360 Web Designs have stressed the importance of using social media marketing for your business. It’s a free and effective marketing tool to reach your target audience. However, we also understand that your business may not always have the time to create content. So, let’s look into the different social media platforms and see which ones your business might want to focus on.

Facebook

Facebook is still the most popular and widely used social media platform, and it’s very versatile. You can use Facebook to share company updates, photos, links, etc. With a business account, you also have access to insights and analytics. Every business should at least have a Facebook page. The messaging system also is great for customers to directly contact your business, ask questions and get direct feedback. Posting relevant updates about your business will inform customers about your new products or create hype for a new product that will come out soon.

Twitter

Twitter is great for sharing short updates and links. You can only share 240 characters in a post, however, it is very easy to interact on this platform. Make it more effective by mentioning other users and liking and retweeting their posts. If your business is highly visual or doesn’t have a blog, then you may not need to use this social media network. But some companies excel at Twitter by using the platform to handle customer service or to express concerns or share praise in current events. If the content is interesting, and users retweet your posts, then Twitter will help your business virally.

Pinterest

Pinterest is a more visually oriented platform and works really well with DIY businesses such as crafts, fashion, photography, food, and beauty. A user can subscribe to digital “bulletin boards” by different categories. When you post to a board, you have to put it in a category. Only users who have subscribed to that category will see your pins. Because of this, Pinterest is great for direct marketing to these individuals and works well for niche markets. However, if you are looking for a more broad kind of digital marketing, it may not be right for your business.

Snapchat

Snapchat is a mobile-only social media platform. Its appeal is in its disappearing content, which users can send pictures and videos to each other or create stories which disappear after 24 hours. Once a video or photo that is not in a story is viewed, you cannot see it again. Because posts are temporary, there is less polished content, albeit seeming more genuine. A small business will probably most utilize the stories feature, as it can create-story driven and interactive content that your followers can see and respond to.

Instagram

Instagram is another mobile-only social media platform. Like Pinterest, it works well with very visual businesses. If your business needs to show its work via images, then Instagram is a great choice. Like Pinterest though, it might only work well for certain niche markets.  Highly artistic businesses tend to excel on this platform, so if your content isn’t visually interesting, then you might want to skip it.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn, while not as hugely popular as Facebook, is still the best platform for professional networking. It’s a great platform for doing job posts and finding great talent for your business. Because it is more professional, users create their profiles to be similar to resumes. Businesses also use it to showcase themselves. LinkedIn is best used to learn more about company culture and finding industry-specific groups that can ask and answer questions. If you are helping other users by answering questions, this will help paint you as an industry expert, bringing people to your website and doing business with them.

YouTube

YouTube is great for businesses that have visual, creative, or educational content. Because of this, the platform is heavily driven by creativity, so having a great video editor is paramount. However, you can still market on YouTube without having a channel. There are many popular “YouTubers” who publish videos frequently and have large audiences. Because these people often make their living creating YouTube content, they partner up with businesses to include product placement, because they already have engaged audiences.

Conclusion

We hope that you have a better idea on which social media platform will work best for your business. We recommend you try out a few, then if you find some that are ineffective, you can always delete the account. However, we don’t recommend only doing one platform either. Spreading out on different platforms will increase your chance of users finding your business. We recommend at least three. Test out your posts, use free analytics and insights, and see if you are creating effective content. You can also look back at some of our older blogs about social media. Good luck, and have fun networking!