Surviving a Recession as a Social Media Marketing Agency/Consultant
Social media marketing agencies and consultants stand in a very unique position during this recession, and there is no reason why they shouldn’t survive this recession and even come out bigger.
How To Not Do Social Media Marketing
If you’ve been on LinkedIn long enough, you’ve received plenty of solicitous messages from new and potential connections. They usually look something like this: “Hello, we at XY Company offer the following services…”, “Hello, I recently graduated and am seeking a job at your company…”, and more recently, “Hello, promote me by subscribing to my channel…”.
If you’re like me, you give them a cursory glance: 2-5 seconds, then move on with your business… Until you open Instagram and see your friend’s business’ page spamming your timeline with posts “advertising” their products — you want to be a supportive friend, but it’s the third time in a week and it’s getting on your nerves now.
Why do these things grind our gears so much? These two examples highlight a phenomenon that takes shape in a myriad forms. Put simply, the problem with these people/businesses is that they try to take before they give. And our brains don’t like that — no one likes to be finessed. See, humans are inherently selfish — it’s a necessary element of self-preservation. When we encounter new opportunities, we think “Hmmm, what’s in it for me?” We analyse the benefit to us — even the most altruistic of humans still consider the benefit to them and/or those whom they are serving.
Knowing this, it honestly puzzles me why anyone would start a DM by talking about themselves. Do those DMs actually work? I’ve never sent one like that, so I don’t have the data. But I have done a series of sales-y posts for an eCommerce store, and I can freely tell you that they actually hurt your business.
If you give it away, they will come
No ones goes on social media to be sold to. We want to be entertained or informed, and being sold to is only a part of the experience, not the main draw. So if all you do is “sell” on your social media, that’s something you should correct with immediate effect.
What can you do instead?
It’s really simple: GIVE AWAY YOUR BEST CONTENT
Seriously. Stop asking so much from your connections or followers, and instead focus on improving their experience on the platform. LinkedIn is easy: inform more. If you are to DM someone, stop asking for them to open their wallets, but instead seek to educate them on how you can help them achieve their goals. It has to be organic as well. I am more likely to read something like this:
“Hello Felix, I read your article on the future of Kenyan agriculture and I had some thoughts, starting with how small-scale farmers can position themselves to take advantage of this opportunity…”
Give at least 3 times as much as you ask
The benefits of this approach are immense. Here’s a few examples who have used this strategy to great effect:
Oberlo: One of the most widely used Shopify plugins. Their Facebook page offers tons of insight into the world of eCommerce, and they’re constantly educating their followers about trends and changes in that sector via their YouTube.Tai Lopez and Gary Vaynurchuk: These two gentlemen have been able to create multi-million dollar marketing machines by giving away information for free. Information that some consultants would charge you an arm and leg for. I literally get excited whenever I receive an email from Tai’s newsletter. Think about that — how many of your email subscriptions do you look forward to hearing from? How many do you actually open? If you’ve never heard of either Tai or Gary, I dare you to look them up on YouTube and watch their videos for 20 minutes — you will learn at least 1 powerful thing.
Giving away your best content is a powerful strategy that’s used by countless businesses to reach their goals. From increasing loyalty to creating awareness and growing email lists, there’s so many opportunities for growth. It serves two purposes simultaneously: you build up a fan base, and you get to show that you’re actually an expert at what you do. See, your audience will try out the ideas you give. If they do work, you create a community of loyal fans who are always looking forward to your next post. And when you do ask something of them, they will respond with overwhelming positiveness.
It’s a known fact that most leads aren’t always ready to purchase, but who do you think your fans will approach when they need the services that you offer? Whom do you think they will refer to their friends? Think about the organic shares as well… the kind of authority you build. In the process, you also preemptively address a lot of the objections that your customers may have.
This is simply is the best marketing strategy in today’s world. It’s transactional: you give, give, give and give some more, then you ask. Most people do the opposite though — taking before they give — which is why they are also quite frustrated with their results.
If you are strategic and employ a long-term approach in your delivery, you can unlock a world of unexplored opportunity for your business.
How is your business educating the world? Are you giving away your best content? What free information are you giving away without expecting anything back? You’d be surprised how much profit you can realize by giving away valuable information for free.
