influenced to purchase something, or visit their site after seeing one of their posts? Have you ever clicked on an ad you’ve seen scrolling on your feed? These are all parts of social media marketing – and for many, they’re just a normal part of the day-to-day usage of sites like Facebook, TikTok, X, YouTube and Instagram. It’s exactly what it says on the tin, marketing on social media platforms that your target audience are most likely to be using, whether that be through paid ads or boosted posts, or general posts onto your business page / personal profile (depending on your platform and marketing plans). 

 

Now we know what social media marketing is, lets look at some ways it can help your business. 

First of all, social media marketing can build your brands reputation and awareness. Having people become aware of your brand is key to your social media marketing efforts – brand awareness already exists for many big companies, but small businesses and new businesses can really take advantage of social media to help make their audience aware of who they are. When you’ve built brand awareness, you need to build your reputation, and this comes with trust. You can use reviews that may have already been provided to you, or simply talk to your customers by replying to their comments, answering their questions and solving their pain points with your products and services. You should already know how important reputation is for a business on and offline, so keeping an eye on incoming comments and reviews can help to curate and boost your businesses reputation on social media and show new audiences that you’re trusted by those who are already buying from and interacting with you. 

Your target audience are the key to successful social media marketing. They’re what can make or break a campaign – if you’ve targeted your content towards the wrong people, then you won’t see the results you desired, affecting your overall performance. Knowing exactly who these people are, where you’re most likely to find them, the traits they possess and demographics they fall into will help to design your entire marketing approach. Tailoring your content and ads towards this audience ensures you’re hooking in the right people and solving their issues – if you have a product, for example, that exclusively targets itself towards Gen Z women, then familiarise yourself with what this audience is likely to be into by looking into current trends, lingo, content styles and competitors who are in the same field / lane as you when it comes to their marketing. Having all this information at your fingertips will help to make your marketing much more effective. Your insights will also be able to tell you information on audience demographics, so you know if things need changing or keeping on the right path depending on who is interacting and clicking through on the posts or ads you put out there. 

Speaking of your insights, social media marketing can be a great tool for understanding your businesses online marketing performance. As mentioned, you can see insights on your audience, but you can also see click through rates, reach and impressions, ads can show you your ROI and cost per click – there’s a whole host of information that can be extracted from your social media marketing efforts which only helps to aid with the formation of your campaigns, improving them as you go forward and begin to see how your audience is responding to the content that you’re putting out there. 

Customer service initiatives can be boosted by your social media presence – letting customers get in touch directly through apps like Messenger. With the rise of AI, automated systems are becoming ever-more popular – meaning FAQ’s can be answered easily through an automated system, or if you’d rather use human interaction, ensure you have a response time mapped out to ensure your customers are getting answers within a quick time frame. This can often be seen on an app like X, where businesses will have dedicated accounts for responding to customers who @ their customer services with questions and requests. Sprout Social Index Data found that 73% of consumers will buy from a competitor if they don’t get a response – so make sure you’re prompt with your customer services on social media. Remember, if you’re dealing with negative comments, reviews or questions remain professional and try to take this of the timeline and into a private message conversation, where you can sort out any issues in a less public but respectful manner. This is also great for your brand reputation – offering to help publicly, apologising for any issues and offering to sort the problems out through a DM conversation shows that you care to get things sorted fast – which also bolsters trust in your business, as your audience will see you’re dedicated to helping out others in a quick manner who require your customer services. 

Social Media Marketing isn’t all there is to getting your business online – digital marketing in general is a great tool. From paid ads, websites, email marketing and SEO, all of these things can combine to make your social media marketing efforts more effective and vice versa. Having an overall online presence can help to boost your brand awareness and drive more traffic to your websites or social media pages, and by integrating a wider array of digital marketing into your overall strategy you can start see how successful you can be when you move more of your operations online. 

