Currently, 97% of Fortune 500 companies rely on social media platforms for growth. Everyone has a presence on social media platforms, from customers to stakeholders. Every business is trying to harness the power of social media to grow its brand. Companies can develop connections with their potential customers among social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, etc. From building a brand to creating brand awareness, you can do it all on social media. All you need to do is develop a solid social media marketing strategy for growth. Whether you are starting a small business or running a huge enterprise, social media has significant benefits for your business. You just need to employ the right strategy for your business to get results. Let us look through some of the high-impact benefits of social media for businesses.
Benefits of Social Media for Businesses
Affordability
Even if your company has a limited budget, you can work your way to achieve excellent brand recognition on social media. While starting a small business, there is no need to spend on paid advertisements in the initial phase. It is better to start with organic marketing for your brand. Social media is the platform where you can work your way through organic marketing. Firstly, you can create a Facebook or Instagram page for your brand for zero cost, to begin with. Later on, you can think about paid ads after getting a good organic reach.
Targeted Reach
Social media can help you target a particular audience for better results. You can run paid ads on social media sites like Instagram and Facebook to reach your target audience. You can even tailor these ads as per different criteria like location, age, sex, and salary. This will allow you to enhance your conversions as you will be targeting specific customer segments. This will also boost your revenue.
No limit to working hours
If you are running a traditional business, you have to set working hours. But, if you are running your business with the help of social media, then there is no limit to working hours. Even when you are sleeping, your business will be awake. As your business profile is available online at any time, people can check out your business offerings and get your services at any moment. With 24/7 availability and accessibility, you can focus on evolving your business and taking it to the next level. The best thing here is that you can even set up automated responses or chatbots to serve your customers when you and your employees are off the clock.
Enhanced Customer Service
Social media platforms have bridged the gap between customers and brands. Now, brands can directly communicate with their customers. This will develop an enhanced sense of connection as well as increase the satisfaction levels of customers. Customer service plays a crucial role in building brand loyalty. With social media usage, small businesses to large enterprises can focus on customer service and connection for building credibility and loyalty.
Brand Community Growth
When you grow your brand on social media, you are also building a community of people with mutual interests. With more people in your community, you can expect tremendous growth opportunities down the line. On top of that, these community members can potentially generate content and act as brand ambassadors too. These are some of the crucial benefits of social media in the growth of every business. Social media is not going anywhere. Its usage is only going to increase with time. If you are thinking about automating the process of social media management, then there will still be flaws. This is something where you will need human efforts. Keeping this in mind, businesses are trying to find the best social media managers to scale up the growth of their business. Currently, there are plenty of job offerings for social media managers in every field. In order to become a social media manager, you need to understand the algorithm of different platforms. Once you get the learnings, you need to start applying them to your personal accounts and grow them. That’s when people will find you credible. You might find plenty of tips to become a social media manager, but the most important tip is to focus on learning. Before you can go out and experiment, you need to learn the ins and outs of social media platforms. There are plenty of online courses available in the market for becoming a social media manager. Let us look through some of the best courses.
Social Media Marketing & Management [Udemy]
This course is a perfect one for beginners. If you are new to the marketing field of social media, you should consider taking up this course on Udemy. The course will cover all the fundamentals that every certified social media manager needs to know. As it is a course for beginners, no prior knowledge or experience is required. The course is focused more on startups and businesses that are looking forward to exploring the opportunities on different social media platforms.
What will you learn?
Get to learn the basics of both B2B and B2C marketing of your products and services on social media.Finding unlimited leads and turning them into salesAutomating your entire marketing careerSelling online with Digital Marketing through different platformsScaling your ads for automating your sales
The best thing about this course is that the creator keeps updating the course every few weeks. So, you can expect valuable content that is constantly monitored and updated as per the trends. If you are interested in social media management, digital marketing, digital sales strategies, and more on the marketing side, you can take this course.
Social Media Management [Coursera]
This Social Media Management course by Coursera will help you learn about content creation as well as its management skills. You will learn how to create compelling social media content and market your brand online. On top of that, you will also get clear about content calendar setup and managing social media posts. This is an online course with flexible deadlines. So, you don’t need to worry about time as you can take it up according to your time. As it is a beginner-level course, there is no need for prior domain knowledge.
