Social Media Marketing

How to Build Relationships With Social Media Marketing

Social Media marketing

Social media marketing is not about selling your product or service, nor is it about getting likes, favorites or retweets. It is really about building relationships with people. This means that using bribes such as discounts and freebies to lure people to like your page or follow your account is not a good idea. This does not build trust or authenticity. Yes, in the short term it does increase the number of followers/likes, but in the long term you are not building a relationship nor are you getting the quality of people who really become your brand advocates.

It is the long term relationships that are built on trust, authenticity and respect that will drive your social media engagement and brand. So how do you build these relationships?

3 Key Relationship Builders:

1. Be human:

No one likes a robot. Your brand has a personality show that to the world. Be real so that people can identify with you, have conversations with you, and listen to what they say. People interact with and are more likely to buy from people they like. Your company needs to be liked by them. Really liked not just followed. You should encourage your employees to be a part of your social media from behind the scenes photos to comments signed by them.

2. Inspire and be fun:

Explain who you are and how you got to be here now. Share stories about individuals in your company. Share the causes you support and why. Strong emotional connects compel people to connect and respond to you. Make sure to ask people about their stories as well. Listen and respond to them. Now let’s move onto the fun! People love to share things that they find funny. Laughter brings people together and promotes positive emotion. So be sure to add humor to your social media. One note of caution, make sure that the funny things you are posting are appropriate for your brand. Try some pictures from around the office when something funny happened. Don’t forget to ask people to post some things they find funny as well.

3. Share old things too:

People really connect with events from the past so make sure you are sharing them as well as asking people about their experiences. The can be using old images for a throwback Thursday or telling stories of how things used to be. This prompts people to share and comment. The more people relate to you and engage with you the more likely they are to purchase from you.

As you can see above, social media marketing is not selling.

Social Media marketing is building relationships. People hate salesmen and the especially hate companies who try to push them on social media. Instead of doing that, do the things above that give ideas, experiences and information that is relevant to the people following you. You should consider your social media fan base and friends of your company. You can build better relationships when them as friends than as just a follower. The final take a way is your followers are human. They put their faith and money behind companies they believe in and relate to, be that company.

If you have any questions call us in San Diego at (619) 297-2281 or email contact@neyenesch.com. We are glad to help!