This is the easiest method to create a social media marketing strategy

Social media marketing is a great way to engage and find new customers online, but what you do is far more important than just having a presence. Creating a social media marketing strategy for your business might sound easy, but think about it for a while. Do you really know what you are going to do with your campaign plan? Are you going to post random blog posts and status updates just to publish something? It’s important that you have a strategy in place so that you can best serve your target audience, and also help you achieve your business goals.

Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, LinkedIn, Slideshare, YouTube, Google+, Blogging… its enough to make your head spin. Busy companies and people venturing on the social web for marketing purposes for the first time believes you should be seen everywhere online. While this will have its benefits, if you cannot maintain your presence 100% on all the channels you are using, you will lose interest in your campaign, and so will your audience. You don’t have to be everywhere online, but you have to be where your audience spends their time.

Where can your target audience be found?
So, before you start updating all your social media profiles with content, take a step back and assess who your target audience is and where they can be found online. If your business is focused on B2B, consider a couple of social media channels like LinkedIn, YouTube, SlideShare, and Facebook. If your business is focused on B2C, you’ve got a little bit more thinking to do. For example, if your target audience is younger, Instagram, YouTube, and other rich media related channel should be high on your list. If you are targeting moms, Pinterest and Facebook are your new best friends. Do your research and find which channels your target audience is using.

Once you have found out where your target audience hangs out online, it’s time to start your messaging and targeting plan by creating a profile for yourself on these channels. Before creating your profile, study the customs of the specific social media channels you are joining. Specifically, what you can and cannot do on the channel. Sure, you can post a bunch of updates with links pointing back to your website, but should you? Probably not because you will be labelled as a spammer. Instead, research how other people and brands are using the channel to see how you can make the most out of your campaign.

Social media strategy content
After you have set up your profile and studied your target audience on the social media channel that you are going to use, what type of content are you going to use on the selected channel?

Are you going to post random content? Inspirational quotes? Relevant and helpful content? Videos? Infographics? The answer is simple. Focus on magnetic content. This is a type of content with magnetic effects which draws people in instead of pushing content out. Magnetic content should be relevant, to the point, unique, and entertaining. This type of content also has the ability to be shared because of its nature.

Magnetic content can take many forms such as text, video, images, and even curated content. Once you have an idea of what type of content you are going to publish and use to engage with your audience, it’s time to create an editorial calendar that you are going to use with your social media strategy. Use a basic excel spreadsheet to start off with and include the date and time of magnetic content publication, the textual pose, the content, and the channel you are going to publish the content on. If you are going to post simple updates, use a free tool such as Hootsuite to schedule your posts.

The rest of the content that you are going to publish will come from daily interactions with your audience. This can include the sharing, retweeting, and liking the content of the people who you follow on the social web, and responding to any questions and comments your audience is asking.

Social media = social participation
Social media is all about social participation and once you are taking the mighty step on the social web to enhance your business, you have to take the responsibility to effectively respond to the queries and comments you receive on the social web from your customers. In general, it’s good to have a plan and process in place for customer feedback – both negative and positive. To ensure you are providing the best value on the social web, and to respond when you receive any types of comments or engagement, it’s good to assign the monitoring and analysing of data concerning your social media plan to a person or team to manage your strategy. This way, when someone interacts with your brand, you can respond appropriately and swiftly.