Welcome The Jungle

 

We've got fun and games...

Ah, social media. The digital quagmire of our time. It is very easy to get lost in it all. It is at once, the greatest marketing tool, right at our finger tips, but it is also our greatest source of distraction. It is so easy to simply click an icon and lose an hour or more. Scrolling, scrolling, forever scrolling.  Each of us experience and use social media in our own way. Those of us that need it to make a living, or use it as a promotional tool, have to sort out how to separate work, from play. I have had to separate my work profile, from my personal profile. I distract too easily. I can waste hours and hours. That said, we want the clickers, the scrollers, the commenters, those that we can engage, those that are willing to give us their time. It is there that we can build relationships and perhaps, pedal our wares.  

With all those eyeballs scrolling away on social media, which platforms are the most important in terms of digital marketing? Where should we focus our attention? Where best can our stories be told?  

Facebook is the big dog. In 2020 Statista published a study where it asked digital marketers which platforms were the most important to their businesses. Facebook was the clear favourite, by a wide margin. 59% of digital marketers said that they believe that Facebook is the most important platform for their digital marketing purposes. Instagram and LinkedIn are 2nd and 3rd, at 17% and 14% respectively. YouTube, Twitter, and Pintrest are also important, albeit much less so. 

Why is Facebook so important? What makes it stand out from the rest? Web.com published a list of 9 reasons as to why FB was the most important marketing tool. To paraphrase, Facebook is huge, growing, and people spend a great deal of time on it. Add its continued growth, and its relatively inexpensive advertising options, and you've got a Goliath that doesn't appear will be slayed anytime soon. 

Does that mean we should focus on Facebook marketing alone? No. An organization needs to have a prominent Facebook presence, of course, but why limit ourselves to one platform? Our goal should be to garner as much attention as we can. That means that the best social media strategy would be to publish posts across multiple platforms. Search out those eyeballs, find those clicks, engage with as many potential customers as possible. 

It makes little sense however, to post unique content on all platforms. Doing such is very time consuming, and perhaps more importantly, we want our social media presence to have a consistent voice. There are many tools and software packages that allow us to efficiently manage all aspects of a social media campaign. Hootsuite for example, posts updates across multiple platforms, and also provides analytics which break down how your posts are performing. Hootsuite is great, and the tools it provides are very helpful, but it is very expensive. If your social media campaign grows, and it appears that the marketing that comes with it, is helping drive revenue, it might make sense to download advanced, and frankly quite pricey digital marketing software. But if you are just starting out, and have little to no revenue coming in, it probably makes more sense to use whatever free tools you can find. I particularly like Canva , Hubspot, Animaker, and Capterra all of which offer free tools, and are user friendly. 

Set your goals, find your voice, use whatever tools you can find to share your vision. Consistency in message, and posting regularly will do wonders for your marketing campaign. It does not have to be difficult.   

Yes, it is a jungle out there. The digital marketing world may seem ominous, or even overwhelming. But fear not, there are strategies and tools for every digital marketing situation. We can beat back the underbrush, roar back at the lions, and repel the bugs no matter how small we are. How? By finding our voices and expressing them intelligently. We are all in this together. Let's help each other sort it all out. 

Thanks for scrolling.