Business

Ultimate Guide To Social Media Management

By: Dale Arasa - @inquirerdotnet

Inquirer Los Angeles / 08:09 AM December 16, 2021

Digital marketing is becoming the norm, social media management. Companies realized that most of their customers are online 24/7, and they all have social media accounts. This is why you’ll see many of them with profiles across multiple platforms. This is to help them expand their reach and get an edge over the competition.

You might be using social media marketing already, so you’re probably aware of how difficult it is to keep track of all those social channels. It’s hard enough to maintain a steady stream of updates, but you also have to address comments. On top of all that, you are running a business with multiple aspects. That’s why I posted this social media management guide!

We have to start with the basics, such as why companies need social media marketing and how they can use it. Then, I’ll discuss how you can manage that branch of your campaign with the right tools and methods. I will also add a few social media management tools that could facilitate the handling of your social media strategy.

Why do you need social media marketing?

Did you look at your Facebook or Twitter feed lately? If not, you may have been glancing at it while reading. Don’t worry. The other readers are likely doing the same thing!

That’s because the internet is such a large part of our lives right now. We could get products and services delivered right at our doors with a few taps.

Specifically, most people around the world have a social media account. This isn’t just a bold claim as the data supports it! Here’s the number of users for each platform as of October 2021:

Facebook – 2.895 billion
YouTube – 2.291 billion
Instagram – 1.393 billion
Twitter – 463 million

That’s truly a huge pool of potential customers! No matter where they are across the globe, your brand could reach them through these social channels.

This is why small businesses and large corporations have been using social media marketing more than ever. As the name suggests, it involves promoting brands through these platforms.

That’s just part of a bigger marketing strategy known as digital marketing. Aside from social media, it uses other tech-related tools like publishing blog posts on various websites.

Based on the previous list, it’s easy to see why businesses are ramping up their social media marketing efforts. But how can you start this type of campaign?

How can I plan my social media marketing?

This isn’t as simple as making an account on every social media platform and hoping for the best. Follow these steps to spend less time and gain more benefits:

Set your customer persona – Determine the target audience of your social media marketing campaign. While most people use Facebook and Twitter, they will still have preferences based on their age and interests.
Pick your platforms – Let’s say you’re catering to young adults aged 18 years old to their early 20s. Online gaming is trending for people at that age, so many use gaming-oriented social networks like Discord. In turn, your brand may need to have a presence on that website.
Create engaging content – After setting up multiple social media profiles, you should start filling them with interesting content. Your social media posts should help your brand by informing you about your products and services. What’s more, your content should be worth sharing with others, so people are likely to spread it on the internet.
Develop a community – Eventually, people interacting with your social media content will comment about it. Connect with them by addressing these comments, whether they’re good or bad. This shows that your brand responds to the needs of others, so people are more likely to have a good impression of it.

What is social media management?

If you use this type of marketing, expect to handle various tasks every day. After all, you will use multiple platforms to update and track 24/7.

This isn’t like how you normally use these websites. You must be careful about everything you say and post because those will affect your online brand image.

This is why most companies maintain a formal tone when communicating online. Others may act more casually, such as the Wendy’s Twitter page.

If it aligns with your brand’s offerings and customer base, you may do this. If not, it’s best to stay formal and polite when speaking with customers.

This is just one part of social media management! Implementing this marketing strategy in real life involves a lot more. Here are the tasks you should expect:

Handling multiple accounts – Let’s say your brand now has accounts on various social networks. You’ll have to find a way to monitor them so that you can monitor feedback.
Scheduling content – You’ll take hours if you make every single social media post from scratch! This is why you should make a content calendar by planning the ones you’ll need every week and month. It would be great to assign someone else to build and post these at the right time.
Using analytics – Just looking at the likes, shares, and comments won’t give you enough info. That’s why most social media sites provide real-time analytics, even the ones you may not expect, such as TikTok!

What does social media management need?

As I said, you could get your employees to handle your social media accounts. This may save time, but this means these people may not have enough to handle other tasks in the company.

