Social Media and Digital Communications Strategy

 

Set Goals

 

We will discuss with you the objectives and goals that you hope to achieve. Having these objectives allows us to build campaigns that meet your expectations. Without goals, we have no means of gauging success or proving your social media return on investment (ROI).

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Goals should be aligned with your broader marketing strategy, so that your social media efforts drive toward your business objectives and goals.

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A key component of setting effective goals for your social media strategy is to determine what metrics we’ll use to measure their success. We want you to think beyond vanity metrics such as retweets and likes. Focus on things such as leads generated, web referrals, and conversion rate. 

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We help you keep your audience and customers in mind by using the S.M.A.R.T. framework when discussing your goals. This means that each objective should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound.

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Audit Accounts

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Prior to creating your social media marketing plan, we need to assess your current social media use and how it’s working. This means finding out who is currently connecting with you via social, which social media sites your target market uses, and how your social media presence compares to your competitors’.

 

Once we’ve conducted your audit you should have a clear picture of every social account representing your business, who runs or controls them, and what purpose they serve. This inventory should be maintained regularly, especially as you scale your business.

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It should also be evident which accounts need to be updated and which need to be deleted altogether. If your audit uncovers fraudulent accounts - a fake branded Twitter profile, for example - we will report them. Reporting fraudulent accounts will help ensure that people searching for you online only connect with the accounts you manage.

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We will assess which channels you should continue using or potentially add to the mix. We will help you determine which channels are most effective for your brand. Once we’ve determined which channels to use, we will help develop your brand’s voice, tone, and style. This includes things like what sort of language your social accounts will use, what kind of content to post and so on. 

 

Social Media Account Creation or Optimization 

 

Once we’ve finished with your social media audit, we will hone your online presence. If you don’t already have social media profiles on each network we want to focus on, we will build them from the ground up with your broader goals and audience in mind. If you do have existing accounts, we will update and refine them to get the best possible results. Optimizing profiles for SEO can help generate more web traffic to your online properties. 

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Each social network has a unique audience and should be treated differently. We will perform network-specific optimization.

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Social Media Marketing Inspiration

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For inspiration, we look to what others in your industry are sharing and use social media listening to see how we can distinguish you from competitors and appeal to prospects they might be missing.

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Consumers offer us social media inspiration, not only through the content that they share but in the way that they phrase their messages. We watch how your target audience writes tweets, and strive to work within that style. We learn their habits - when they share and why - and use that as a basis for your social media marketing plan.

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Content Marketing Plan and Social Media Content Calendar

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Having great content to share will be essential to succeeding at social media. Our social media marketing plans include a content marketing plan, comprised of strategies for content creation and content curation, as well as a content calendar.

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Our content marketing plans answer the following questions:

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• What types of content do we create, curate, post and promote on social media?

• Who is your target audience for each type of content?

• How often will we post content?

• Who will create the content?

• How will we promote the content?

 

Your social media content calendar lists the dates and times we intend to publish Instagram and Facebook posts, tweets, and other content. It’s the perfect place to plan all of the social media activities - from images and link sharing to blog posts and videos - encompassing both your day-to-day posting and content for social media campaigns.

 

We will sure your calendar reflects the mission statement we’ve assigned to each social profile. You can establish a content matrix that defines what share of your profile is allocated to different types of posts. For example:

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• 50 percent of content will drive back to your blog

• 25 percent of content will be curated from other sources

• 20 percent of content will support enterprise goals (selling, lead generation, etc.)

• 5 percent of content will be about employees and culture

 

We try to follow the 80-20 rule - 80 percent of posts should inform, educate, or entertain your audience and the other 20 percent can directly promote your brand.

 

We Consistently Test, Evaluate, and Adjust Your Social Media Marketing Plan 

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To find out what adjustments need to be made to your social media marketing strategy, we rely on constant testing. We build testing capabilities into every action you take on social networks:

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• Track the number of clicks your links get on a particular platform using URL shorteners and UTM parameters

• Use social media analytics to track the success and reach of social campaigns

• Track page visits driven by social media with Google Analytics

 

We record and analyze successes and failures, and then adjust your social media marketing plan in response.

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The most important thing to understand about your social media marketing plan is that it should be constantly changing. As new networks emerge, we may want to add them to your plan. As you attain goals, we will need to set new targets. Unexpected challenges will arise that we will all need to address. As you scale your business, we might need to add new roles or grow your social presence for different branches or regions.

 

We will rewrite your social media strategy to reflect latest insights, and make sure your team is aware of what has been updated.

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