins. So that’s more of a personal preference. This is a good space for that brand-building, we work with many different types of bloggers, so this may be a great area for your branded images with your mission or topics you cover. If you are a mom blog that works with kids ten and younger or just giving your audience a little insight into who you are, that’s a great place to have it.

Your logo or image here, your company name, and this all depends on your brand. Caitlin and I have branded Social Speak Network, so that’s our logo; that’s obviously what all of our social media is. But as a blogger, you may be branding your name, so this may be your name if you don’t have a business name for your blog. So it depends on what brand you’re using; that’s what would go here. And then your description, making sure it’s apparent what it is that you do. And then you’ll see we have only 635 followers, we’re following 129 people, but we have over 43,000 monthly views. That’s good for us. Pinterest is not a social media platform, It’s important to have followers, but you’re not banking on the number of followers you have on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter. It comes down to your Pin strategy. That’s the most important piece.

So you’ll see that these are all the Pins that we have created and that we’ve put up on our account, and you’ll be able to see how many times they have been viewed, and these have just been posted this week, so there’s not a whole whole lot of views on them yet. You’ll see that the ones that we pinned a few months ago have many more views. So what I want to do is look at what the Saved button is, which will change our profile to show the boards that we have. Now, when you think you can click on All Pins, we’ve had 63,000 Pins. And there is a mixture here of what we want to do. We talk a lot about healthcare digital marketing tips. We have social media marketing for small businesses. We have SEO and blogging tips, social media management for bloggers, finding your target market, Instagram marketing tips, Facebook marketing tips.

Setting Up Pinterest Boards

Some of these boards like this one that only has 18 Pins, we have it pinned there for a while, so we can either move those Pins to another board or let that board go if we’re not utilizing it. With our SEO, you can see that we have 663 Pins there and 500 Pins in our healthcare digital marketing. So focus on the boards you’re going to be utilizing the most, and what’s important with those is that you have an SEO-friendly title, so search engine optimization. Remember, Pinterest is that search engine, so what is your audience looking for? Are they looking for how to find your target market? This is great because that is what this board says. And if you click onto the board again, we haven’t used that board a lot because we only had 16 Pins. Then the description. To describe what that board is about and what types of Pins people will be seeing on that board. And again, you want to utilize those keywords here as well.

You can add notes; if you post to a different group of Pinterest boards, they’ll have notes of those rules. That’s a great either way to utilize that Notes section. Doing your Pinterest audit, going through each of your boards, and ensuring that you have a keyword-friendly title, a description, if you click this Edit button, the pencil, this is… So here, I don’t have a description for email marketing, so email, maybe it should be, “Is email marketing dead? No. It is very much alive and works great. In this board, we will show you how to grow your email list and utilize email marketing for your business.” So email marketing tips, you can add a board cover. It’s going to pull up the Pins from that board, and you can pick which one you want, okay? Let’s see; we’ll do this one. Click done. And then if you don’t like that board cover, you can go back, click Edit, and then maybe find this one, and then that looks perfect.

You’ll have the name, the description, and then click Done, okay? So go through each of your boards and make sure that you are utilizing the space correctly. Here in our content marketing strategy, we have over 1700 Pins. But here on How to Build an authentic business brand, we only have 10 Pins. These tips can go into maybe our business tips, and we can get rid of that board. You can also have secret boards. We love using Pinterest to get ideas on what other people are pinning. So you can create a board here at the plus sign and click Board, and then this can just be Pinterest image ideas. Keep this board secret. So what this means is as you’re scrolling through Pinterest, you can save images to this board, but they will not show up on your profile, this is just for you to see as an admin, and then you can pull that board up and look at, “Oh, okay, this is what I liked about that image,” and… As you need. So, “Oh yes. Oh, I love how they did that. That’s perfect, I like that image. Oh, this is cute.”