The best solution is fewer staff members using a social media management tool. Look for the following features when selecting one for your business:

This tool must serve as the hub to track all your social media accounts. These apps vary on the sites they allow, but yours should provide access to the biggest ones like Facebook and Twitter.
Your tool should allow you to set scheduled posts. You can’t post content by yourself all the time. A social media management tool helps you maintain a constant stream of content with less effort. People are more likely to notice your brand if they see it’s usually active.
When making the content, you will likely use stock photos or images from your company. Your tool should make it easy to access these pictures to make social media posts quickly.
As I said, you will have to check how people react to your brand. Scrolling through all the comments and posts will take too much time. This is why your tool must compile the latest ones and show them to you.
After seeing the feedback, you should discuss it with your marketing staff. Your social media management tool should help you connect. That way, you can quickly come up with ways to improve customer service, even if you’re not in the same room.
Social media management tools can also provide detailed analytics based on your site’s performance over a certain period. They only use the data given by the social media site, though, so you won’t get the same metrics across all platforms.
What’s great about most of these tools is that even startups and small businesses can afford them. This opens them to more users who want their brands to “go digital.”

Best social media management tools

You can find so many tools on the internet, so it can be hard to choose one. You will also have to put them side-by-side since you need the ones with the better features above the others.

That’s why I found three of the great ones, listed them, and provided details for each one. Check my recommendations below:

Hootsuite – Overall best social media management tool
SocialPilot – The option with all the basics
SEMRush – This one is 100% free

#1. Hootsuite – Overall best social media management tool

Photo Credit: www.hootsuite.com

My top pick compares itself to the other big names such as Sprout Social. If you check the features, you’ll see that it truly competes. Here’s what you get with Hootsuite’s Pro plan:

$19 a month with a 30-day free trial
Lets you manage ten social account
Get real-time analysis reports.
Create social profiles to schedule posts for each type of target audience
Integrates with more than 250 other apps
Live chat support right on the dashboard

What separates Hootsuite from other tools is that it has a free plan. You get the basic features, but it only allows one user, two social accounts, and five scheduled messages.

Check the previous list, and you’ll see that Hootsuite meets everything your tool should do. That’s why it is my best pick for the best social media management tool!

#2. SocialPilot – The option with all the basics

Photo Credit: www.socialpilot.co

This one gets second place on my list because of the in-depth features. SocialPilot only has a few, but you can do so much with them:

This platform helps you work with your team by setting roles for the members. Those will determine what the staff can do with SocialPilot. What’s more, this tool gives you a Social Calendar so that every member can see the tasks and content set for every day and week.
The Social Calendar also lets you set when your content will come out. You could change the schedules by dragging and dropping the entries on other days on the calendar. If some of your content is performing well, SocialPilot can publish it again.
SocialPilot also reports various details like the number of views and likes. It even shows you the people who interact with your sites the most. This allows SocialPilot to tell you the best time to post content.

SocialPilot isn’t on the top of my list because of the pricing. The basic Pro plan charges $25 per month, and it only lets one user and ten social media accounts.

#3. SEMRush – This one is 100% free

Photo Credit: www.semrush.com

Maybe you want to try a social media management tool first before you pay for one. Trying it for 14 days or a month might not be enough to see the effects, though.

That’s why I placed the SEMRush Social Media Toolkit on this list. You don’t have to pay to use this as the title says. It also has different features for each of the following platforms:

Facebook Business
Twitter
Instagram Business
LinkedIn
Pinterest
Google My Business

The previous entries can still do more than SEMRush, so it’s at the bottom of my list. Still, it’s a great choice if you have a startup and you don’t want to spend a dime on online tools yet.

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Final thoughts

Nowadays, social media marketing is a must for any company. That’s why business owners should learn social media management and use the right tools for it.

See the websites of my suggestions to learn more about them. Of course, these may not match your needs, so feel free to look for other options online.

You could save a lot more time by getting help from a digital marketing agency. Fortunately, LeadAdvisors can handle your social media campaign! Click here to learn more.