4 Costly Facebook Advertising Mistakes You Might be Making
Most Facebook advertising failures stem from a failure to understand how the system actually works.
9 Social Media Marketing Tools Every Marketer has to Know
Social media marketing can be a daunting task.
Especially when you’re starting off.
At face value it looks easy, but it’s not until you’re in the thick of it when you realize all the teeny tiny details that make a difference require an investment in the form of time and energy. It can overwhelm you, leave you feeling out of your depth because these tasks require different skill sets and disciplines.
Here’s a few tools that will ensure that you don’t get bogged down by the minutiae when growing your social media presence:
1. Buffer & Hootsuite
Over the last month, we have assessed the social media profiles of various small and medium sized companies. The most recurring problem the respondents have reported is that they find it hard to carve out the time daily to post on social media.
They feel that on top of doing their regular duties, growing their companies, meeting their targets, being parents, keeping their homes in order… they just don’t have enough time left in their day to craft good content for their social media. At least not regularly. Once in a while they’ll post up something well thought out, but on the most part it’s a quick update posted on irregular intervals.
It doesn’t have to be that way.
Facebook has a feature that allows the admins of a page to schedule their posts. Buffer and Hootsuite enable someone to bring all their social media accounts on one dashboard and schedule their posts for later times. Just using one of the two apps reduces your workload by half.
The solution is quite simple. Instead of adding to your daily duties, I suggest you allot some time weekly – an hour or two – to plan out your posts for the week and queue them. Regular posting will increase your brand visibility, and the social media algorithms love users who feed them.
2. Canva
Canva is a graphic design software that is an alternative to using stock photos. It’s a free tool that allows you to create designs and presentations with a strong visual impact. This tool contains dozens of social media marketing templates for making all sorts of designs that you may need: from posters, Twitter headers, website headers, Ad creative, blog images, YouTube thumbnails, all the way to business cards and fliers.
The best part of it is that despite deploying some pretty sophisticated functions, it still remains an obviously easy app to use. The interface is simple, and everything works the way you expect it to. You can edit a photo, edit the layout, add clip art, play around with text… it’s quite easy to use, and a lot cheaper than Photoshop. If you want to create conspicuous images that communicate, Canva will get the job done.
3. Fiverr & Upwork
Say you need a logo for your website. Or you need to edit a video clip to use for your Facebook ad.
But you don’t know the first thing about video editing. And the only logo you ever designed was your signature.
The good news is you can tap into a vast database of freelancers through these two websites. You can reach professionals from all sorts of disciplines: copywriting, survey design, email marketing, web design, virtual assistants, ad managers, accountants, you name it! All starting from $5 in the case of Fiverr. And you pay once you’re pleased by the work done. Both platforms have got protection features for their users, mediation and friendly customer service to handle any issues that may arise.
By outsourcing certain tasks, these two toolswill help free up your time, allowing you to focus on working on your business instead of just working for it.
4. MicroWorkers.com
Oh, this one’s a gem. And grossly under-priced. The workaround to most online marketing challenges.
What’s the simplest way to get real people to upvote you on Reddit/YouTube or to share your Facebook post? Why, pay them, of course.
MicroWorkers enables you to find people to do micro tasks for you on the internet, and it gives you control over the quality of the work done. You can assign people from specific countries only or exclude specific countries or regions. It allows you to collect proof of work before you approve payments to your workers. You post the task that you want done, select the number of workers you need, and set your budget.
And did I mention how cheap it is? One-click tasks like upvotes cost $0.09 per user. Retweets and Facebook shares start from $0.23. Every order has a minimum of 30 workers, and you can even set standards for eligibility such as the minimum number of followers required to do the task. $7 seems pretty cheap to boost your reach by 30x, don’t you think?
And it’s not just for social media. The site has powerful features that you can use for building backlinks, testing an app or service, generating traffic, and many other tools to cement your place on the internet.
5. Telegram Messenger
For most people, Telegram is just another messaging service like WhatsApp but with cloud-based storage for your messages.
But we know better.