Pinterest Images

Because you’re going to see, there are different styles to Pinterest images and different lengths, and the longer lengths work better. Here’s an infographic. This image here is slightly longer than this one, but it’s a little hard for me to read and seems a little cluttered. I may be more apt to click on this one because it’s cleaner. So look at what types of Pins you like, what images you like, and then save them to that private board so then you can get ideas when it comes time to create content, okay? So now you have these four Pins here in my super-secret board, and we are all set. So after you do the audit on your boards, you want to come over to your analytics. And I always just click on the overview. And now, with Pinterest, you also want to try different; Types of content. Images are number one. Try the square images. If you use Tailwind, you can link your Instagram to your Tailwind, and you can pin the exact images you’re putting onto Instagram on Pinterest. So that makes it easy to monitor those square images. Are they getting clicks?

If you pin them, you’ll need to change the link because they’re going to link back to your Instagram account automatically. If that’s where you want them to go, great, otherwise change the link back to your blog. As I said, the long images. And if you’re using Canva, Canva has a great tool to create Pinterest images at different sizes. So you can try different sizes, as I said but also get creative with your Pinterest templates of adding video into these templates. So that will help increase those user views because you can add your video to this image, customize the colors, add a different change of the content, and then be able to put that onto Pinterest. You would also just have animated images like this that say, “10 Great Places To Travel With Kids.” It stops the scroll on Pinterest. So as you use different types of content, you’ll want to monitor it in your analytics. Looking at your Pin’s impressions, you can look at engagements. And this is just going to be the last 30 days.

And then, and you can see okay, so on Wednesday, I had 85 engagements on our Pinterest account. That’s awesome. What about Pin clicks? We want to make sure we’re driving that website traffic to the right places. So we had 60 clicks on Monday, the 27th. Obviously, on Christmas, we still had 30 clicks, which it’s Christmas Day, and people are still on Pinterest, so Pinterest never sleeps. It keeps going and going. This is a great platform for you to be able to look at to say, “When is my audience on Pinterest, what days of the weeks?” And so that’s where you’re gonna wanna monitor your engagement, what are my top boards? Business tips and social media management for bloggers, we’ve had 5700 impressions, 56 outbound/inbound clicks, and this is no promotion, this is just organic, 31 saves, 111 pin clicks. So this is interesting to be able to see the difference between the boards, what’s working more, and what’s not. And then also here are…

Repinning Pins on Pinterest

Some of these are our original content, and many of them are curated content, meaning Repins from trusted sources, like pin, from CoSchedule, Social Media Today, Hootsuite, Buffer, etc. We look at Social Media Examiner Neil Patel, the people in our industry that we get our information from, and we’ll repin their boards, or their pins to our boards. And then many of them are, obviously, with our logo on it, this is our own. So it’s cool to see, okay, so this one here had 2500 views or impressions, but I can create an image similar to this with our branding and see if it gets even more views. So Pinterest gives you all of the data you need to be successful on Pinterest. Here we have 740, so 6.2% engagement on this pin, 2.2% engagement on that pin. So it’s good to know what people are clicking on, what images they’re finding attractive, to draw them to that, and so that’s really where we want to then focus on, okay, what about this post drew people to it, where it makes them wanna click, and keep going, because this pin was created August 27th, and this is the stats for December to this month, so it’s really cool to look at where… What’s working, and what’s not working.

Then the other part is, if you go back to your profile, you can promote some of the pins or as many pins as you want that you have put up, and this is where it helps drive that traffic to your website even more. So here’s why Pinterest is good at driving blog traffic, I clicked promote, and it’s going to bring me here: what is the destination URL you want, what is the daily budget, and how many days?

