How to craft a social media strategy

In April, our expert panel came to our MeetUp stage with host Ben Keene to spill their social media secrets.

Here are some key points we took away from the session.

Crafting a social media strategy 

Social media expert and founder of award-winning social media agency, Untapped Digital, Corrie Jones gave some actionable advice on how to craft a social media strategy. Instead of spamming Facebook group chats until you get a response, Corrie tells us the five things you need to consider for a successful strategy.

1. Goals 🥅

Ask yourself, what are your aims? What do you want to get out of your social media. Everything you produce should match up to these targets.

Whether you want more followers that translate into customers, to raise awareness of your brand or build a community, make sure this is reflected in any content you publish.

2. Channels 📲  

Where is your target audience and what channels will they be using? Don’t use every single social media platform for the sake of it, make sure you are making noise in the right place to reach the right people.

3. Type of content 📸 

Figure out what content works best for your business and what engages your customer base the most. This may mean experimenting but whatever you try, be realistic with what you can produce and don’t over-commit.

4. Create a community 🤝 

This starts with who your audience is and who you want to attract. A community will help create a hub for your startup that can transform into loyal customers if you are posting the right content that they relate to.

5. Measurement 📊 

If you aren’t keeping track of your engagement, how will you know what’s working? Make sure you measure your engagement and website traffic - if something isn’t working you can change it and get better results.

Experimenting 

Abi Oyepitan, co-founder of LIHA Beauty, spoke to us about trying out different approaches to find out what works best for you online. She opened up about contacting influencers and how she has used the power of social media to create conversations about her skincare brand.

Her attitude towards trying new strategies rang true with fellow panelist Henry Connell, co-founder of award-winning English sparkling wine and spritzer brand, The Uncommon. He said that ultimately "it's about building trust" online.  As well as working with wine writers, he also uses micro influencers.

"We found influencers to be really useful. We focus on engagement rates and how they talk to their audience," 

The importance of an online community

When it comes to starting up, even if you have a co-founder, it often means a lot of hours and hard work being put into your business. At the start before you hit your time to shine, “being a founder of a business can be really lonely," Corrie admitted.

"Being in a community where you can share how your day is going is really useful on a personal level," she added. Seeing other founders in the same or similar positions as you can be comforting as well as motivating. 

So as well as reaching your customer base online, think about reaching out to fellow founders for a support network - social media often shares the highlights of being a founder with a lot of the behind the scenes grafting in the drafts.

Numbers aren’t everything

Corrie confessed that even though  follower count may look promising, the most important thing is to see traffic going through to your site and it’s vital to watch  your rate of conversions.

"It's not just about the number of followers or likes you get!" 

To hear more in depth conversations from our MeetUp, keep your eye out on our socials to know when the video will be released on our YouTube channel.