Not all social media marketing for your local business needs to cost money. Here are three organic social media tips you can apply today.
Organic social media still has value. I said it. Paid advertising might take the glory these days, but I want to show some love to our old marketing standby: organic, or unpaid, social media.
This content isn’t boosted or sponsored or otherwise placed on a pedestal, and that’s a good thing. Your audience wants value without pressure to buy or sign up, and this delivers it.
While a long-term strategy is beneficial, these are three tips that you can start using today to improve your social media marketing for your local business.
Tip #1: Research What Your Competitors Are Doing
Knowing what your competitors are doing is the first step to growing your own business. Now, we don’t mean copy them. If anything, we mean do the opposite. Researching what your competitors are doing on social media and how your shared audience is responding offers the insights without investing into the work yourself. It’s called efficiency.
One easy way to do this is to add your competitors’ profiles to “Pages to Watch” on Facebook Business Manager.
This provides basic metrics, so you can see how their content is performing compared to yours. On your page in Business Manager, click Insights in the top navigation bar, and scroll down. Pages to Watch will be below your most recent posts, and you can add up to five.
Facebook makes it easy by offering suggestions, and we recommend taking advantage of their ideas. After all, their algorithm knows your relationship to your followers andyour competitors better than you.
Tip #2: Create Events for Each Facebook Live Broadcast
Hosting regular Facebook Live broadcasts is a great way to connect with you audience, although it’s difficult to get the same reach as the Facebook Algorithm continues to change.
Along with the consistency of regularly-scheduled broadcasts, use Facebook Events to improve your viewership and retention throughout each broadcast.
This benefits you in two ways:
- Followers are aware ahead of time and can set aside the time.
- Attendees are notified when the broadcast begins.
Hosting these scheduled broadcasts offers you an easy way to improve your organic social media presence without additional software or knowledge of their API. Now here’s the bad news: it takes time to build up an audience. But be consistent, share valuable content, and your broadcasts will grow.
To take advantage of this feature, simply create an event as your Business Page. Then, go to your video library and schedule a live video. Attendees receive a push notification to remind them to tune in (or should I say, tap in?)
Tip #3: Incorporate Lifestyle Stock Photography
Lifestyle photography doesn’t feature your product or service. Instead, it embodies the lifestyle you want your brand associated with. Custom lifestyle photography is an unattainable goal for many small businesses, but there’s a solution.
Websites like Unsplash have curated a library of stunning photos from a community of photographers giving their work under an “all rights granted” license. This means you can use their photos on your social media profiles, on your website, and in a blog post. The best part about Unsplash is that they don’t looklike stock photos, so you can use them on Instagram without hurting your aesthetic.
Another stock photo website is Pexels, which is an aggregate of both paid and free websites. Always check the license on each website you use, paid or free, to ensure your use is within the license.
You Can Do This!
Even though paid advertising is the shiny favorite for many companies, organic social media still offers value. This includes monitoring how your audience reacts to your competitors’ content, using Facebook Events to go live, and using free lifestyle photography.
As a local business, you can implement these tactics today, so there’s less wondering if your plan is working and more planning what you’re going to do with all this growth.
