How to do social media marketing (guide for beginners)

 Social media marketing  in Kenya is increasingly getting more competitive as businesses continue to embrace it as a powerful tool to connect customers to their brands. According to Datareportal (2021), Kenya has over 21 million internet users. Facebook has the largest number of users in Kenya with 53%, then Twitter 25%, Instagram 6%, and YouTube 5%. The internet users have 3-5 social media accounts and spend close to 2 hours on social media every single day.

The growing number of social media users in Kenya offers an incredible opportunity for small to large business to:

• Advertise their brand, products, or services.
• Create customer relationships
• Increase sales on social media.

This article covers all the social media marketing guides and tips you need know to market your business effectively.

Why do you need a social media guide for your business?  

A social media guide helps your business discover and understand new social media trends. Undoubtedly, with the above statistics, social media has the potential to make your business grow online.

However, since other businesses compete for the same audience, you need to have an innovative social media strategy to outrank your competitors.

Before you can start a social media marketing campaign, here are some of the critical questions you should ask about your business:

1. What are your social media goals and objectives?
2. Who are your competitors?
3. Which platforms are best for your business
4. What social media tools do you need to create a campaign?
5. Should you hire a social media marketing agency or do it yourself?

Here are the key elements in a Social Media Marketing strategy. 

A social media strategy is an action plan document with details about your social media goals, tactics to use, and how you measure your social media marketing performance.

Many small businesses make the worse mistake of going into social media marketing without a strategy. Having a social media plan guides you in identifying your goals, competitors and deciding which platforms are right for your business.  You can opt to create a strategy for your business or seek the expertise of a social media marketing agency. 

Your social media marketing strategy should contain the following key elements for an effective social media marketing campaign.

• A target audience persona: having in mind the character of your target audience is essential in understanding their interests, needs, and behavior.

• Clearly defined goals: What are the goals of the social media marketing campaign?

• A budget: How much you need to invest to get a ROI. If not sure about how much you expect to spend, check out Akus Digital Solution’s breakdown of social media marketing charges in Kenya
• Well-conducted research about the campaign and content to be posted will lead to optimum performance.

• Resourcing: Deciding which social media tools and skills you need for your campaign or whether to outsource the work to a social media marketing agency.

Tools for social media marketing.

Below are social media tools that can help you manage social media marketing campaign effectively.

Scheduling Tools: Buffer and Hootsuite can make your campaign organized, especially when it comes to monthly calendar activities such as postings.

Keywords Research Tools: SEMrush, Ahref, Uber Suggest, and Google Trends.

Monitoring Tools: Awario,  Talkwalker, Mentionlytics, and Mention can helps to keep tabs on consumer reviews, questions, or complaints about your brand.