Whilst getting brand recognition and a large number of followers is nice, at the end of the day, sales conversions rule!  Encourage your followers to make a purchase with these 8 top tips from our team.

Be Responsive

Answering DMs and comments quickly and helpfully is a must!  This is the single most important point that customers raise when asked “How satisfied are you with your interaction with a brand?”

Check out ManyChat if you’re looking to automate and combine Facebook Messenger and SMS to grow your business.  This is an effective way to receive notifications, via keywords, that customers use in messages.  Using chatbots can help cut down on the time spent monitoring messages.

However, the personal touch of a real person responding to a query or a complaint can’t be beaten!

Keep your replies professional but a little humour can go a long way (where appropriate).  Be prepared, though, for a less than enthusiastic response if your followers aren’t impressed with your jokes.

tweets from Royal Mail to customer complaint

Finally, don’t forget to keep the conversation going until you’re sure it’s finished.  No-one wants to be left hanging!

Promotions

Everyone loves a bargain or a freebie!  Social media followers often follow branded accounts just to be kept in the loop when special offers and sales take place.

Announce deals, discounts, offers and sales with correct information, on time and with the correct links.  You’d be surprised how many brands aren’t organised and fail to plan ahead – a quick way to lose customers and sales!

Educational Content

Just like in school, it never pays to skip educational opportunities.  Your social media followers are eager to learn.  Show them something new, a time-saving hack or a simple how-to.  Spread your knowledge and don’t be scared to team up with other brands.

Make it Visual

A picture is worth a thousand words.  And online content is no different.

Firstly, ditch images with poor quality and bin those that have been badly cropped or have a watermark across them.

Ensure that your images are from reputable sources.  Try our friends at Canva for some great integrated design tools to make your posts pop.

Video and image content gather more engagement than pure text-based content.  Over recent years, we’ve all become savvy about what constitutes a good picture and can spot bad composition, shoddy photoshopping and low-quality editing.  Try the free and Open Source image editor Gimp as a cheaper alternative to Photoshop.

Funny-haha, not funny-strange

Humour goes a long way if you’re clever!

Show a sense of humour to help customers feel that your brand is approachable and real.

Caution: There’s always the potential opportunity to offend.  So, before you post something humorous, run it through several people in the office first … just to make sure that it’s as hilarious as you think it is!

Exclusive Content

Offering content, deals and special surprises helps to make your followers feel appreciated.

Whilst some brands create intricate social media based campaigns, you could use something as simple, and as useful, as a branded printable.

Behind-the-scenes

No matter what we say, we all like a bit of gossip!  We like to feel that we’re part of the action and included in the narrative.  Seeing what happens behind the scenes at your company is a great way to make your followers feel part of your brand.

It’s a fabulous opportunity to showcase the great people who are part of your company too.

Youtube and Instagram stories are at the forefront of the tools used by brands to share insiders’ content.

Throwing Shade

Who doesn’t enjoy some friendly banter between brands?  A bit of rivalry online can be a god-send to engagement too!

Take a look at the supermarket brands willing to jump in with some festive fun on Twitter:

While others prefer a more subtle approach.  Take this reactive piece of marketing from a pub in Rutland after planning permission was given by the local council to introduce the first ever McDonald’s to the county.

Some strategies do work better for some businesses than others but, in general, these actions can be adapted to work for brands like yours.  You just need to be mindful of maintaining a cohesive tone and not being disrespectful to anyone.

You definitely don’t want to fall into one of the 8 most common mistakes brands make on social media!