#AryxeTalks: Social Media Presence for SMEs

by Krisiana Kostadinova & Aleksandra Stamatović

To properly kick off the 2023 Aryxe Talks series, we’ve sat down with Krisiana Kostadinova, one of our star team members in all things social media, to discuss the importance of social media presence for all small and medium-sized business owners. She will share her stance on this topic and her most precious tips and tricks – keep on reading to learn more!

In your opinion, can brands afford not to be on Social Media in this day and time? 

Absolutely not! In today’s digital age, social media has become a key part of many people’s daily lives and a powerful tool for businesses to reach and engage with their target audience. As such, it is only beneficial for brands to have a presence on social media platforms. Looking up a brand on social media has become the new “googling” – if you want to know what the brand offers and has been up to, just check their social media! Moreover, brand managers and owners can use social platforms to their advantage and connect with influencers to promote or review their products/services, generating sales and raising brand awareness.

What’s your advice for those just starting their business? How do they kickstart their social media presence? 

I have 5 go-to tips that I always emphasize for all those looking to start just now with their Social Media presence. It may be easier if we cluster them in separate bullet points, so here it goes:

1. Choose the right social media platforms. The first and most important step is to create brand accounts on suitable social networks based on the demographics and interests of the desired target audience. For example, if you cannot create videos or the type of products/services can’t be shown through a video, then TikTok is not the platform for your brand. On the other hand, it will be the right platform if your target audience is in the age gap of 18-30, and you should definitely consider a way to showcase your products through videos. Another factor influencing the choice of social media platform is the content strategy, which leads us to my next advice…
2. Develop a content strategy. Consider the types of posts you want to (and can) produce and how often you want to share them with your audience. Creating a monthly plan can help you prepare everything in advance, so you will never run out of posts, and it helps you stay consistent. You can use the good ol’ Microsoft Excel for these purposes or simply turn to online tools like Canva, for example.
3. Stay consistent with the brand identity. Always use the same profile picture (in the dedicated formats, of course), brand name, and brand colors across all social media platforms. This way, your accounts will reflect your brand identity and messaging.
4. Engage with your audience. Don’t sleep on the communication with your followers. Social media is a two-way conversation, so it’s important to actively engage with them. This can include responding to comments and messages, sharing user-generated content, and asking for feedback. Managing and answering questions and comments on big accounts may be very hard and time-consuming, so use the opportunity to build trust with your audience while you can still keep up. 
5. Try to get verified. Some platforms, like Instagram, do not require a certain number of followers to give you the blue checkmark. It will be enough to prove that your brand account is important for the public interest and choose your type of organization/business. You will also need to provide documentation (either taxes, registration docs, etc.) that proves your brand is legit. There is still a chance of not receiving verification. Still, it is worth the try because the blue checkmark will help users identify your official account and help you in cases where other accounts may try to steal your identity for malicious purposes. 

What makes a piece of social media content successful?

Factors such as relevance, engagement, visual aesthetics, value, and consistency make the content successful. For example, if you want to use the growing excitement of a meme relevant to your field of business, do it quickly, or you will risk wasting your time and resources on creating a piece of content that is no longer interesting to the public eye. Encourage users to engage with your content by asking them questions, creating polls, or asking them to rate something with like, laugh, and love reactions. Always post nice-looking and tidy posts and give them value by offering something funny, insightful, or emotionally appealing to the user. And the most important thing: stay consistent – consistency is the key! Meta has a dedicated Meta Business Suite, where you can connect your Instagram and Facebook accounts and schedule your content in the Content Planer to go live automatically up to a month or two in advance, so you don’t have to post it manually or forget to post it at all.

If you want more tips on content marketing, check out our dedicated article!

What to do in a crisis situation on Social Media? How does one come up with a mitigation plan? 

If someone is bashing your brand or writing negative comments on social media, don’t ignore or delete them. Try to understand why they needed to share this and the reason behind their words. Respond to these comments, communicate with transparency and empathy, be there for your followers and help them solve the problem they have encountered with your brand – provide support and assistance to those who need it. This will also show your audience that you are willing to help and listen to them, which only helps you to build trust. A nice tip: provide a personal discount or a special offer to users who had a bad experience with your brand. This shows them that you care and will encourage them to give your products/services a second chance. 

Should SMEs outsource SMM or try to keep it in-house? What’s the best way to achieve goals? 

It really depends on the resources of the business. Having a dedicated person in the role of Social Media Manager in-house is a good idea because they can communicate directly with the team. Still, they should have the skills and time to create content and understand the audience. This is also a whole job position, so the brand must have the resources to provide in exchange for their work. This can be hard if the brand is small and does not have the budget for an additional role. 

Nowadays, everyone can manage social media accounts, even business owners, because of all the free marketing and social media information and resources. Moreover, social media marketing has become so crazy (in a good way) that even memes and short reels with trending sounds show great results. 

On the other hand, a person who does not have the qualification for a Social Media Manager/ Content Creator may not be familiar with all the regulations of information on social platforms, which may sometimes cause harm to the brand image. Using the services of a digital marketing agency is always a safe option because you will have qualified specialists define your target audience, create a successful content strategy for your brand’s needs and prepare and schedule monthly plans, all after a few meetings and not much of your time.

How can they track their performance and know where to look for improvement? 

I suggest the account manager looks at the insights under the posts on social media; they provide valuable information about the audience that the post has reached and about their performance. Each social media provides analytics tools, but it would be wise to export them all once a month or two and compare the performance between different social media channels and posts. This will help to adjust the strategy if needed and improve the social media presence over time when noting which posts perform better than others. There are plenty of tools and apps on the internet that helps with tracking performance and reporting. Again, the same thing can be done using Microsoft Excel and writing a few formulas. 

After all, nowadays, social media is overflowing with content and information, and it is hard to reach your goals organically. The beginning is hard, and if you fail to achieve certain goals, you should consider investing in paid advertising. 

If you want to check the facts and learn more about it, read why we believe small business owners need to invest in digital advertising.

What’s your key advice for SMEs in Social Media Marketing in 2023?

Define achievable goals and aim for them through your social media content. For example, if you wish to increase the number of followers of your accounts, giveaway posts always do wonders. A chance for a free product in exchange for a follow is a fair trade! 

Another important thing is spending some time on social media through the brand account, analyzing your posts and their performance, looking for improvement, and looking at what your competitors do and what does the trick for them. Don’t copy, but do use their idea in your favor. 

Bonus advice: keep an eye on trending topics, sounds, and memes. Sometimes they can make you go viral overnight. 

If you need help kickstarting your social media presence, feel free to check out our services and contact us to discuss the best solution for your business.