How To Advertise On Social Media?

Businesses today are trying to engage and reconnect with their customers constantly. Most businesses do it via social media platforms by posting personal and professional posts. According to The Content Factory, 84% of B2B marketers integrate some sort of social media into their business. Hubspot had also mentioned that 92% of marketers indicated social media marketing was crucial for their business, with 80% claiming that their efforts increased traffic to their websites. So, what are the advantages for businesses to create a presence on social media platforms? Let’s first explore the commonly used social media platforms and marketing tools on the platforms. Then, I will evaluate the optimal time periods for businesses and individuals to post in order to gain the highest engagement. Finally, I will conclude with a few final comments for you digital marketers out there!

• The Platforms:

Facebook dominates as the #1 social media channel with 1 billion Facebook users. Salesforce completed a descriptive research and in their 2015 State of Marketing report and discovered that Facebook is the #1 social media channel for marketers in 2015. Let alone, there are 40 million small businesses on Facebook. The justification, claimed by Hubspot, for the 40 million business pages on Facebook is due to customer’s expectation of businesses having three social media pages of some sort. Online web pages act as a source of information and are crucial to reaching customer satisfaction. Social media sites are also shown to drive 31.24% of all referral traffic onto the web in December 2014 and Facebook itself drive 25% of the 31.24% alone.

Instagram falls as #2 social media platform with 500 million monthly active users and 300 million daily active users, with 80% outside of the United States. Given that, Instagram could be a social media platform to reach global consumers. Also, Instagram makes it easier for marketers by offering advertising tools such as their photo advertisements, video advertisements, and carousel advertisements. Photo advertisement is a clean and simple canvas that utilizes primarily imagery to advertise. Video advertisements, on the other hand, allow visuals with sound and motion in landscape form for 60 seconds. The carousel advertisements allows a swipe function that shows additional images (not videos) and a call-to-action button.

Twitter follows Instagram holding the #3 most popular social media platform. Twitter has 313 million monthly active users and 1 billion monthly visits to sites. Again, 79% of Twitter users are out of the United States, making global advertising easier for businesspeople. Twitter’s Goal-Based Marketing allows you to set a budget and pay only when effective – defined as getting user follows, retweets, replies, and clicks – with no minimum spending required. Furthermore, Twitter conveniently targets audience through the usage of keywords in tweets to maximize relevancy on their feed. Lastly, you can amplify your messages by directing tweets from your account to people who are interested in your business.

• When should I post on Facebook, Instagram, or other social media platforms?

1) Facebook:
Not to any surprise, Facebook is often used at work or at home on mobile or desktop. According to CoSchedule, the best time to post on Facebook is between 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. during the later days in a week, such as the Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.

Specifically, the best time to post is Saturdays and Sundays at 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.
The second best time to post on Facebook is Thursdays and Fridays between 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.
The third most popular time to post on Facebook is on Wednesday at 3:00 p.m.

To gain the most sharing of your posts and click through rates, the general suggestion would be to post at 1:00 p.m., followed by 3:00 p.m., and 9:00 a.m.

2) Instagram:
Instagram is often used on mobile devices, so users tend to use this social media platform any time. Readypulse discovered that the best time to post on average is at 2:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. The reason behind 2:00 a.m. is because fewer people are active on Instagram during that period and by posting, you would engage more users using Instagram at that time. The reasoning behind 5:00 p.m. is that most people are done work for the day and possibly are browsing on social media before they head home.

Specific timing during days of the week to gain the most engagement:

• Monday at 7:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m.
• Tuesday at 3:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m.
• Wednesday at 5:00 p.m.
• Thursday at 7:00 a.m. and 11:00 p.m.
• Friday at 1:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m.
• Saturday at 12:00 a.m. and 2:00 a.m.
• Sunday at 5:00 p.m.

3) Twitter:
Twitter is often used at work or at home between breaks and commutes. Hubspot claims that the best time to post on Twitter is between 12:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. on Mondays through Fridays. Oddly, the timeframe from 5:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. on Wednesdays seem to engage a lot of people as well.

• Conclusion:
In general, having a strong online presence on social media platforms, such as Facebook and Instagram, would be an asset for businesses. Utilizing social media platforms can potentially enlarge your exposure to customers, reach target population, and lower your marketing expenses (managing a Facebook or Instagram account yourself is literally $0)!

Keep in mind, as effective as social media platforms can be, marketers have once defined an 80/20 rule – only 20% of your content should be directly about your product. 80% of your social media content should be about complimentary content. In addition, set weekly or monthly sharing contests or goals to keep your customers and fans engaged. Moreover, develop a steady feed with matching filters and messages to create a consistent brand image. Other than that, you are all set to you!

Sources:

18 Reasons Why Your Business NEEDS Social Media Marketing

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2015/06/26/top-10-reasons-your-brand-needs-to-be-on-facebook/#4114871a2d94
https://business.instagram.com/advertising/
https://business.instagram.com/
https://ads.twitter.com/login?gclid=Cj0KEQjwhvbABRDOp4rahNjh-tMBEiQA0QgTGp9PLYeVch7iJvblVusGTyqgDnTblSfYFcrlBKBUbXgaAv0g8P8HAQ&ref=ca-ps-go-branded-mktg-broad
https://about.twitter.com/company
http://www.good-citizen.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/networking.jpg