What Social Media Platforms Are Right For Your Business?
– Clarissa Burrows
There are so many social media platforms available these days, it’s difficult to know which platforms you should choose when promoting your business. However, regardless of which platforms you choose, the fact is, you need to be on at least some, otherwise for all intents and purposes, your business may as well not exist.
We’ll break down each social media platform and explain what type of business should be on it so that you can decide what platform/s will best suit your business.
Pro Tip!
Whichever social media platform you decide to go with, you need to post regularly and religiously. You need to engage with others on the platform, in a timely manner and make connections with people in your industry or those who fit your target audience. Remember, it’s called “social” media for a reason, you need to be sociable on your pages for the best results.
Social Media Platform Crib Notes:
Facebook –
We’re all familiar with Facebook. This platform has basically become the modern-day equivalent of a company website. If a business has no active Facebook page, that will throw up red flags for the consumer and could result in breaking down trust in the business or simply making potential customers decide not to do business with you.
Facebook should be considered step one, it’s the most essential place for any business in any industry to be visible. This is where customers or potential customers will check to see if your company is legitimate. This includes, do they post regularly. Are there reviews? Are there pictures or videos of the products or services happening? You need a “yes” to all of these to be a reliable page.
Facebook is the one platform that you need to be on, regardless of your business or industry.
Instagram –
This is an image and video sharing platform that is fantastic for businesses that have a product or service that is enjoyable to look at. This platform may be one of those you’ve heard about, so you assume you need it but that’s not always the case. You need to consider how Instagram is used. Users go on Instagram to share pictures of themselves or their lives or look at aesthetically pleasing images from other users, these are people who value attractive visual stimuli. Does your business have loads of products to showcase? Do you have many events to share pictures of? Then yes, Instagram might be for you.
Instagram works for businesses in the food and beverage industry, events, fashion, and self care industries, etc as they all sell physical things. Any industry with tangible products for sale will do well on Instagram. You need to share regular posts, multiple times a week, so ask yourself if you’ll have enough going on daily to photograph and share.
LinkedIn –
This has traditionally been considered the “business” platform and everyone thought of it as a kind of professional showcase, an online CV if you will. Many businesses believed that LinkedIn was more for potential employees to impress them but slowly they too have begun to use the platform as their own professional showcase which is working well for all involved.
However, with Twitter’s takeover by Elon Musk, there’s been a bit of a mass exodus from Twitter to LinkedIn, making LinkedIn relax a little. LinkedIn is becoming a little more casual, making it a great place for online CVs, opinion and thought leadership pieces, and general interest posts. There is still a bit of a formal undercurrent at this point but who knows how long that will remain?
LinkedIn is a great platform for more academic, cloud-based, or knowledge work businesses. I want to call them “serious” businesses but that’s not quite right. These are businesses that are prestigious and are oftentimes selling their knowledge and not necessarily a product. Think, IT companies, business consultants, and the like.
Twitter –
Twitter’s popularity may be falling overall but it still garners significant use. This platform is mostly for people who have limited free time to consume information. Topics are sorted using hashtags and all the trending hashtags at the time of use are lined up on the right of the interface making it quick and easy to see what’s happening at a glance.
This kind of person is often a younger, entry-to-mid-level professional or an older, senior management-level professional. This is the type of available target audience on Twitter. If this is who your business targets, then Twitter will work for you.
Keep in mind, there are character limits for each tweet and you cannot edit tweets after the fact. Twitter verification is also a paid for thing now so not having a blue tick is no longer the end of the world. Keep your tweets short and to the point as that is what people come to Twitter for. If your business is more technical this may not be the platform for you.
YouTube –
The long format video sharing platform is truly not for everyone. Unless you have dedicated people to sit down and regularly film and edit an entertaining, educational, or informative videos YouTube might be a little challenging.
This platform is more for larger businesses that have the money and time to dedicate to animating or filming videos or for influencers whose business is themselves and their own lives. Something that many companies do, when they don’t really want to use YouTube as one of their main social platforms, is use YouTube as the place for the occasional video they do share and then link to that video on their regular platforms.
TikTok –
This short form video sharing platform is quickly rising in popularity. It’s a common misconception that TikTok is for children, it is absolutely for anyone, and that includes businesses. This platform can be a fun way to quickly reach and engage with your target audience or simply with fans who enjoy watching your content. For example, there are many creators who have actually started making money off TikTok by sharing videos of their work, like cleaning_kaka who cleans people’s homes and has almost 4.1 million followers. Or alecpaintsofficial who is a wall painter but does so in a satisfying manner and he has 3 million followers.
So TikTok is great for any business that wants to be personable, explain their products, or has a satisfying to-watch job.
Reddit –
Reddit is becoming more popular with advertisers as its targeting abilities are unparalleled. Each community on Reddit (called a subreddit or sub) focuses on a specific topic or interest and there are many subs for a single interest. So, you could share your business ads with all people who like -insert your business’ thing here- and boom, you’re instantly talking to all the people who have actively said they’re interested in your specific thing.
The only potential drawback with Reddit is that it isn’t exactly the most mainstream platform, meaning the users there fit into certain niche categories. You probably won’t be able to talk to the average homemaker housewife on Reddit, but you will be able to reach anyone interested in alt culture, gaming, tech, and a variety of other things. There are however subs for pretty much any interest you can think of. So, you can see if Reddit is for you, by looking up how many users are interested in the various things that make up your business and if there’s a nice chunk of people who are interested, maybe Reddit is for you.
It works much like any other social media platform where you can share posts and videos on your page or in subs or advertise on Reddit.
BeReal –
BeReal offers a social media alternative. Every day you get a notification, and you have to take a picture using your dual camera within two minutes in order to share it with others. This is a tricky one for businesses, as there are no ads on the platform and a limit to the number of friends you can have (roughly 2000).
So, you can use BeReal as a kind of brand awareness platform and do things like offer a giveaway or ask people to post a BeReal featuring your product in order to win a competition, share it on Instagram, and tag your business. Or you could cross-post your BeReal to your Instagram stories or post it to another platform. This platform only allows access to a very niche audience and we aren’t’ entirely sure yet if a business would benefit from using this particular platform.
So, what do you use?
We’d suggest Facebook as a basis for all business social media presence. This is the perfect platform to do basic engagement and begin your company’s social media journey. For your secondary platforms, you need to work out what best suits your brand, obviously, you can contact us, and we’ll guide you on what we suggest is most likely to work for you.
Social media is not a fixed thing, it’s so dynamic and ever-changing that you could test out all the social platforms available and see what works best for your business before you commit to one. Every business is different, meaning every business will flourish on different social media platforms. If one isn’t working, try another. Your target audience is out there and waiting for you to connect with them. It’s time to reach out.
Have any questions? Let’s connect, contact HashTagME to guide you today.
