Are you working on building and creating your social media channels but aren’t sure what the best practices are for social media management? Maybe you are an expert at social media but haven’t seen the results lately.
In this blog, I’m going to walk you through the 8 best practices of social media management so that you can start to grow your channels, profile, and in extension your authority online. Did you know that your social media channels are a great way to showcase your expertise? By utilizing social media to highlight what you are incredibly skilled at, you are in reality growing your authority.
1. Be Consistent
Being consistent with your social media channels is one of the easiest ways to stay on top of mind with your followers. If you are consistently showing up in their feed, they are more likely to think of you when they have a problem that you can solve.
Not only is this a good practice with your social media management, but your overall business strategy. There are so many different ways that you can be consistent in your business. For example, sending invoices consistently, having team meetings, hosting events, and so much more.
2. Be Strategic with Each Platform
Planning content around each platform will help you be as efficient and effective with your social media management. This means understanding that people use different social media platforms differently. For example, someone on TikTok isn’t going to want to see long videos or static images. TikTok is about fast and quick bits of information. If someone is on Instagram, they want to see beautiful and highly edited images.
Once you build your strategy to be specific to each platform, you’re going to see your level of engagement shift with the target audience you are reaching. If you’re posting Facebook memes on LinkedIn, you aren’t going to be taken seriously since it is a professional networking site.
3. Post Diverse Content
Now that you’ve created a strategy for your social media management, it’s time for you to create content. Building content is easier said than done, especially if you don’t have a design background. One tool that I completely adore for small business owners and even pro designers is Canva.
With Canva’s help, you’ll be able to diversify your content. This means you’re posting a variety of images, videos, graphics, LIVEs, etc. Viewing a profile that is all static graphics can get boring. Show your audience your personality through your content!
4. Schedule Your Social Media Content
This is truly one of the best practices of social media management. By creating a social media calendar, I can visually see my strategy in action. I can plan out my content and see where I can diversify my content.
This is also a great way to see how you can launch and promote your products and services. If you have a Black Friday sale, planning and scheduling your content will be key to your success.
5. Focus on Quality
Yes, it is very important to be consistent with your posts on social media, but you also need to focus on quality. Quality is what will attract clients, especially if you are trying to sell a beautiful service or product. For example, if you’re trying to sell shoes but the pictures of your shoes on social media are blurry, your sales won’t be as strong as if the image was clear.
Quality is another practice of social media management that can be implemented throughout your business. Think of where you can improve and start to make changes towards that.
6. Automate Your Social Media
If you want to save loads of time, automating your social media is the way to go. Facebook and Instagram have free automation through the Meta Business Suite. This is personally, how I plan my content as I don’t have much extra funds to spend on third-party tools. I also use a free version of Hootsuite for my LinkedIn. There’s nothing wrong with using a free social media automation tool, as long as it does everything you need.
7. Pick the best platforms for your business
Guess what, you don’t need to be on every social media platform. One best practice of social media management is to know who your target audience is and be on the platforms they are on. If you want to reach a younger audience, try Instagram or TikTok. If you’re looking for people who want to belong or want to find like-minded people, try Facebook and Facebook groups.
8. Have fun
The last thing to remember is to have fun. Social media is a place where people can connect with one another. New ideas are born, projects are created, and sales are made. If you aren’t having fun then you aren’t going to enjoy your time on the platforms.
Social Media Management doesn’t have to be a big and scary concept. By breaking down these best practices, you will see that it really isn’t all that big and challenging. You just need to see that there are steps to the process that you can do. You can create a solid social media strategy when you put these 8 steps into place. Happy Social Media Management
J.Rachel West is a passionate marketing & branding devotee. She loves working as her own boss at her marketing agency, JRW Consulting LLC, and is driven by seeing the success of her clients and women in business.