Which Social Media Channels Should My Business Be On?

This is a ques­tion I get fre­quent­ly from my clients. The hon­est answer is that not every busi­ness needs to be active on every social pro­file. So how do you know where to invest your time and valu­able mar­ket­ing dol­lars? To begin, I’d like to define a social media chan­nel. Accord­ing to Whatis​.com, social media can be defined as any ​“online com­mu­ni­ca­tions chan­nel ded­i­cat­ed to com­mu­ni­ty-based input, inter­ac­tion, con­tent-shar­ing and collaboration.” Reviews of a busi­ness are cer­tain­ly com­mu­ni­ty-based input, so any plat­form that allows this type of inter­ac­tion will be con­sid­ered a social media chan­nel and can include the fol­low­ing social networks: 

• Google+
• Houzz
• Face­book,
• Yelp
• Angie’s List
• Thumb­tack
• Porch, etc.

Now that we under­stand the types of social chan­nels we’ll be look­ing at, let’s dive into some research tac­tics you can use for your own local busi­ness!

Hit the SERPS (search engine results pages)

One of the first places I look to see which social chan­nels my client should have a pres­ence on is by enter­ing a few search queries that are rel­e­vant to their busi­ness and ser­vices. The below screen­shot is from an incog­ni­to, non-per­son­al­ized search for the key­word ​“los ange­les painters.” That’s a lot of social net­works appear­ing on the first page for this local­ized search term! In fact, for this par­tic­u­lar query, 6 out of 10 results are social net­works. Bar­na­cle SEO Strategy A bar­na­cle SEO strat­e­gy refers to estab­lish­ing a pres­ence on web­sites that are con­sis­tent­ly rank­ing for key­words rel­e­vant to your busi­ness and ser­vices. Results on the first page of Google get rough­ly 91.5% of all clicks, so if you’re not rank­ing, you can still increase the chances a poten­tial cus­tomer will find your busi­ness by set­ting up and opti­miz­ing a pro­file. Even if your web­site is on the first page, increase your expo­sure by cre­at­ing active pro­files on the plat­forms rank­ing above or below you.

Which Chan­nels Are Your Com­peti­tors Active On?

Com­pet­i­tive research can help you iden­ti­fy new oppor­tu­ni­ties and gaps in your cur­rent dig­i­tal mar­ket­ing strat­e­gy. While there are paid tools that can help assist you in this analy­sis, the free option is to do a lit­tle detec­tive work and to see what accounts your top com­peti­tors are active on and where they are receiv­ing reviews.  If a top com­peti­tor is active on a social network(s), it just might mean that it’s help­ing their busi­ness grow.

What’s Already Dri­ving Qual­i­fied Leads & Sales?

As a smart busi­ness own­er, you’re like­ly already ask­ing poten­tial cus­tomers how they found your busi­ness. How­ev­er, many of your cus­tomers may not be tech savvy and ful­ly under­stand the dif­fer­ence between some of your online mar­ket­ing chan­nels – espe­cial­ly those that appear in Google search results — e.g. organ­ic, paid etc. Hav­ing Goals set up in your Google Ana­lyt­ics account to track all desired vis­i­tor inter­ac­tions, like a form com­ple­tion or phone call, is essen­tial for eval­u­at­ing which chan­nels are con­sis­tent­ly send­ing new leads.  Let the data help guide the deci­sion as to where you should be spend­ing more time and bud­get.

Put Your Best Foot Forward

For the social chan­nels you do decide to be active on, make sure you’re putting your best foot for­ward by hav­ing a com­plet­ed pro­file which can include: 

• Your business’s logo
• Busi­ness descrip­tion that accu­rate­ly describes who you are, what you do, and why you matter
• Pho­tos of your best work
• Link to your web­site and oth­er social profiles
• Accu­rate NAP data (name, address, phone number)
• Reviews – not manda­to­ry, but many providers, like Yelp, include reviews in their rank­ing algorithm

The above screen­shot shows the Houzz pro­file of Gere­ty Build­ing & Restora­tion. Each social net­work has unique oppor­tu­ni­ties for you to ful­ly com­plete your pro­file, stand out, and attain more vis­i­bil­i­ty.

Wrap­ping It Up

Hope­ful­ly these research tac­tics have pro­vid­ed you with some ideas about where to get start­ed. Do you have ques­tions about how a local SEO or social media mar­ket­ing strat­e­gy can increase online leads and sales? If so, please leave it in the com­ments below.