How to Improve Your Selling Processes with Social Media

How to Improve Your Selling Processes with Social Media

There are over 2.7 billion social media users around the world.

In fact, social networking is one of the top online activities, as more and more people are using the site for both professional and personal purposes. Plus, with the increase of smartphone usage, these numbers are only increasing.

But can social media really be used to drive sales? Absolutely.

There is an infinite number of ways that social media can improve your selling processes.

From expanding your global reach to allowing you to engage directly with customers, the best social media sites bridge the gap between online and in-person connection giving your customers a personalized experience.

Here are seven tips to improve your social media sales strategy to drive revenue to your site(s) and business.

1. Choose the Right and Relevant Platform(s)

One of the first and most important components of social selling is to consider is what the right platform(s) for your business may be.

To determine this, you’ll first want to figure out who your target audience is and where they’re engaging the most. For some businesses, you may have more than one type of demographic and/or social site.

After you’ve determined your audience, you can figure out how you’ll reach them and with what platforms will be the most useful and relevant for their needs.

2. Establish a Strong and Engaging Online Presence

First and foremost, create a handle that represents your business as best as you can. Then stick to using that handle (or very similar) across all platforms. This keeps consistency and can significantly impact your growth, as users will be able to quickly follow one name across the board.

Next, you’ll want to use your social media sites to create relevant, sales-driven content. Just having a Facebook page, for example, is not enough. You need to use the Facebook page to create content that your users will enjoy reading, sharing, or commenting on.

As you consistently post, you’ll create a stronger and more engaging presence that will bring people in and keep them.

3. Research Competitors and Create a Growth Strategy

As you work on your social selling processes, you’ll inevitably be doing some competitor analysis on different brands, companies, and user engagement trends.

Your goal is to turn this research into an actionable growth strategy for your business.

As you create your business goals, think both short and long-term. It’s important to consider things like brand awareness (how many consumers know who/what your company is and does), engagement (how people are actively viewing/sharing your content), your overall brand loyalty, and other strategies like how you’re generating leads and then transferring those leads into sales.

4. Connect and Build Your Online Relationships

Social selling should be a collaboration between sales representatives and marketers. It should also be about making connections with other brands, companies, and individuals who can help increase your presence and growth.

A big tool for social media sales strategy is influencer marketing. Influencer marketing taps into social media influencers who can advertise your products on their feeds for a percentage of sales.

You can create a strong sense of loyalty and brand credibility through this means of authentic advertising. This also gives you an opportunity to create more branded content and even develop personalized hashtags for your brand/business.

5. Convert Your Loyal Followers to Marketers

There are two main ways to build a loyal following: First, be authentic. This means responding to reviews (both positive and negative), engaging with your online customers, and being available to answer questions and address concerns.

The second (and most rewarding) way to build your selling processes is to re-post content from real users engaging with your products/services.

This gives credibility to what you provide, plus generates more excitement for your consumers if there’s a potential they’ll be re-shared on your pages.

With this strategy, your customers are doing the work for you.

6. Invest in Your Advertising

If you’re serious about your social media sales strategy, then it’s important to invest in your online advertising methods.

All social media sites offer the ability to advertise your posts to a large audience by ‘boosting’ or creating sponsored content. Creating campaigns and customizing your ads will help to reach the right audience, too.

You’ll also want to simplify your buying process as much as possible. If you have the ability to link directly from a post to your content—do so! This is the easiest way to get consumers from the original ad to your sales page (and hopefully generate a sale). You can also create ‘buyable’ or ‘Pin-able’ (Pinterest) graphics that you can link to, for example.

7. Be Consistent

Consistency is key when it comes to social media selling.

You’ll want to be consistent with how and when you’re posting so that there’s reliability to what you share and who you reach.

Improving Your Selling Processes Is Possible (If You Invest)

Social media is an incredible tool for building your business and expanding your global reach.

Although the process may seem daunting at first, it’s definitely possible if you invest in the process. The most important things to remember are that your brand must be consistent, visible, and shared to the right audience.

As you work on building your social media strategy, think about how you can create a brand people can rely on. Finding and connecting with your target audience will make all the difference in the content you create and how you’re curating it. And after you invest in these processes, you’ll inevitably see the sales.

For other ways to grow your business and increase your selling processes, as well as tips for expanding your global market reach, click here.