The most attractive feature of the app is its channels. Channels work a bit like WhatsApp groups, except only the admin can create content, and other than viewing content, the subscribers do not contribute anything, except maybe take part in the polls that admins may post. It’s really that simple. The beauty of it is that if your channel has interesting content, getting subscribers shouldn’t be hard. And good Telegram channels do blow up rather quickly. With such a personal connection with your audience, Telegram can help your business grow in bounds, as long as you keep on producing high quality content. Here’s a few of my favourite channels: t.me/googlefactss , t.me/bestmemes, t.me/WallpapersGram, t.me/WorldWideHipHop.
The other BIG thing that Telegram brings on board is engagement groups. Did you ever have one of those Instagram groups whose main purpose is to engage with each other’s posts? Engagement groups are like that on steroids. Instead of buying likes or followers, users use them to find real people who will engage with their content. The concept is simple: users post links to their Instagram posts, and other users engage with their IG posts.Every group has rules. For example, if you’re in a “dx20 L+C” group, then you have to like and comment on the last 20 posts in the group, before you can post a link to your Instagram post. Most of these groups are managed by bots (Telegram’s a jungle), and if you fail to give the required engagement you are penalized. Here’s a few groups so you can see how it works: t.me/Boostchatinfluencers, t.me/d8boost, t.me/BoostGramDx30
One thing I’ve noted is that the guys at Telegram have been working hard at this app, bringing in new features and pushing the limits with each new update. They’re regularly bringing in new exciting features, not just fancy social media tricks, but features that are useful for other aspects of your business such as reporting and receiving payments.
6. Jarvee & Everliker
So, you’ve been reading our articles and have decided to start an Instagram account for your business. You’ve consistently posted content with a high VRIN score, but your notifications are as dry as the Sahara. You’ve asked your friends to shout out your new account, but you’re not getting your ideal kind of followers. You could buy followers, but we all know that doesn’t work…
Here’s a simple hack:
Look for influencers in your industry and follow them. Go through their posts and follow the users who engage with their content. Reciprocation is big on Instagram, so if your profile looks appealing enough, that should be enough to pull them into your ecosystem. Engaging with their content comes with two benefits: increased exposure for your brand, and an awareness of the latest trends. The later of which is crucial to surviving on social media. If you do this for 20-30 minutes daily your Insta is bound to skyrocket.
Or you can automate the whole process: Jarvee and Everliker enable you to target users by hashtags or accounts they follow. They can then follow them and like their posts, unfollow, etc. you just need to give the program your instructions.
A bit of caution: Don’t go crazy with the bots and follow and unfollow a thousand people per day; don’t use them to do something a single human isn’t capable of doing. The guys at Instagram won’t like that.
I should also point out that while engagement groups and bot accounts are a good way to get your brand in front of people, they’re just simple hacks and not a strategy to running a sustainable business. They’re good for getting some traction when starting off, but past some point they won’t be enough anymore. The sure way to grow a business online is by providing value and connecting with customers — never forget that.
6 Free Social Media Marketing Tips for the Hospitality Industry
It all starts from the website. Visitors of a hotel’s website are mostly looking to do three things: make a booking, find your address, or call the hotel. Ensure that these details are prominently displayed on the Homepage and all your social media profiles.
Instagram’s ‘Like Ban’ Has Some Considerable Marketing Ramifications
Over the last few weeks, residents of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and several other countries have been using a different kind of Instagram: one where the number of likes and views on their friend’s Instagram posts are hidden. This change — now being referred to as the ‘like ban’ is a move by the Facebook-owned company aimed at “reducing anxiety and promoting mental well-being” for its users by shifting focus from the numbers to the content.
“We want people to worry a little bit less about how many likes they’re getting on Instagram and spend a bit more time connecting with the people that they care about,” – Instagram CEO, Adam Mosseri
This change is currently still being tested in those few territories, but it’s not a far-fetched idea that they may decide to eventually implement it globally. It may not happen soon — or at all — but I do like being prepared, so let us explore the world of Instagram without counters. What does it mean for marketers, and how do we thrive under the new regime?
Fundamental shift
While the move has some altruistic purpose to it, the biggest change is the almost indiscernible shift in the core operation of the platform. See, with the absence of likes, marketers have to look at other ways of measuring performance of their posts and campaigns. So instead of focusing on vanity metrics — number of followers, likes per post, etc — which are quite easy to fake, we will have to look at other aspects that tell us about fans’ sentiments regarding posts.
