Social media is an ever-changing landscape, and the teams responsible for managing it must be adaptable and quick to respond.
Every new year (or even week) brings with it the chance to learn, explore opportunities, and try out new things for social media teams. As we get ready for 2024, we’ve compiled some important social media advice that you can incorporate into your strategy – remember, you’re not navigating these changes by yourself.
We consulted with the members of Sprout Social’s community, known as the Arboretum (or the Arb), to gather their most recent and effective social media advice and strategies. Let’s get started.
What we learned when we asked for social media tips
When we asked the Arb members for social media tips that other social pros can use, their answers reflected the sophisticated, strategic ways social teams are thinking.
Before we get into their direct tips, here are three core themes we uncovered across the responses.
Social media professionals are expanding their focus beyond just their immediate colleagues.
There’s no question that teams beyond marketing are catching onto the power of social media—and how social might be able to help their team, too.
A common focus in many of the responses we saw in the Arb involved working with departments beyond marketing. This includes working with other teams to spark new content concepts, and to bring social insights and impact to teams outside of marketing.
Sharing data extends beyond just your team. As per The Sprout Social Index™, a significant 76% of marketers concur that their insights provide valuable information to other departments.
2. Teams are streamlining processes—within their team and beyond
The more teams and leaders understand the value of social, the more asks and collaborations naturally arise.
As social teams and strategies grow, the more complex communication and collaboration systems become. From adopting Artificial Intelligence (AI) to adjusting content requests, the need for streamlined processes was well reflected in the responses we received.
Social groups are increasingly deliberate in their approach to content and strategies.
Social pros have always known that social is more than “just posting.” There’s strategy and intention behind every post.
Numerous marketing professionals and groups are elevating their scrutiny and purposefulness to a higher degree. A prominent trend we observed revolved around the concept of intensifying the integration of business objectives and audience data into the content development strategy to enhance the consideration given to social media updates.
Keep reading to get more detail about these three takeaways from our expert tips, and to learn ways to employ them in your strategy.
8 social media strategy tips from social media experts
Here are some fresh social media suggestions from our community, along with some timeless advice to keep in mind.
1. Extend social media’s influence beyond the social team
It is clear that social media is increasingly becoming multi-functional. Teams beyond marketing have much to benefit from leveraging social media for business purposes. However, the social media team also has much to gain from collaborating with other teams.
As Micah Mellander, Social Media Administrator at Visions Federal Credit Union put it, “I am always trying to find new departments within our organization that could benefit from social media.” To do this, he suggests setting up meetings to talk through other departments’ goals and what products or services they’re in charge of.
This helps the social team spark new ideas, too. Dasle Hong, Senior Brand Marketing Manager at DailyPay, builds on this idea. “Each week, we bring together individuals from product, design, customer support, client success, marketing and more to brainstorm on a certain topic, like a holiday, campaign, event, etc. Everyone comes to the call with an idea and/or example, and we spend the entire time ideating, collaborating and executing content for that week as a cross-functional group.”
2. Actively break down silos
Social teams must collaborate across multiple departments. And yet, it’s common for social teams to feel siloed.
“One of our main challenges as a team is collaborating with other departments and stakeholders on key initiatives or campaigns when it comes to organic social,” Kelly Bean, Social Media and Community Manager at Trustpilot, tells us. So one of the tips she has is to enhance these processes.
“In 2024, our goal is to establish a smooth internal procedure that ensures all important stakeholders are aware of the requirements when instructing our team, the connection to our overarching business strategy, and the way our team functions in preparing for upcoming content.”
“It’s very much in the testing phase,” she explains. “But we’re hoping that in time, these shared calendars can feed into our master calendar and make things much smoother for us as a team!”
3. Tap influencer, creator and advocate voices
An effective method to reach your target audience in a more intimate manner is to collaborate with influencers within your industry who can assist in promoting your products naturally.
When you partner with an established influencer with an active following in your niche, you expose your brand to a new audience that might not be aware of your company.
Many brands are also turning to nanoinfluencers, who cultivate a small but passionate niche of followers. As influencer marketing becomes increasingly common, a micro- or nanoinfluencer can convey an extra level of authenticity. With an audience of loyal followers that know, like and trust them, a collaboration will let their followers know they recommend you as a brand to trust as well.