I think 84% of Pinterest is done mobile-y, so it’s important to see what it would look like computer view, but that mobile. So that’s what it would look like a computer, this is what it would look like mobile. Most people use Pinterest on their phones. So take time, go through your Pinterest account. If you need help figuring out what board names you should have, how you should be creating those pins, what that strategy looks like, let us know, we do have Pinterest management packages, and we are helping our clients with that creative process, but also more the time management process. If you’re using the right tools you can pin from anywhere from 25 times per week up to 200 times per week, if you’re utilizing the right tools, so… And that’s a mixture of organic content, pulling from your blog post, from your social media post, and then that’s also that repining, pulling from people that you know, and trust, that are like-hearted, and like-minded to your business, and being able to pin their pins to your boards as well.

If you need help, head on over to socialspeaknetwork.com today, schedule a free 30-minute consultation, let’s get you pinning correctly today. Thank you so much, have a great day.

Social Media Tips For The Holiday Season

As the holiday season sneak up and the end of the year approaches once again, most business owners are thinking of ways to connect with their audience while looking for one last push to finish the year strong.

Every business owner I know has more on their plate than usual at this time of the year. They’re focused on mapping out their holiday social media strategy and pushing out online deals that would capture their audience’s attention. After all, consumers are already at their computers, with their credit cards on standby. You don’t want to get left behind.

Use these tips to get ahead of the marketing game and stand out from the competition.

Create holiday-themed content

Did you know that 64% of consumers turn to social media platforms when looking for gift ideas for their friends and loved ones? If you haven’t already, take this opportunity to share deals and special offers on your social media pages.

Of course, you shouldn’t just focus on deals. You want to offer valuable content to your fans and followers.

Take time to fill your social media calendar with holiday-themed content. Depending on what niche you’re in, you can create some gift guides, share holiday recipes, or even share some safety tips.

Host a holiday giveaway

With the competition getting tougher every year, businesses are looking for a way to stand out. Now, the only thing that’s better than a good deal is something you can get for free. Hosting a holiday giveaway gives your audience a chance to get a free give for themselves or their loved ones.

The key to a successful giveaway is high demand. That said, you need to provide a compelling incentive — something your audience wants. For best results, you can involve your audience in the planning process. Conduct a survey and ask them what they’d like you to giveaway.

But before you start planning what to give away and what the guidelines are, it is important to determine your goal. Are you looking for ways to grow your email list? Or are you hoping to get your followers involved with your brand?

Get your ads ready to go

The holiday season is a busy time for business owners. People are already in buying mode as they’re looking for the perfect gift for their loved ones. If you want to generate more sales, you’d like to get your products in front of your audience. And running ads is one of the best ways to do so.

But here’s the thing… Ad costs usually go up this time of year since there is more competition. That means you’d have to pay a bit more than you would on a regular day.

To make the most of your ad budget, we suggest that you focus on warm audiences- those already familiar with your brand. Customers with pre-existing brand affinity are easier to convert than new, unproven audiences.

Create genuine holiday messages

2021 is nearing its end. This is the perfect opportunity for you to connect with your clients and customers in an authentic, non-salesy way. Not only will it help you build a relationship with them, but it’s also a good way to cut through the noise.

Remember that most users receive dozens of “Happy Holidays” emails from brands during the holiday season, so make sure yours stand out. So if you decide to send holiday greetings via email, we suggest that you create a powerful, personal message that honestly speaks to your audience.

A video message would be a great option if you want to increase your engagement while showing your customers how much you appreciate their support. Why? Because studies suggest that 72% of consumers prefer watching videos from businesses over other types of marketing.

Practice the art of storytelling

It’s the season of joy, giving, and gratefulness once again. Use this time to share a heartwarming story with your fans and followers and practice the art of storytelling.

With more vying for the attention of online shoppers, it becomes even more challenging to cut through the noise. A nice, touching story will capture your audience’s attention and get the readers into the holiday spirit.

There are a lot of ways to tell a story. You can write a blog, conduct an interview, or create a short video. The key is to focus on brand cohesion and a story that your audience can resonate with.

Final thoughts

The holidays is a time of joy and togetherness for many of us. But for businesses, both big and small, it’s also the biggest period for online sales. All of a sudden, you’re met with a flurry of holiday advertisements and tempting shopping deals.