One source of gauging fans’ sentiments is the comment section. It is often overlooked compared to likes, but it tells you a lot more about a page than anything else. Notice how the pages that really connect with their followers often get not just many likes, but comments as well. Comments will tell you who bought their followers, who has an engaged following that is excited about each post, and who’s hardly connecting with their followers. Not to mention that they’re not as easy to fake.
This means that marketers now have to churn out more content focused on getting more comments than likes. Your posts no longer have to just look good, but they also have to provide so much value to your audience that they fell compelled to add some words along with the like they delivered. Instagram’s algorithm already takes engagement into account. Posts that get higher engagement in terms of comments vastly outrank posts with large likes and are generally shown earlier to your followers.
Success Metrics
A simple way I use to judge the performance of an Instagram page is by analyzing the Likes:Followers ratio of their last 5-10 posts. The higher the L:F ratio, the stronger the page. But L:F ratio is only useful up to a point, since as accounts grow in followings, their L:F ratios drop. Case in point: the biggest Instagram accounts (@cristiano, @kyliejenner) have a L:F ratio of about 0.8%, while average accounts with 10,000 followers have L:F ratios of anywhere from 15-30% depending on the quality of the content. With the like ban the L:F system might soon be extinct, but don’t worry, because…
I also like to look at the Comments:Followers ratio. Because whereas even the worst posts can generate likes, the number and tone of comments usually tells you much more than likes ever can. Pages with engaged followers are consistent with their comments, whereas non-engaged followers rarely ever leave comments. A good C:F ratio ranges from 0.1% to 0.0001% depending on the size of their following. A page that consistently does over 0.05% C:F is pure gold.
Post saves are another judge of success. People typically only save meaningful content, so keep an eye on that too. Although to be honest, there’s loads of other ways to track performance on Instagram: for example, customizing campaigns and tracking them to sales. If your company makes use of influencer marketing, give each influencer a unique discount code for their followers to use. Sales attributable to each influncer can then be matched to their code. If you’re a marketer sifting through options of influencers to partner with, comments should be your guiding tool.
Key takeaway
The like ban coupled with Instagram’s declining organic reach makes it imperative for marketers to create content that resonates with fans and actually gets them engaging with it. The focus should shift from vanity content and focus, to quality content that informs and educates and expands your fanbase. You want people to have a conversation in your comments in reaction to your posts, sharing your posts on their stories and tagging their friends, not just liking them.
The findings of Instagram’s test could bring some major changes, to not just their app, but other social media platforms as well. Mental health concerns over social media use have increased in recent years, and as the platforms get more proactive in tackling this issue, we may see similar moves by other social media giants in coming months.
Are you looking to scale your Instagram and use it to make money? Talk to usfor a free 30-minute personalized strategic session.
The 7 Cardinal Sins of Social Media Marketing
Beware of these mistakes while going about your social media marketing activities. Tread carefully, and remember that the internet never forgets.
Social Media Marketing – Is It Worth It?
Over the last few months we have spoken dozens of business managers about the advantages of social media marketing. Being users of social platforms, they are able to appreciate the impact that a well-thought-out campaign can bring, but a lot of them are hesitant to adopt such a structure in their organizations.
After a while we noticed that their fears, worries, and reservations were mostly centered around the same things. We documented these objections in what we’ve come to term as our “rebuttal guidebook” in order to understand what factors were motivating them and to create solutions that solved these problems. Here are some of the more common objections we have received:
1. “We already have a marketing department”
Good heavens, mate! We don’t intend to overhaul or replace it, no. In fact, we like your marketing department so much, we’re going to be working with them to get you in front of thousands of eyeballs daily. It is actually easier working with an in-house marketing team (and cheaper for you too), as they understand the organization, its culture and have their finger on the pulse of the place.
