The term ‘optimization’ might make you think of search engine optimization (SEO) and things like restrictive keyword requirements, rigidity, and a lack of creativity in your marketing.
However, when it comes to social media, optimization looks a little different. While the majority of businesses are on board with social media, many fail to make the necessary changes that could significantly boost their performance.
The good news: optimizing your social media presence does not mean you have to sacrifice your brand’s voice, message, and creativity.
In today’s post, we’re going to discuss 5 simple optimization strategies for brands big and small, and everyone in between.
What’s the point?
Social media optimization keeps businesses sharp and forces them to analyze, audit, and adjust regularly. Setting up an account is step one. Continuously adjusting and adapting that account to what’s working in the world of marketing is how you stay optimized.
Although many brands make it look easy, the highest performing accounts pay attention to the fine details of social media optimization. For example, content, visibility, engagement, and ROI all require equal attention and effort.
1. Profile Optimization
Before focusing on anything else, make sure your social media accounts align with your company’s brand, message, and goals. A general audit of all your social profiles with a focus on branding and marketing messaging will help you determine areas in need of improvement.
Details to consider:
- Make sure branding and creative visuals are consistent with your business’s online presence; this includes things like logos, fonts, taglines, and hashtags.
- Make sure to consistently use an appropriate link or call-to-action that sends visitors to the proper landing page.
- Make sure your marketing message is consistent across platforms and matches your current promotions.
Social media can be seen as a gateway to your brand and what you have to offer. If this is someone’s first encounter with your business, consistency is key in keeping customers engaged and not confusing them.
2. Searchability Optimization
Optimizing your social profiles is great and all but won’t do you any good if nobody can find you. Social profiles are starting to pop up in Google searches, especially after recent updates to social platform search features. Brands need to pay attention to how they use keywords across their profiles and posts.
This doesn’t mean you have to keyword stuff your posts. It just means that regularly performing keyword research for brand-specific keywords and adding those keywords to your posts will work to improve visibility and keep your content relevant.
When it comes to social media, you get to be creative in how keywords are used. For example, relevant keywords can be used in the form of a #hashtag or even used in your social bios.
3. Use High-Quality, Creative Content
Whether you’re optimizing ad campaigns or basic posts, you want to be posting high-quality creative content.
Creative content, whether it’s images, videos, or copy, is the core of successful social media advertising. Think about all the ads you see on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and more – which ones stop you when scrolling? Which ones do you click on?
Ads that are eye-catching, creative, and clearly have thought behind them, are the attention-grabbing ones. It’s these types of ads that you want to strive for when optimizing social media ads and content.
Creative content is unique, original, and different – it’s not doing the same thing over and over again.
4. Individual Post Optimization
Once you’ve established a big-picture content strategy, it’s time to hone in on individual posts. Each post can be optimized differently, depending on what your goal is with that post. For example, posts that are part of a marketing campaign will be more refined than a meme or simple morning greeting.
For those posts that require more attention, you’ll want to make sure things like captions, hashtags, keywords, and calls-to-action are appropriate and reflect your current promotions and initiatives. Finding that balance between personality and promotion isn’t always easy, but it’s critical in maintaining a distinct brand voice throughout your posts and campaigns.
Building and maintaining brand awareness across platforms is key when it comes to social media optimization and is something digital marketing experts are well-versed in. Working with someone who has experience in creating and optimizing content for social media can make the difference between you and your competitors.
5. Maximize Social Media Ad Campaign Budgets
There are many ways to budget social media ad campaigns, which is why it’s always a good idea to do your research and learn where your money is going. Even if you’re working with a digital marketing company that does the research for you, you should still know where your money is going.
When considering your social media ad campaign budget, remember the following:
- Don’t be afraid to spend money. Especially if you work in a competitive industry. If you don’t put enough money into social media ads, don’t expect to get much out of them.
- Be wise in how you spend. Don’t just put your money anywhere. When planning out your budget, make sure you know exactly where your money is going.
- Target your audience. You don’t want to put time, money, and effort into getting an ad just right only to target the wrong audience. Having your audience dialed in is a great way to save on social media ad campaigns because you’ve narrowed in on a group of people who are most likely to convert.
- Watch your analytics. This is a step you don’t want to miss, and it’s one that digital marketing experts won’t let you skip. You’ll want to let your ads run for awhile to see how they perform. Checking in often lets you see how your budget is being spent, how fast, and what results are coming from it.
Working with a digital marketing company like WebLocal means you’ll have a team of experts monitoring all of this for you while ensuring your money is spent wisely.
How should your business approach social media optimization?
It’s simple; think of the strategies above as steps and start with the first one. The more you do, the better – even if it’s only optimizing your profile bios to begin with. These strategies coupled with a resource like WebLocal is your best bet at getting the most out of your social media marketing efforts.
Whether you’re unsure how to get started with social media optimization or would simply like to learn more, you know what to do: contact us today.
