Thursday, 24 April 2014 / Published in Social Media

8 Reasons Why Your Business Needs Social Media

Having a social media presence isn’t just about the convenience of technology, it’s rather about capitalizing on a cultural shift happening across the world. Social media provide entrepreneurs unique instant gratification — as soon a post goes up on social media, people are showing their support, approval, admiration or the complete opposite.
Although consumers are rapidly changing their habits and behavior, entrepreneurs still haven’t caught up. There’s a need to learn what customers are really looking for and focus on broader engagement instead of simply trying to drive an immediate sale using SEO and paid search.
If you’re wondering why you should get on social media and how it can benefit your business, look no further. Some key points are outlined below;

Social media generates a huge amount of data about your customers in real time. According to a research, everyday, there are over 500 million Tweets, 4.5 billion likes on Facebook, and 95 million photos and videos uploaded to Instagram. Behind these staggering numbers is a wealth of information about your customers—who they are, what they like, and how they feel about your brand. Through daily active engagement and social listening, you can gather relevant customer data and use that information to make smarter business decisions.

When you have a presence on social media, you make it easier for your customers to find and connect with you. And by connecting with your customers on social, you’re more likely to increase customer retention and brand loyalty.

Social ads are an inexpensive way to promote your business and distribute content. They also offer powerful targeting options so that you can reach the right audience. For example, if you run an ad campaign on LinkedIn, you can segment by things like location, company, job title, gender, and age—the list goes on. If you’re running a Facebook ad, you can target based on location, demographics, interests, behaviors, and connections. You can track and measure the performance of your social ads in real time.

Even if you aren’t on social media, most of your customers expect you to be. Over 67 percent of consumers now go to social media for customer service. They expect fast response times and 24/7 support—and companies that deliver win out.

One of the biggest benefits of social media for business is using it to increase your website traffic. Not only do social media help you direct people to your website, but the more social media shares you receive, the higher your search ranking will be.

With social media monitoring you can gain key information about your competitors. This kind of intelligence will allow you to make strategic business decisions to stay ahead of them. You can monitor industry keywords and mentions as well as competitors’ names and products.

In the past, marketers faced the challenge of ensuring their content reached customers in the shortest possible time. With the help of social media, specifically when it comes to sharing content about your business or for content curation, all you need to do is share it on your brand’s social network accounts.

Social media isn’t about blasting your company’s sales pitch on social, it’s a two-way channel where you have the opportunity to enrich relationships with your customers. For example, social media allows tourism brands to create dialogue with travelers, therefore creating relationships with customers before, during, and after they have booked a trip with the company. This kind of social media dialogue between brands and customers is something traditional advertising cannot achieve.