If you need help capturing the festive season in your social media posts and looking to separate your brand from the competition, we encourage you to book a free 30-minute call with us. We’ll help you build your social strategy and prepare for a more profitable 2022.

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Can you believe we are already in the last month of 2021? It has flown by, and that brings me to my point of this video today. When to hire a digital marketing agency?

When is it time to bring in a company to help with your online marketing? This can be anything from social media to blogging, videos, your overall strategy, website help, landing pages, lead magnets, all of these components equal a big piece of your marketing, and with online marketing, there’s no way around it. You have to be online.

2020 really showed us that as business owners, there are a lot of people that had been in business for years selling some type of a product at events, and they had a very strong following. Once that went away due to the pandemic and shutdowns, they didn’t have the online component to help support them. Another example is if they were a coach, and just had the in-person meetings, and they didn’t have the systems in place to bring their patients online while being HIPAA compliant and being able to set up those different pieces that they needed to maintain their business.

Now coming to the end of 2021, we’ve learned a lot over the past almost two years. What do we need to do? As a business owner, if you don’t have employees, you most likely have independent contractors, maybe you have a bookkeeper, a graphic designer, a virtual assistant, and all of those people play a crucial role and being able to help you move forward every day, every month,  and every year. When it’s time to hire a digital marketing agency, and a lot of times people think it’s just too much, I’m never gonna be able to afford that, and there are different companies with different structures, Social Speak has been in business for 14 years, and we work hand-in-hand with our clients of all different sizes, from just solopreneur up to 52, 125 employees and more.

Looking at what projects do you need help with? Having a virtual assistant is absolutely probably one of the best things you’ll be able to invest your money in because they help with those daily tasks, they’re able to make sure that you are staying accountable and that you’re getting things done that need to be done. Whether that is sending out emails, scheduling meetings, maybe even putting together social media posts, if that’s something that they’re comfortable with. When we come into play is when you need help with that overall strategy. If you are a commerce shop and now you’ve started a Shopify store online and your sales are good and you’re growing, but you need help kind of getting to that next level, what does that look like?

Here are some questions you may be asking yourself:

  • What does that strategy look like?
  • How do you implement a successful Facebook campaign for ads?
  • Do boosted Facebook posts work?
  • Do you get more out of Pinterest?
  • How can Pinterest drive traffic to your website?
  • How do you create those images?

These pieces may be outside the skill set of your VA, which is completely fine. That’s where we come in to help bridge that gap. To be able to get you from point A to point B. We like to work in phases, phase one, this is what we want to do, phase two, phase three, etc. We will be working through things together and you’re able to have that support that you need on a technical side. The behind the scenes stuff can get messy and confusing like the Shopify sites, shipping, e-commerce shops on Facebook and Google, running the right ads, creating the right drip campaigns, and even remarketing ads.   How are you able to get those ads in front of more people? How are you able to do a remarketing campaign and make sure that the people that have shown interest in that ad are seeing it again? So they finally say, “Fine, I’ll buy… I’ll buy that item.” We all have seen those ads when we click on something on Amazon and then we see them on Facebook, those are remarketing ads, so how do you create campaigns like that to stay in front of your audience? Are you using the correct system for your email marketing? Are you sending out newsletters? Are you growing your email list? Those are all other pieces that where a digital marketing agency’s expertise comes in and can help you streamline your process and your systems and make sure that everything is in line and working the way that you want it to be working.

Whether you are a solopreneur, a coach, or maybe even have a small business, and you’re thinking of, “How can I… BLANK – create a free download, grow my email list, etc.  This is where a digital marketing agency comes in to help you navigate this online world and be able to show the best results possible, because that is key, if you have the right processes and systems in place, your success is only gonna continue to grow and you got into the business because you hopefully love what you do.

