Do you know your audience?
“How can I know my audience?” I’m so glad you asked!
This blog post will give you four really simple and basic ways to know your audience. It will outline where we start at Flywheel when working with potential clients.
Identify your message, product or purpose.
Study current analytics.
Monitor feedback, comments and engage.
Understand the social media platform you’re using.
You want to run a successful small business and there are so many things to consider to accomplish that. One of the most important things to consider when marketing your small business on social media is to know your audience.
Knowing your audience is identifying the group of people either supporting your business, buying your product, liking your messages or listening to what you have to say. Sometimes you can better understand your audience by also knowing who doesn’t like your message – but that’s another blog post.
Here’s what you do:
Identify your message, product or purpose. Whatever your small business is, a mission statement is a guiding message that helps you define what you’re doing. It allows you to see where you want to go so that you can eliminate anything that distracts from it. If you sell a product, you know all about it and why it’s useful to people. You also know who the product is useful to and why they need it. You know every detail about it.
If your product is your expertise and the information you offer, it’s important to know why you’re passionate about the information, who needs the information and how you can get that information to more people. What’s the age group, income level, and are they male or female? What problem does your audience have that your product, service or message answers?
Identify your message, product or purpose in a clear and succinct mission statement so that you can laser focus on accomplishing it.
Study current analytics. Social media platforms offer business analytics so that you can see the reach of your message as well as the engagement. Just like you would judge the reception of a personal post based on likes or comments, you can judge your business messages based on viewing statistics. Depending on the platform, you will be able to see trends in engagement as you post regular content. You will notice patterns of what works and what doesn’t. You can even determine the best time of day to post based on your audience. Studying analytics will help you further dial down on the age group and income level of your audience.
This is a great article that I think will be really helpful to learn more about analytics.
Monitor feedback, comments and engage. Every post needs a call to action or request for engagement. Don’t get discouraged if at first you don’t get the responses you hoped for. This is where you have to exercise some online networking with others who are either your peers or competitors. Comment on their posts, share their posts, and engage on their posts in a positive and friendly way.
Make sure to respond to comments on your posts and tag others where appropriate. After you receive comments or feedback, take time to quickly read over the profile of the person who commented. View the personal posts the commenter has made. If someone sends you a message, set aside time to respond. You will understand a lot about your audience just from monitoring the comments and feedback on your posts.
Understand the social media platform you are using. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and the many other platforms are all different and are used differently. What works on one platform will not always work on the others. Additionally, not every platform needs to be used for your business.
Facebook and Instagram are where you post pictures and information related to what you sell or a service you offer. This gives customers a picture of the business you run. Think of it like an old-school phonebook without the excessive use of paper and with the added benefit of free photos! LinkedIn and Twitter are great platforms to establish yourself as an expert voice in your field of work.
https://smartblogger.com/social-media-sites/