The 10 Best Social Media Tips for Small Businesses

In today’s digital age, avoiding social media is practically impossible. For a business, a social media presence is no longer optional, either. Social media profiles are, and have been for many years, a must-have for every business. Whether a customer is looking for product reviews or information about your business, they expect to find an active, polished profile when they search your company name—one that provides more than a simple listing in a business directory or a compilation of customer reviews. A robust social media presence offers an accessible way to understand your ideal client better, reach a broader audience, engage with customers and build brand loyalty.

As beneficial as social media can be for your business, inactivity is equally damaging. When a business profile is dormant, potential customers may think that you lack credibility, aren’t interested in interacting with them or that your business is out of touch with the modern world. Some may even assume you’re no longer in business!

Every small business has its own voice, tone and branding which requires a personalized approach to social media. But when you look at the most successful small business social media profiles, a few important commonalities emerge. Here are our 10 best social media tips for small businesses.

1. Define Your Goals

What do you want your business to gain from marketing with social media? Setting up, posting and monitoring your social media accounts will always take time and effort on your part. (This is why many small businesses choose to delegate this task!) You want the results to be worth your investment. So, before jumping in to start using social media, adding a new platform or even revamping your current online presence, you need a social media strategy that includes setting goals.

First, understand what is achievable through social media and what your resources can reasonably support. Then, ask yourself what you want your business to gain from the hard work you’ll be putting in and what a positive outcome will look like. Finally, set clear, measurable goals to evaluate your progress. Whether you aim to increase brand awareness, drive website traffic, generate leads or boost sales, specific objectives are necessary.

2. Know Your Audience

Who do you want to reach on social media? Defining your target audience and understanding the demographic you want to capture is the only way to reliably create social media content that will resonate. This kind of in-depth knowledge of your audience is necessary across the board in marketing but is especially helpful for social media.

You need a solid understanding of who your ideal customer is, how they interact with the world, what problem your product solves for them, how they make purchasing decisions, and most importantly, how they use social media. Use the answers to these questions to tailor your social media messaging and concentrate on the platforms where your audience is most active.

3. Choose the Right Platforms

So, where does your target audience consume social media content? After determining who your audience is, the next step is deciding the best method to reach them. When you think about social media, Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook probably come to mind immediately. But what about Reddit or Quora? Your potential customer may be searching for the answer to the problem your product solves right now! Or perhaps your ideal customer is actually scrolling through TikTok, X or Snapchat waiting for your latest post to catch their eye. 

Of course, you don’t want to waste time and money making TikTok videos if your target audience is on LinkedIn. Writing lengthy articles isn’t a good approach if your product is best suited to a visual format. Answering questions on Quora may be pointless if your target audience is most comfortable with the community vibe on Facebook. Understanding how your target audience uses social media means you can focus just on the platforms that are in alignment with your goals.

4. Create Content that Attracts Attention

What type of content should you post? This is where your creativity comes in! Social media is content. But you can’t post just anything. Your audience is looking for value, which you can provide with a mix of educational, entertaining and promotional posts. Great content captures attention, establishes a positive reputation and encourages shares.

The types of content that attract the most attention include those with high-quality visuals, engaging videos, user-generated content, live streams, informative articles and frequently asked questions.

5. Post Different Types of Content

What kind of content should you post? Keeping users interested in your business means you can’t post the same type of content every day. Regardless of how much a customer loves your product, they don’t want to see only advertisements from you. The same goes for memes, videos and articles.

Posting a mix of content keeps your feed interesting and fresh. Additionally, different types of content appeal to different people. Your chance of connecting with potential customers goes up when you vary how you communicate your message.

6. Post Consistently

How often should your business post on social media? The answer to this question is specific to your business and your audience but regular posting is always recommended. Every social media platform has its own unique algorithm that decides what to show users when. The details of these algorithms are typically closely guarded secrets, but they all have one thing in common: posting consistently is rewarded.

Don’t flood your followers with constant messages, images or advertisements, though! Regularly sharing with your followers will boost your profile but excessive posting will most certainly have a negative effect on how they perceive your business.

7. Plan in Advance

How does your small business keep up with posting high-quality content? By planning in advance! If you start posting on your platform without a content plan in place, you’ll likely experience one of two outcomes. You’ll either quickly taper off and lose your momentum or you’ll end up haphazardly posting content that lacks quality and meaning. Feeling forced to come up with new post ideas at the last minute isn’t ideal. A time crunch isn’t helpful for creativity, either! 

While you don’t want to get so caught up in planning that you never start, a content calendar with a few weeks of posts created in advance helps ensure a regular posting schedule, keeping your audience engaged and your brand top of mind. And, of course, your plan isn’t rigidly set in stone. Posts can always be replaced or rescheduled as needed.

8. Engage with Your Audience

How does your business get the most out of social media? The opportunity to humanize your business by connecting with your current and future customers is one of the greatest benefits of social media. Set aside time to interact directly by responding to comments, messages and mentions. This is also your chance to highlight your excellent customer service. Always show appreciation for positive feedback while addressing concerns or complaints right away. Transparency fosters loyalty and trust!

Social media isn’t a one-way street, though. You’re not limited to educating potential customers about your business. These platforms are also an excellent place to learn about what your audience is thinking. This kind of communication provides invaluable information about your customers’ pain points, what they like about your business and what they may not like.

9. Run Contests and Giveaways

How can you really catch the attention of your audience? Contests and giveaways are perfect for boosting engagement with current customers and attracting new ones. Events with the greatest return on investment are those that incorporate a reward for users that share your contest or giveaway in their own feed. A well-planned public event can definitely create buzz around your business and increase brand exposure.

In addition to making sure the rules are clear to those that enter and that the prizes are relevant to your business, always follow the legal requirements of the social media platform, along with any local, state and federal regulations that may apply.

10. Analyze and Modify Your Plan

How do you know if your social media is meeting the goals you set when you started out? After your social media platforms have been active for a few months, you should have enough information to evaluate your progress. Take a look at your engagement, reach and conversion rates. You may be surprised at what you find. That video post you were so sure would really resonate with your target audience may have been outranked by a simple answer to one of your frequently asked questions. Don’t take anything for granted and be prepared to pivot!

Without evaluating the performance of your social media profiles, you’ll always be guessing what your target audience is interested in and what they respond to. Use the insights you gather to refine your strategy, identify what works, remove what no longer makes sense and make data-driven decisions.

Social media offers small businesses a powerful platform to connect with their audience, build brand awareness and drive growth. By defining clear goals, understanding your audience, creating quality content and engaging consistently, you can leverage social media to its fullest potential. Talk with one of our marketing experts today!