Most B2B companies are on at least one social platform, but many are just not getting the results they want. They’re hearing about other businesses that are using social to gain loads of followers, increase their market visibility and thought leadership, drive leads, and more. So why isn’t social working for their business?
Most likely, it’s because they don’t have a solid social media content strategy in place. Instead, they’re posting randomly when they have time or only when they have some big news, like a major product announcement. A good social media content strategy should fill the gaps in between such news with a regular stream of valuable content to keep followers continually engaged.
This does take work, however. This is problematic, since according to a recent Content Marketing Institute survey, only 10% of respondents had six or more on their content marketing teams while 58% this year and 57% last year had only one or no full-time person dedicated to content marketing. If your company is one of those without content marketing resources, partnering with a team of social strategists and content developers can make sense.
Preparing an Effective Strategy
In simple terms, a social media content strategy is based on knowing who your business wants to reach, where you can find them, and what types of posted content will appeal to them most. If you have a buyer persona, now is the time to dust it off and get a good look at who your audience really is, including their primary challenges.
You can start developing a content strategy by asking yourself what you hope to achieve. Establish thought leadership or brand awareness? Engage prospects in a dialog? Drive sales leads? Once you’ve identified the purpose, every piece of posted content should support it—otherwise you’re back to random posts that don’t build momentum toward your goals.
Developing (and Sticking to) a Content Calendar
A content calendar is what it sounds like—a master list of what you plan to post about and when. Some marketers create these for a month or a quarter at a time. Just remember to build in time to create the content, which again must be of value to your audience.
In general, we recommend to our clients posting 2-3 times on their social channels per week. This article provides insight on when the best times are to post on social platforms, including LinkedIn.
The big question is, how will you develop all this content? The good news is that not all of it must be created from scratch. It’s possible to augment original content with curated content from industry newsfeeds, or to repurpose parts of other marketing content you’ve created, such as excerpts from a white paper, a recent blog post, video from a trade show event, or statistics from an industry survey. This past Carabiner blog post gives more ideas on ways to repurpose previously created content.
Of course, if your business is on more than one social platform, it’s fine to cross-post content to all of them.
Posting Isn’t a “One and Done”
It’s not enough for a prospect to follow your brand—you clearly want to engage with them through the content you provide. Again, this is why it’s important to ensure there are resources to monitor your company’s social posts and respond to those who engage with them in a timely manner. Similarly, don’t be afraid to engage with your followers’ posts, as well. It’s all about establishing a dialog and building trust.
As its name implies, the whole point of “social” is engagement, so be sure to make it a component of your overall content marketing strategy.
If you’re needing assistance in developing a social media content strategy, we can help. Our social strategists can home in on your target audience and its interests, while our pro writing team can help develop quality, engaging content. Let’s connect today.