Businesses are spending more than ever on social media marketing, according to Duke University’s CMO Survey taken in Fall 2014. In the next five years, social media budgets are expected to increase from their current rate of nine percent up to almost a quarter of businesses’ entire marketing budget.
What’s the reason for the big increase? According the latest report from Shareaholic, Facebook accounted for 23.39 percent of social referrals to websites in the second quarter of 2014. This is a 10 percent gain since March 2014 and a massive 150 percent gain from the second quarter of 2013. Facebook is such a valuable referral source because 64 percent of Facebook users visit the site on a daily basis, according to Pew Research. Facebook leads in social referrals because its users are loyal, constantly staying plugged into their News Feeds and finding content shared by friends valuable.
Other social networks are also on the rise. Twitter and LinkedIn generated 1.14 percent and .04 percent of social referrals, respectively. Pinterest and StumbleUpon also showed gains year over year. Almost 20% of adults use Instagram, making over 200 million active users who photo-share an average of 60 million photos a day.
Besides being an outstanding venue for marketing, social media marketing allows you to connect directly and personally to potential customers and business partners all over the world with just a few clicks and keystrokes. The number of social media networks can be overwhelming. This overview should help you determine which are right for your business.
Use Facebook to...
Connect with over 1.4 billion members and 1 billion active daily users
Post informational and promotional content
Market your company to potential partners through business to business relationship building
Appeal to those who like visual communication and story telling
Use Twitter to...
Connect with the movers and shakers on the fastest growing social network, used monthly by 23% of the world’s online adult population
Express your company’s personality through posts
Engage directly with mass audiences
Build relationships with individual members of your audience
Communicate in real-time
Use LinkedIn to...
Join more than 3 million companies and 380 million users who have profiles on the world’s largest professional network
Network within your specific niche market
Share your expertise and gain knowledge
Increase visibility and awareness of your company because your audience exists on the network and communicates within groups
Leverage your individual employee knowledge by answering questions and further expressing your expertise
Use Pinterest to...
Market your business to over 70 million users (80% are female) on the social network that leads in ecommerce
Share products or highlight services
Maximize search engine optimization efforts
Express unique company personality
Build a sense of community with your audience
Become the go-to source of information in your area of expertise
Sell your products to the 88% of Pinterest users who purchase a product that they pin
Use Instagram to...
Count your business among the 70 million photos and videos uploaded every day
Target the younger consumer ages 18 to 29, 53% of whom use Instagram
Tap into client creativity
Express your company’s image through photos and videos
Host photo-based campaigns and contests
Use YouTube to...
Reach more adults ages 18 to 34 than any cable TV network
Put a personable face on your organization
Extend brand messaging with video content
Increase search engine optimization efforts
Express your company’s creativity
Engage with your audience through contests and/or user-generated content
Use Google+ to...
Join the second largest social network in the world with a 35% growth rate
Increase search engine optimization organically
Engage directly with potential clients and business partners through publically broadcasted Hangouts
As of early 2015, 93% of organizations were using some form of social media marketing. Your competitors are doing it, and you should be too. Maycreate can help. Set your business apart from the sea of others on Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Instagram, Vine, YouTube, Tumblr, Reddit, StumbleUpon, etc. by working with us to develop and execute an in-depth social media marketing strategy. We’ll develop a plan that fits the needs and personality of your company. That’s what we’ve been doing for clients since MySpace was today’s Facebook. Contact us today to see how we can make social media work for you.