What will you learn?
Establishing and maintaining a social media presenceCreating brand, tone, and voice for your social media presenceManaging content calendarEvaluating the performance of your content on different platforms
With this course, you will gain various skills like content curation, content management, social media marketing, and content marketing.
Meta Social Media Marketing Professional Certificate [Coursera]
If you are thinking about building your career in the social media marketing field, you should consider taking up this Meta Social Media Marketing course on Coursera. It will make you industry-ready with all the necessary skills and the right credentials. There is no requirement for any degree or prior experience for taking up this course. The course will prepare you for an entry-level role in the field of social media marketing. Once you get an idea about different social media platforms, you will learn about building an online presence, creating daily content for posting, and managing social media accounts.
What will you learn?
You will learn to develop an effective advertising campaign for the target audience and also analyze the results.Handling everything related to Facebook ads, from creating to troubleshootingBuilding an online presence with content postingManaging accounts on different social media platforms
With this course, you will gain various skills, including digital marketing, performance advertising, social media marketing, content development, ad management, and more.
Introduction to Social Media Strategy | Learn with Buffer [Skillshare]
The Social Media Strategy Course is a beginner-level course on Skillshare. No matter what your requirements are, you need a sustainable strategy for your brand to get the right results. Whether you are looking to enhance brand awareness, drive more sales, or increase website traffic, you will need a solid social media strategy to make it happen. This course will help you identify the right social media platform for your business. From organic marketing to paid advertising, you will get an idea about everything you need to become a social media expert.
What will you learn?
Choosing the right social media platform for growing your businessCreating as well as curating effective visual contentUsing tools like Buffer for scheduling, analyzing, and improving your postsDeveloping custom social media strategies as per brand requirements
Once you are done with this course, you will have the confidence to take up clients. You will be able to come up with custom social media strategies to serve their purpose. On top of that, you will also get a hands-on project in this course so that the instructor can determine your progress.
Online Advertising & Social Media
This course on edX will help you develop online advertising ecosystems. You will notice a huge increment in your brand’s outreach after applying the concepts from this course. The best thing is that you will get an idea about analyzing the received insights and acting upon them to increase the efficiency of your social media strategies. You will learn about various other concepts, including advertising, hashtags, social media ads, landing page, influencers, lead generation, click-through rate, and more. This course will help you build a sustainable online advertising strategy for your brand.
What will you learn?
Building online advertising ecosystemsEvaluating online social media campaignsAnalyzing social media big data
If you are introducing yourself in the field of online media advertising, brand marketing, digital marketing, or even in marketing analysis, then this course will add value to your knowledge.
Advanced Social Media Certification Training Course [Simplilearn]
This course on Simplilearn will help you become an industry-ready social media marketer. You will learn to elevate your social media branding strategies and execute various campaigns for the same. The course revolves around advanced social media, advanced web analytics, and advanced content marketing. As it is a project-based course, you will learn a lot. You will build your social media skills by working on real-life industry-based projects.
What will you learn?
Elevating your social media brand and running successful campaignsManaging reputation onlineContent marketing and Influencer marketingSocial media growth strategies and web analytics
You will get knowledge of various social media platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and more, through this course. So, you can help your clients to scale up their business through all the platforms.
Social Media Marketing Foundations [LinkedIn]
In this LinkedIn course, you will learn about the basics of Social Media Marketing. The instructor talks about the benefits of social media for businesses. You will also learn why it is worth making an investment in social media to reap the benefits down the line. Businesses are often confused about their organizational goals. This course will make it clear for you to determine your goals as well as your audience. You will learn to draft a personalized social media strategy for your business.
What will you learn?
Understanding organizational goals and building a personalized social media strategyChoosing the right platforms as per business requirementsSelling on social media platformsMeasuring your social media activity
You will even learn how to connect on different social media sites effectively. Business is not only about selling. You will also learn the importance of networking.
Conclusion
Currently, social media is the new trend. So, if you are thinking about moving forward in this field, this is the right time. By taking up any of the courses mentioned above, you will get clear with the basics of social media marketing. You will find plenty of job opportunities as a social media manager or social media marketer once you gain the right skills. You may also look at some of the best full-stack digital marketing courses.