A complete marketing strategy will include several different tactics to reach your business goals; social media is just part of the strategy. It’s up to you to determine whether you want to invest the time and resources to use social media effectively and which networks you should concentrate on. Social media is in the mainstream and is included in marketing strategies for a wide variety of companies including those in manufacturing.
A Matter of Time
According to Digital Sherpa, 25% of small businesses spend from 6 to 10 hours a week on social media. Around 18% spend more time than that, some more than 21 hours a week. Social media activity includes:
- Promoting content on social channels
- Interacting/engaging with other users
- Monitoring for mentions, both positive and negative
- Maintaining the social media account and keeping it up-to-date
What this indicates is the need for an upfront commitment of time to consistently engage in this tactic. However, one positive business aspect of social media is that, beyond the time commitment, you don’t need to pay for anything. Many networks do offer paid advertising but a free account is probably adequate for your purposes.
Understand, too, that social media is a long-term effort. You will not see immediate results; social media is another channel where you build an audience and a level of trust before you begin to see results.
A Matter of Place
Another consideration is where your target audience spends its time on the networks. If a majority of your potential customers are on Facebook and you are concentrating on Google+ you won’t gain much traction.
Ask your current customers whether they engage with social media and, if so, on which networks. You also want to ask them if they respond to businesses on that network. Go on the social media you are considering and look for other manufacturing companies to see whether they are successfully using the channel.
Before You Create Any Accounts
Getting into social media takes the same coordinated effort that you would put into any other part of your business. Before you rush off to create accounts you must plan.
Identify and Set Goals
What is your expectation from social media marketing? Are you building awareness or do you want to see conversions? What would indicate that a particular social network is working or not?
Goal setting will make you think about how you expect social media to help your manufacturing business.
- Who is your target audience?
- What will you do for people there?
- Are you marketing locally, nationally or globally?
- How will you measure effectiveness? Number of likes, followers, interactions or conversions?
Identify the Right Platforms
Each social network has a different type of audience and different methods of communicating. You don’t need to engage on a large number of platforms but you do want to understand how each works and how selecting the right platforms gives you a strategic mix that establishes a cross-channel presence.
Facebook is still a popular platform and becoming more so with businesses and customers. Some companies duplicate their website on their Facebook page and engage in commerce. Others treat it more as a place to interact with potential customers and to promote content.
Facebook is one of several networks offering specialized pages for business. It is a platform that readily lends itself to multimedia marketing.
LinkedIn is targeted more to the professional audience. You can create a LinkedIn page for your business that has information about your manufacturing company and your products, look for employees and promote news and events. There is less overt marketing here but many B2B companies are heavy users.
You can post images and videos but LinkedIn isn’t as multimedia ready as Facebook.
Twitter is quite different. This is a platform that limits tweets to 140 characters. It demands economy of expression. Twitter is also a very volatile network with tweets streaming past each user’s timeline at a rapid clip. Getting attention can be difficult.
However, Twitter is an excellent platform for promoting content, links and events. Many tweets contain a small blurb and a link to another site for those who are interested. It can be used to post announcements of new blog entries, events, news and other items of interest that can promote your expertise and thought leadership.
Google+
Google+ seems to be somewhat of a free-for-all with news streaming by almost as fast as Twitter. But Google+ has several built in features that make it great for business including an easy way to provide video conferencing and webinars (see the Hangout feature). It also offers you an easy way to segment your audience into circles for more effective targeting.
Pinterest is great for manufacturing as it gives you a ready-made stage for images of your products, almost catalog-like in nature. Youtube provides a platform for video: show off your manufacturing process, put up how-to videos and use as part of your campaigns.
Captain’s Orders: Engage!
Once your accounts are set up there are some things to keep in mind:
- Coordinate your message across your social media accounts and with your overall marketing messages. Coordinate your campaigns across all your channels.
- Interact with others strategically. Be relevant, consistent, and customize your message for the channel.
- Develop a process for handling negative comments as well as positive communications.
Social media is all about interacting with others across a sometimes non-linear platform in near real time. Some companies have a virtual store on social media; others post or promote relevant content. Social media is also an excellent platform for running contests. The more you engage the more attention you will get.
Also have a process for protecting and/or rehabilitating your reputation online. Social media is a giant megaphone; news of any kind travels far and fast.
Conclusion
Social media marketing is simply another tactic you can have in your tool box. It can be great for reaching a lot of people quickly, most social media posts are crawled by the search engines and more customers are starting to expect a social presence.
Before jumping in, decide whether you have the time and resources to do it right. Then start small and slow; create accounts on the networks where your ideal customer hangs out and listen for a while. Once you gain followers and likes you can expand your efforts. And don’t forget to make it easy to share your content on social media.
