Social Media: How to Choose Platforms

Social media has become a powerful tool for companies, brands, and organizations to promote their products, services, and messages. It allows for direct and easy connections with customers and the ability to develop relationships. There are currently more than 3.6 billion social media users around the world (Chen, 2021). In January, the top two most popular social media networks around the world in terms of usage were Facebook and YouTube, with over 2 million active users (Chen, 2021). Social media is a critical tactic for businesses to stay relevant. If used effectively, it will allow them to reach their target audience and create brand awareness (Freberg, 2019).

From Facebook to Twitter to Instagram and TikTok, there are so many different platforms that are constantly evolving and changing. It can seem very overwhelming with so many options, making it confusing to choose where your company or organization fits in. 

So, how should you decide which social media platforms will work best?

An important part of knowing where your company should invest time and resources involves understanding the social media platforms. Every social media platform has a different audience and style. They also each have their own unique voice, community, rhythm, expectations from users (Reed College of Media, 2021). For example, 72% of Instagram users are between the ages of 13-17, while the majority of Facebook users are between the ages of 18-49 (Jackson, 2019; Chen, 2020). 

After you learn about some of the key demographics and features of different social media networks, it’s important to develop a strategy for how your company will use social media before posting. 

A strategic plan is defined as “a systematic, thorough, and aligned document that outlines from start to finish what a brand, individual, or organization wants to accomplish to address a problem, take advantage of an opportunity, or explore potential new possibilities through experimentation.” The social media strategy acts as a roadmap (Freberg, 2019).

When creating a strategic plan for social media, there are many different components your company should consider (Freberg, 2019): 

• Background Information: Research that helps to understand the past of the company, gaps and advantages, and any issues or challenges.
• Brand Voice: How do you want to come across to your audience? Do you want to be funny serious? Brand voice is how you will present yourself online and considers things like tone and personality. 
• Vision and Mission: The guiding principles and purpose of your brand or organization. It helps determine who you are as well as your philosophies. 
• Environmental Scan Analysis: This looks at many different things such as political factors, legal factors, economic factors, economic factors, community factors, technology factors, and social and consumer factors. 
• Client or Company in Focus: You should focus on these key pieces: the history of your organization; the brand voice, story, reputation, and industry; the key players and organizational structure; the products, services, and educational thought leadership; an analysis of media channels; and previous campaigns and initiatives within social media.
• Social Media Communication Audit: An analysis of different communications elements such as content, channels, social media tools, influencers, voice, and your company’s overall presence on each platform. 
• Situational Analysis: Based on all the data collected throughout the process, this provides an overall look at your brand or organization to better plan for the future. 
• SWOT: An evaluation of your businesses' strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
• Goals: This should involve a goal statement, which is a single sentence that showcases the overall plan for your social media initiative.
• Objectives: This section details what you want to accomplish through the use of social media.
• Key Audience Members: A breakdown of your primary and secondary target audiences. Who are you trying to reach?
• Strategies and Tactics: This details what you want to achieve and how you will achieve it, specifically what tools you will use.
• Evaluation: This section details how you will measure success. Are your efforts paying off? What KPIs will you measure.
• Budget: This provides an outline of how much money you have to spend on social media tools and advertising. 
• Calendar: A calendar helps to organize the content and ensure you’re on the right track to achieving your goals.

It’s critical to clearly establish things like your company’s goals, business objectives, audience and KPIs.  If you aren’t sure who you’re trying to target, the message you want to convey, or your goals of using social media, you most likely won’t be reaching the right people or seeing any return of investment. Strategy is key before implementing your plan. 

Part of this process also involves looking at where industry competitors are spending time and the content they are posting, specifically what type of content is resonating with audiences (Jackson, 2019).

It may take some testing to determine the platforms that work best for your business. Once you find them, figure out the type of content that your audience and continue finding ways to creatively entertain, educate, and interact. 

A new platform doesn’t mean that your business needs to create a strategy for that platform immediately. It’s good to keep an eye on new platforms to see how they’re being used and who’s using them; however, sometimes it’s better to focus on a few platforms rather than spreading yourself too thin. 

Freberg (2019) states, “Quality over quantity —whether it is followers, content, or conversations —always wins.” It’s great to have thousands of followers, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that people are engaged and interested in your content. Followers, which are considered a vanity metric, also don’t always result in a large return. It’s more important to focus on metrics like the number of mentions, comments, unique visitors from social media, and time spent on a website (Kallas, 2019). How many people are actually taking the time to look at your content, interact with your content, and even take a step further to explore past social media? These are the Key Performance Indicators that will help to truly determine the success of your social media and content.

There are many instances where social media teams are small or made up of a single person. This can definitely make it more to manage accounts. It’s better to be on one or two platforms where you’re able to reach and engage with your audience consistently than to be on seven different platforms and be inactive. People crave authenticity, consistency, and engagement (Freberg, 2019). 

Trying to tackle too many platforms at once may make your audience feel like you aren’t present. Your content should consistently provide value to your audience (Solis, 2010). Solis (2010) states, “Don’t speak at your audience through canned messages. Introduce value, insight, and direction with each engagement.”

What works for some businesses may not work for yours. Stick to the platforms where you can consistently perform at the highest level. You don’t need to be on every platform (Jackson, 2019)

It takes time and consistency to build a community, so it might just take some patience. If it’s really not working long-term, try something new on the platform and experiment. It might also be time to reevaluate your strategy, which might mean putting more focus into another platform that’s working really well. Develop a strategy that will set your business up for success and will help you to perform at a competitive level. 

References:

Buffer. (n.d.). What is social media marketing? Buffer. Retrieved from https://buffer.com/social-media-marketing. 

Chen, J. (2021, February 3). 36 essential social media marketing statistics to know for 2021. Sprout Social. Retrieved from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-statistics/.

Chen, J. (2020, August 4). Social media demographics to inform your brand’s strategy in 2020. Sprout Social. Retrieved from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/new-social-media-demographics/#FB-demos.

Freberg, K. (2019). Social media for strategic communication: Creative strategies and research-based applications. Sage Publications, Inc. 

Jackson, D. (2019). Which social media channels work for your brand? Sprout Social. Retrieved from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-channels/.

Kallas, P. (2018, July 11). 48 Social media KPIs you need to know (Key performance indicators). Dreamgrow. Retrieved from https://www.dreamgrow.com/48-social-media-kpis-key-performance-indicators/.

Marketing Land. (n.d.). Social Media Marketing. Retrieved from https://marketingland.com/library/channel/social-media-marketing.

Reed College of Media. (2021). Week 4 lesson: Social media analytics and advertising channels. Retrieved from https://ecampus.wvu.edu/webapps/blackboard/execute/displayLearningUnit?course_id=_155927_1&content_id=_7582545_1&framesetWrapped=true.

Solis, B. (2010, May 18). 21 rules for social media engagement. Mashable. Retrieved from https://mashable.com/2010/05/18/rules-social-media-engagment/.