What are basic principles of social media?

With social media being at a high rate of usage for all companies, you would be falling behind if you weren’t utilizing it to elevate your company or brand. I have created a listed of five basic principles that I believe everyone should follow when using social media.

1. Know your Target Audience.

This may sound redundant, but knowing who you are making content for, and what they want to see is what’s going to help you the most. This is the first thing that should be established and sought after in this and every online marketing scenario. As mentioned before in a previous blog post, knowing your target market is important because, it doesn’t matter how many views your site gets. What matters is getting loyal people to keep coming back, but more importantly engaging with your content.

2. Educate.

People do not want to constantly feel like they are being sold to. They will feel bombarded and lose interest QUICKLY! Social marketing is about informing or solving people’s problems with information and answers.

3. Give away free information.

People will not purchase your information without knowing what its about, or loyalty. The best way to get people interested and hooked into your information, especially when establishing yourself online, is to offer free information. This doesn’t mean that every piece of information you give away is for free, but it is to be enough to build trust and to spread word about your content. A prime example of this would be in the situation of publishing an e-book. If I were to see an e-book online titled Digital Marketing, I obviously know what its about! But, with no background information on what I’m going to learn, my interest would not be peaked to buy it.

4. Show your passion!

If you can show passion about something you love, social media is the right place to do so. You can reach and connect with such a wide variety of people online, as the internet does not have many boundaries. But, when posting about something you are passionate about, people will be able to tell through your postings. When posting about something you are passionate about, you will be more apt to take what you do seriously, as it is something you enjoy. Passion cannot be faked!

5. Listen and Engage.

Remember to listen to your audience, they will always let you know what they want and what they are looking for. Once processing your consumer’s feedback, act on it! Engaging with your consumers is a great way to bridge that personal connection from business to consumer. Engaging with your consumers is also another way to hear more about what they want to see from you. This will give you so much insight and by combining your vision and your consumer’s desires, this will allow your brand to grow organically.