Expert advice: Finding the perfect influencer can be difficult. Think about using an influencer management tool to simplify these tasks, accelerate the process, and improve brand awareness and credibility.
4. Use goals and pillars to guide intentional, purposeful content
Your content should always connect back to your brand’s goals. As Molly Rodin, Digital Marketing Manager in the Robotics industry explains, “My biggest piece of advice would be really know and understand what your social goals are and how they connect to the larger organization’s goals. It’s not enough to set a goal at the beginning of the year and check back in at the end of the year.”
Understanding the specific objectives for your team and beyond acts as a beacon for your content creation. As they elaborate, “For any initiative or partnership or piece of content, you should effortlessly respond to the following inquiries: Who is the intended recipient? What is their interest in this? What action should they take following this material? How will success be gauged for this, and how does it relate to the overarching goals? Then, modify your approach based on the responses.”
Beyond helping social teams prioritize their own content, it also helps teams prioritize asks from other departments. After all, every social pro is familiar with the, “can you just post this on social?” question.
As Molly explains, “As social media managers, we get asked to do a lot. Having really clear objectives is the best way to prioritize what we’re doing, weed out low-value asks and make sure our content is set up for meaningful success.”
Crafting a clear and concise message will enable you to produce content that aligns with your brand and connects with your target audience. By staying true to a consistent message, you can trust that your social media content will remain pertinent to your followers.
5. Scale your team
Social media isn’t the job of one person anymore—it’s a department collaborating with many other teams. As social media and its impact grows, so too does the need for multiple people at the helm.
“My #1 tip for B2B brands in 2024 is to scale up your team as much as possible,” Katy Severance, the Digital Marketing Manager (Global Social Media Program) at Riskonnect tells us. “We are scaling up as 2024 comes around the corner so that when next year hits, we’ll be ready to hit the ground running with new concepts, campaigns and platforms we haven’t previously had the time to tackle.”
To achieve a larger team, you don’t have to immediately hire new positions, particularly if you need to justify the need for additional staff. As Katy recommends, “Check if a member of your content team can create and schedule some content. Consider bringing in a summer intern for a short period.” Once you have concrete outcomes from these actions, use them to support a request for a permanent employee.
6. Avoid the trap of perfectionism
Everyone working in social knows the experience of putting weeks of work into a post…only to see it outperformed by a video that took 15 seconds to make.
Not every piece of content has to be flawless. Social media teams are often pressed for time. So let go of the need for perfection and welcome the occasional rough, low-fidelity content.
Sophie Den Ridder, Social Media Coordinator at Dealer.com, summed this up perfectly: “I find that getting hung up on making sure every post is perfect often leads to spending way too much time trying to tweak already good posts. Not every post is going to be a viral sensation or garner millions of engagements. A lot of times the posts that do are ones that are more casually created and not super refined.”
Her key takeaway for 2024 content planning? Give yourself permission to have fun on social (within reason!) and go with the flow a little more.
7. Be discerning with trends
Jumping on trending TikTok sounds or post formats is a great way to boost your brand awareness and engagement. But be wary of jumping on every new trend you see. Creating posts that don’t align with your overall messaging to appear relevant is a quick way to alienate your target audience.
This is why it’s so essential to create a focused message that you can use as a baseline to measure all of your future social media posts. Let your brand goals, messaging, audience and voice guide you. This will help you determine which trends fit your brand, and which to skip.
8. Boost your audience engagement
Users of social media platforms desire genuine engagement with the companies they support – it’s an essential component of any strategy for managing a social community. Your presence on social media should embody a reciprocal exchange of dialogue. Interact with individuals instead of solely broadcasting messages to them. If you observe other users discussing your brand or product, don’t hesitate to join in and contribute something extra – this is where social listening can be beneficial.
Make sure your social media strategy includes answering questions posted on each platform and prioritizes customer care. Promptly respond to mentions, thank people who share your content and add value where you see people mentioning your brand.
You can also start conversations to proactively engage your audience. Ask questions and respond to keep the conversation going.
Take action immediately: steps to put this social media marketing guidance into practice in 2024.
Reading about social media strategy tips is just step one. Now, it’s time to put the tips into action.
Here are a few ways to apply the takeaways and tips above to your own social media marketing strategy.
