The late, great, Robin Williams said, “No matter what people tell you, words and ideas can change the world.”
We are all capable of crafting ideas that can inspire potential clients to purchase what we are offering. When it comes time to execute, many struggle. Obstacles such as money, time, and resources can prevent you from achieving their goals, but there are steps that can be taken to avoid pitfalls.
However, the biggest problem is planning. How are you planning to execute your social strategy? What is your course of action to introduce your brand to new audiences?
One method we utilize at PCG for the social department is a six month marketing plan. It gives us a clear view of our client’s marketing goals while providing structure for us to know what to run. Moreover, it leads us to fine-tuning our audience and reaching qualified shoppers. Develop a plan outlining a timeframe that makes the most sense for your business. The things that you will need for your plan are:
- Ads and their objectives: Use your team’s creativity to think of ideas for ads that you would like to run, what their objectives are, and what action they will lead the audience to. Are you creating a brand awareness campaign? Create an ad that will inspire them to go to your home page and explore what you are offering. What about a traffic campaign? This all relates to what you want to sell to your audience! Pick a landing page that makes sense for them so they won’t be just another link click.
- Audiences: Have an idea of who you want to target with these ads: Broad, custom, and look-a-like audiences. Broad can be helpful to start to pull new qualified leads from interest-based targeting. Custom works across all types of campaigns, low, and high funnel shoppers. You can use customer lists, website traffic through the pixel, engagement on your Facebook page, video views, and much more. From these audiences, you can set look-a-like audiences where Facebook will find audiences that have similar qualities to your custom audiences.
- Timeline: How long will you have your ads running? Specials may be monthly, but campaigns with an objective of brand awareness can be a few months so Facebook can learn the audiences who respond to them best.
Once you have your social media strategy, it’s time to execute! Create the graphics, the content, the videos and ensure you have a schedule when everything will be posted. When everything is created in advance and you have specific timeframes you will post, executing becomes a matter of capitalizing on the hard work you’ve already done as opposed to making it up as you go along.
As ads are circulating, examine the results. If they are performing well, make minor changes when needed. If the ads are not performing as well as you want, inspect all variables before changing your strategy. This can involve analyzing your budget, your graphics, and your target audience, among many other factors that go into creating a successful campaign.
Plan your marketing strategy so you can execute properly, and let your ideas or products prosper and change the world!
About the Author
Meaghan Barry is a Social Media Specialist at PCG.