Maybe you’re creating these products, you’re hand-making them, or you are importing them, but they are… They mean something to you, you have a mission, you have core values that you wanna share to with the world, and this is what you wanna do, but you lack knowledge on that behind the scenes technical side of things, because in online marketing, there’s something new every day, and things are changing constantly, so if you’re not staying up on top of what those changes are and how to rethink this and make sure that people that are buying your products are then into being synced automatically into an email list and that you know where they came from and you’re using the correct coupon codes, and we can go on and on, but it’s important to understand that you have options and there are resources there for you, like Social Speak Network to be able to help you get from this point to this point, and help grow your business.

If you are looking to grow your business in 2022 and being able to look at that strategy, that overall strategy, what are the things that you need to change, what are the things you need to rethink, what are new things you wanna implement. We are here to help you. Please head on over to socialspeaknetwork.com, schedule a free 30-minute consultation. Let’s go over what you have been doing, what’s been working, and some ideas of what you would like to see and how we may be able to help fulfill that strategy and digital marketing agency role for your business to take it to the next level.

Social Media Etiquette Golden Rules for Posting on Business Accounts

Social media has tremendous power, especially for businesses. It allows you to build a relationship with your audience and generate leads. While it provides an easy and convenient way to connect with your audience, this connectivity carries risks.

In order to ensure that your business creates a respectful, valuable, and welcomed presence on social media, it is important to adhere to the etiquette. Keep in mind that social media is a public forum. One small mistake can have a negative effect on your brand’s reputation. A careless Facebook post or tweet can spiral into a full-blown crisis.

Here is some basic social media etiquette for businesses to help you get started.

Build a positive social media image 

Social media provides the perfect platform for you to get maximum exposure and strengthen your brand image.

Building a positive social media image means building a reputation. The best way to do this is to build a relationship with your audience. Create content that would get people talking. Make sure to respond to messages and comments to keep the conversation going.

Spread positivity by sharing uplifting content and inspirational news. Celebrate your wins and spotlight your employees on social media. This puts your company or organization in a good light by showing your audience that you care about your people.

Avoid over-sharing

Consistency is the key to social media success. You need to have a posting schedule and stick to it. Your audience will forget that you exist if you don’t post regularly. However, posting too often can annoy your fans and followers.

According to studies, one or two posts a day is enough to maintain an active presence on social media. This will help keep you relevant without becoming a nuisance. You are likely to see a 50% drop in engagement per post if you post 3 times or more per day.

Be self-centered in small doses

Most businesses use social media to provide their audience with updates about their business. Often, they use it to advertise their products and services. Although it’s fine to use social to promote your business, make sure that you encourage two-way communication. Don’t just bombard people with promotions, updates, and advertisements, communicate with them.

Use social media to engage your audience. If you want people to buy your products or use your services, you need to gain their trust. To do that, you first need to build a relationship with them. Strike a balance between entertaining, informative, and promotional to keep your audience engaged. Also, encourage people to comment on your posts and join in on the discussion. Ask questions, respond to their comments, share user-generated content.

Creating a social media calendar will not only help you plan and visualize your social media content but will also prevent you from publishing poorly written content.

Tame your hashtags

Hashtags can be quite beneficial to your social media marketing plan. They can help put your content in front of people and expand your reach. They can be advantageous as long as you don’t go overboard.  But if you use too much of them, they can be distracting. It can also make you look desperate.

Just because you can use 30 hashtags on Instagram, it doesn’t mean you should Use hashtags wisely. To make sure that you get more engagement, choose hashtags that are relevant to your business. For best results, create a unique hashtag for your business.

Don’t badmouth your competition

Some businesses badmouth their competitors in the hopes of discrediting them. However, this can do more harm than good to your business. You probably already hate your competitors, but bashing them makes you look silly and childish.

Focus on the great things about your business and keep the conversations positive. As the old adage goes, “if you don’t have anything nice to say, then don’t say anything at all.”

 

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