Planning a Social Media Strategy for 2014

Since so many social media platform and tools emerged as important for businesses in 2013, it is important to create a plan and a social media strategy for your business at this time. Businesses should be past the point of asking if they should use social media as part of their marketing plan and instead need to be figuring out which social channels to incorporate into their marketing plan.

Commit to Your Social Media Plan

Learning from the past is a one of the best ways to plan for the future. Exploring how your customer base uses social media and interacts with your company and other companies will provide you guidance as to which channels are best to reach and interact with your customers.  If you do make a commitment to social media, then you must fully commit; understand that 42% of customers expect an answer on social media within one hour  of posting. Certainly don’t let your customers be part of the 80% of customer service social media inquiries that go completely unanswered.

Create a Social Media Marketing Budget and Strategy

Treat your social media marketing campaign the same as you would any other marketing campaign. Create a realistic budget for your social marketing campaign. Since you need to have a strategy that includes engaging with and responding to customers, make sure that your plan allows the social media team to be able to respond and engage appropriately. Do not start more social channels than te team can keep up with.

Invest in Technology

Measuring social interaction is one of the most important parts of a social media marketing campaign. Investing in technology can also help automate and make the job of the social media team easier and more efficient. Social media tools and applications are coming out all the time, so keep on top of the best and brightest tools to help your social media to be a succe