Your business has been online for awhile now, you are posting regularly, and things seems to be going well but you are struggling to attract new customers to your business. You know it is not the service or product you are offering because you are selling that effectively. But for some reason on social media things have not started to click together.
The easy answer to attracting new customers online is to hire a firm to do it for you. But hey in the spirit of diy-ers everywhere I will help you out the best I can. The DIY method to attracting Customers online: have shareable content. What is shareable content you say? I don’t know. Great, you are thinking, now I have to go back to google and start searching for another blog that will actually help. WAIT!!!!!! Let me explain I don’t know what will be shareable content on any given day, and NEITHER DOES ANYONE ELSE! Why? Social media is about the masses and they are predictably unpredictable. If someone tells you they have a sure fire way that leads to a 10 fold increase in your social media engagement – walk away because outside of very limited circumstances that is not going to happen.
Now I can make some very educated guesses on what is more likely to be shared on social media. The short list is: cute things, young things, furry things, funny things, inspirational things, or things with a profound story. If you could somehow put all those things together into one thing for your business well then you should be well on your way to highly shareable content. Post things on your page that you would want to share if you came across it on social media. Post things that are RELEVANT to your business. If you have an article the meets a need your clients/customers have then post that article it should get a few shares.
But, for anything to have a chance of being shared it must first grab the attention of people scrolling through their feeds. Start with at least a picture if you do not have a picture people will not slow down to read. Have a picture that sparks the imagination and grabs the eye. Follow this up with a good comment about what you are sharing. Inspire people to share not by asking them to but by relating the content to them. For example do not say share this picture of this dog that I found. Rather say, we all want more time with our furry family members this widget gives you that time or, this mommy never had time for her furry baby until she started using this widget. Now you have pulled at heart strings. Now you are sharing a story, and if it is a good story it will get shared as well by others. Are you beginning to see how this works?
Why such an emphasis on shareable content? Why not just promote my business? Well that is always an option but just like you ignore pages that only promote so will your clients. They are not looking for a promotion they are looking for content that makes them feel social. Something they can share with their family and friends. Think of it this way when you post content only the people who like you page can see it. If you post content that people share, now their family and friends can see your post even if they have never heard of your company before! This is the power of shareable content, it goes beyond your business’s sphere of influence on social media.
Creating and posting shareable content is a huge challenge but one that is worth the effort for it is the cheapest way to get new clients. There are two other ways I want to share with you in this post: the ad, and the free giveaway.
Ads are a good way to increase the exposure of your business on social media. Most platforms have some way to advertise on them and most of them are at pretty reasonable rates. But it is spending money and I know some of you are averse to that. Also just like with posts, ads should be carefully thought out and planned for maximum shareability. People are more likely to click on an ad if it looks interesting. Again you need a picture – a catchy heading, and then powerful text that leads people to clicking on the ad. Most ads on most platforms will dramatically increase your business’s exposure. They will reach people that are in the demographics you select. So choose carefully. Also if you are working on a budget keep in mind that while you may sell to the whole US, advertising to the whole US is going to cost a lot of money in order to be effective. Try to target your ad down to those clients or customers you know are ready to buy your product or service. For example if you sell sippy cups, don’t just market to the whole US. Market to parents, or even better new parents, or even better working new parents. See what I mean.
Lastly another way to attract new clients that is in between the totally free posting, and the potentially expensive ads is to have a free give away. Now this has to be something with real value to the client or customer. The more valuable they feel the giveaway is the more likely they will take action and share it with all their friends and family. Be sure it is a giveaway your company can afford. This can be literally anything a physical product, a white page, worksheet, video, secret family recipe, anything. It just has to be something your customers want and something they think is valuable that way they take action. This is also a great way to build up your email list.
Whew we covered a lot today in this post but I hope you found it helpful. Hang in there I know this social media stuff can feel overwhelming. If you are ready to throw in the towel, DON’T. I have faith in you. But if you would like help with your social media reach out and contact us at contact@armedia.us we are happy to answer any questions you might have and we kind of do the whole take care of my social media for me thing. We would be happy to talk to you some more about your goals and how to attract more customers to your business online. Thanks for reading and stay tuned the rest of this week as we delve more into this topic. Be sure to like our Facebook page so you can stay up to date on all we are talking about. Next week we will cover why you should really consider using video as part of your online presence. See you next week!
