Today's businesses rely on marketing now more than ever to ensure the success of their products or services. Effective marketing is imperative in the success of small businesses especially. More consumers are ordering products and booking services conveniently from their phone screen and this has big implications for small business owners. While most small business owners know the importance of marketing in the social media arena, not as many know how to do so effectively.

For those unfamiliar with using social media as marketing platforms it can be rather intimidating, however what's often more tricky than learning the in/outs of various platforms is learning to post content strategically & consistently. Timely content that will send the right message while increasing engagement with the target audience. Thats where hacking can help, in this case hacking is simply manipulation of an existing process to produce desired results. This post is all about those workflow hacks that you can use in conjunction with your various social media channels to market even more effectively!

The Hacks

Even when marketers know about a particular platform’s complex algorithm (which decides if the post should be shown to the masses or not) they don’t always know how to get it on their side. While the algorithm is far too complicated to understand fully it is a widely accepted fact that most of these algorithms rely mainly on the results of your post when exposed to a small sample of your friends. As soon as content is posted the social media channel exposes the post to a small fraction of a person's social media friends. This means its safe to assume the more people that are online and active when posting the better. My friends over at CoSchedule also realize the importance of timing and how complex it can be to optimize the scheduling of posts. There are many factors like industry, location, product, etc that will factor in to what post times will be best for a particular business.

For a more comprehensive look at how you can determine peak times for posting your marketing content to social media visit CoSchedule's blog.

Fun fact - by the end of 2019 internet video consumption will make up 80% of the total internet usage globally. This seems like a no brainer but still people are hesitating to use video more in their marketing. Whether doing it in-house through a blog/vlog or hiring a marketing agency to produce quality content its extremely important to invest in video content to market your brand.

For more on creating quality video content check out my blog post from earlier this month.

Keeping to a schedule is paramount in the success of your social media marketing. This is especially true after you've completed step 1 of the post, and figured out the best time to post for your specific content. Later, one of my favorite schedulers which gives you feedback and analytics on your posts over time is a great tool for marketers looking to automate their workflow. Automating posts can save you time and frustration allowing you to have more control over your posting and conversion.

Today's consumer wants to know as much about the company they’re working with before they purchase. Not only do they want more information but they have the power to get it at the tip of their fingers. The reality is consumers are now using the internet more than ever to find products, services, and new brands. It is more important than ever to show off your company, your people, and your product or service to create a more genuine feel to your brand. Whether it's through a Facebook, Instagram, or Youtube channel start showing off. Seeing quality moving content is now what shifts consumers to one brand or another.

We live in a time where its easier than ever to connect with talented creators, business people, and friends. This is a great advantage for marketers because there are many artists who are looking to get their foot in the door. Let a budding artist help you with your channel, often they will take the experience as compensation and if you don't like what they do simply don't use it. This is ideal because everyone can win. Often these relationships grow to benefit each party even more so over time.

Try using these hacks, and comment if you have any hacks that you like to use to boost your marketing!

Until the next post!

MJP