Create collaboration and processes that break down silos
Cross-org collaboration is crucial for social teams, and for businesses to benefit from social insights. But 43% of social teams still feel siloed—especially on mid-market and enterprise teams.
Establishing smoother cross-team communication and collaboration was a core theme across our community tips. Apply this to your own strategy—identify where siloes or roadblocks occur, and identify opportunities for more communication.
For example, create a system to share relevant social insights and data with other teams. A social listening strategy can empower you to uncover valuable insights for your product, PR and partnerships teams alike. And auto-generated data visualizations and shareable reports ease the process, helping you tell a data story to multiple departments.
Breaking down barriers can also include collaborating with other teams to incorporate their knowledge into social media content. Consider: enlisting staff from different areas as video stars, featuring them in a “meet the team” series of posts, or just coordinating with them to guarantee consistency in campaigns.
Take a hint from Kelly Bean’s tip above and use a master calendar for visibility. Look for features in your social media management platform that can help you—like Sprout’s built-in content calendar and workflows that streamline collaboration and approval processes.
Get more sophisticated with your data use
The utilization of social data is becoming increasingly advanced and valuable across various departments.
For example, key social media metrics like engagements and follower growth are still crucial and widely used. But many marketers are taking their metrics a step further, connecting them to business goals. According to the Index, 60% of marketers plan to quantify the value of social engagement in terms of potential revenue impact in 2024.
Put your social data into action and tie your social efforts to larger business impact. An easy way to start is by using UTMs in your links to track purchases and actions taken from social. You can create these on your own or, if you use Sprout, easily manage these directly in the same platform you use for content, engagement and reporting.
If you’re unsure, AI will assist you.
According to The 2023 Sprout Social Index™, 81% of marketers say AI has already had a positive impact on their work—especially for freeing up creativity and boosting efficiency.
With so many marketers already adopting AI into their workflows, the teams that don’t risk falling behind. Bring it into your workflow where you think it can make your team more efficient.
Tools that use artificial intelligence, such as AI copy tools, provide a foundation for creating post ideas and written content, as well as responses for customer service and other tasks. Platforms like Sprout’s AI Assist Suggestions also allow you to modify the tone, making the process of creating content and engaging with your audience faster.
Use these social media tips and tricks to refresh your 2024 strategy
No social practitioner or team is alone. Use this expert social media marketing advice to inspire and improve your strategy.
Are you looking for advice on social media or simply seeking to expand your knowledge? Become a member of our group, The Arboretum, and engage with fellow social media experts, attend special live events, and keep up-to-date with the latest trends in the field.
The post 8 social media tips from experienced marketers appeared first on Sprout Social.
Social media marketing is an essential part of any successful business strategy. It allows businesses to reach a larger audience, build relationships with customers, and increase brand awareness. However, it can be difficult to know where to start when it comes to social media marketing. To help you get started, here are 8 tips for social media marketing from experienced marketers.
1. Set Goals: Before you start your social media marketing campaign, it is important to set goals. Think about what you want to achieve with your social media marketing and create a plan to reach those goals. This will help you stay focused and ensure that your efforts are effective.
2. Choose the Right Platforms: Different social media platforms have different audiences and features. Choose the platforms that are most relevant to your target audience and that will best help you reach your goals.
3. Create Engaging Content: Quality content is essential for successful social media marketing. Create content that is interesting, informative, and engaging. This will help you build relationships with your followers and encourage them to share your content.
4. Use Visuals: Visuals are a great way to grab people’s attention and make your content more engaging. Use photos, videos, infographics, and other visuals to make your content stand out.
5. Monitor Your Performance: Keep track of how your content is performing on social media. Use analytics tools to measure engagement, reach, and other metrics. This will help you understand what works and what doesn’t so you can adjust your strategy accordingly.
6. Engage with Your Audience: Social media is all about engagement. Respond to comments and messages, ask questions, and join conversations to build relationships with your followers.
7. Promote Your Content: Don’t just post content and hope for the best. Promote your content on other platforms and use paid advertising to reach a larger audience.
8. Be Consistent: Consistency is key when it comes to social media marketing. Post regularly and stay active on social media to keep your followers engaged and build relationships with them.
By following these tips from experienced marketers, you can create a successful social media marketing strategy for your business. Good luck!
Source: sproutsocial.com
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