The thing is, though, when did they finish school? If it’s more than 3 years ago they probably didn’t learn enough (if anything at all) about social media marketing in their college marketing classes. Then again, maybe they did. But how long ago was that? Things change so fast in the world of social media, that what was a sure money-making beast a few months ago will now only bring in small trickles of revenue today. You need someone who’s up-to-date on the latest tactics, and understands the subtle, frequent shifts in how the platforms operate, so your business can put its best foot forward. And that’s where external consultants come in.
2. “Advertising is too expensive”
An erroneous assumption carried on from traditional advertising. We know billboards and tv commercials don’t come cheap, and some people expect the same prohibitive cost with social media ads. When you tell them they can make profit with as little as a Ksh 350 per day investment, they have trouble believing you. I then usually pull up my Facebook Ads account and show them some stats:
These are results from one of our first eCommerce clients’ ad campaign for their online store. The total campaign budget was Ksh 180,000 for the 7-month period, and we made sales of Ksh. 940,000. We didn’t even have all the funds at the beginning of the campaign. We started off with Ksh. 500/day ads, then scaled up to Ksh. 1,000/day when we started making money from the first ads. At the peak we were spending about Ksh. 3,000 per day on Facebook ads, with returns of about Ksh 26,000 per day.
It doesn’t matter if you have a small budget – you just need to know how to deploy it wisely on the internet for maximum profit. Our Facebook Advertising program teaches about the basics you need to understand to run successful ads every time.
3. “We have a good thing going with TV and radio – why change it?”
First of all, congratulations on your achievements. You seem to have a good eye for picking out winning campaigns, and that is commendable. We’re not asking you to pull down your billboards yet, merely to consider another source of traffic for your business. One with no media wastage, and where you can match every dollar spent to the revenue it brought in, like so:
Traditional advertising still has a place in this world. When combined with social media marketing, however, the results can be downright lethal. You can keep crushing it with your billboards and commercials, while harnessing the power of connection of social media, which equals larger market share. For example, a well-organized Instagram challenge can very easily get picked up by the news, which then feeds back to itself, creating a feedback loop that elevates your brand recognition.
4. “The kind of business we do wouldn’t benefit from social media”
Do any of your customers use Facebook? Here’s a simple experiment:
Create a Facebook page and ask your customers to review it after checkout or a few days after purchasing your goods/services. Trust me, there’s more people like your customers on Facebook, and it can help you create a community of like-minded individuals who value what your business has to offer. Like Drake did with MySpace back in the 2000s when few knew him: he was able to create a cult following on the platform back then, who ate up his music and led to the distribution of his content on other mainstream sources. While everyone was fighting to get on tv, he focused on creating his community online, who then helped get his music to other platforms.
This is the kind of opportunity you leave on the table when you snub social media marketing. Honestly, whatever business you do (unless you’re a witchdoctor) your enterprise stands to gain something once you build a nice online presence.
So why should you set up a social media marketing channel for your business?
1. Social media marketing will get you seen:A social profile, combined with a nice-designed website, will get your brand in front of the people who search for it, on search engines and on social media platforms. The combination of a profile and a sales-optimized website can also lead to more leads and sales for your business.
2. Social media marketing will keep your customers coming back: a competent social media marketing professional can design a marketing funnel that keeps new and existing customers within your ecosystem, so that you’re always top of mind. This includes follow-ups, prompts, discounts, and giveaways. Their reviews will also help you establish your authority, and can be a crucial factor in bringing in new business.
3. A social media marketing consultant will enable you to focus on your core business:soyou don’t have to split your time between running your business and learning how to use Snapchat. You can leave your marketing needs to a professional whom you know will do their best to get you seen. This is someone who understands the system, and is constantly working to learn any new developments in the world of SMM. Such an individual/agency would make a valued partner, don’t you think?
4. Social media marketing consultants give you a fresh perspective:It’s easy to get your head stuck in a bubble, favouring tactics that have historically worked well, despite declining numbers. But what does your marketing and lead generation model look like to your competitors, clients and prospects? A fresh perspective is invaluable, especially if your wheels have been spinning without gaining much traction. A good SMM consultant will breathe fresh air into your marketing efforts, and will also conduct competitive research to find out where your competition is investing their time and money so you can keep pace.
Are you keen on growing your online presence and reaching more potential customers? Apply here for a free 30-minute strategy session with our consultants that will focus on how you can put your best foot forward.