So, can social media marketing really help your business? Yes! With billions of people across the world using social media, the only thing between you and finding a loyal audience online is the hesitation to invest in social media. It may start off slow, but the more you learn and understand what’s required the better the results will be. If you don’t have the time to do this but still want to see how social media can help you, outsourcing it can be a great help – especially as you’ll be working with experts who know exactly how to get you the results you desire. 

 

The goal is to help creators build better content strategies and grow their audience.”. These changes have now been rolled out globally. 

 

YouTube have also recommended that users go for a more community-focused approach, utilising the community post section and engaging with commenters can help to boost your audience interaction, and with their new ‘most relevant’ option, you can find the best comments and questions to reply to quickly. 

Late last month, Instagram Reel lengths were extended to 20 minutes. This means you can upload content like tutorials, how-to’s or whatever your business chooses to make on the platform without having to worry about fitting everything in a short timeframe. However, you must consider your audience in this – do they enjoy longer videos, or do they lean more towards short form? Whilst incorporating longer videos can be beneficial, be mindful of what your audience engages with most. 

If you’ve leant into AI for your YouTube Marketing, make sure you’re staying compliant with YouTubes new guidelines around using AI content. Noted as a ‘minor’ policy, YouTube guidelines will begin to crack down on what they call ‘inauthentic’ content and identify mass-produced and repetitive videos – including content made by AI. 

Threads celebrated it’s 2-year anniversary this month, and after the initial hype of the apps launch back in 2023, it’s now starting to see a return in momentum thanks to their new updates over the last few months. They’ve even appointed a Head of Threads this month, which Instagram Head Adam Mosseri says despite still being a part of Instagram, he “want[s] to make sure we take [Threads] as seriously as our other apps, and so it needs a dedicated lead. 

 

They’ve added some additional updates to their analytics this month – further help to marketers who are starting to invest in using the platform. On the updates have said the following: “You can now tap metrics within the Insights dashboard for more detailed information. For example, tapping the Interactions section shows engagement by likes, replies, quotes and reposts, while tapping the Followers section shows follower growth with geographic data, including top cities and countries, and demographic information like age range and gender.” 

 

So that means you find can more information on the demographics of your audience, you’ll also have new charts showing your interactions and you can see if your posts are being seen via other apps. All of this information can be crucial to planning your social media schedule and ensuring your posts are correctly targeted towards the right audience, so make sure you’re keeping track of these analytics often to keep your marketing on track. 

Google AI will now be able to call business owners to save people from doing it themselves in a new update. 

 

Users will just enter their query, and AI will find the information for them using readily available information and automated calls. It will then present the information in a summary format based off what it’s found. As explained by Google: “From pet grooming to dry cleaning needs, Search can now call businesses to get pricing and availability information on your behalf — without you needing to pick up the phone. To get started, search for something like ‘pet groomers near me’ and you’ll see a new option in the results to ‘Have AI check pricing.’ From there, you can submit your request and Search will do the rest, consolidating information about appointments and services from different businesses to present you with a range of options.” 

 

That’s all for July! Have a fantastic August and remember to keep an eye out for any further updates over the coming month. 

Finally, your social media tip is: You do not need high production to make video work in your ads. 

 

In fact, sometimes a simple video filmed on your phone outperforms everything else. 

 

The goal is not perfection, it is connection. 

 

Show your face. Talk directly to your audience. 

 

Explain what you offer and why it matters, clearly and calmly. 

 

Keep the video short. Thirty seconds can be enough. 

 

Use captions so people can follow along with the sound off. 

 

And always end with a clear call-to-action. 

 

Video builds trust. It makes you feel real. 

 

That alone can drive more clicks and conversions than a polished graphic 

 

Look at your ad goals and your current financial situation, which can help you to determine your ad spend. Don’t spend too much – starting out small helps you to control your finances, and when you’ve got all the elements right, you may find that a small budget can bring you great results and a big return on your investment. 

Don’t underestimate the power of targeting – knowing who your target audience are is crucial for ensuring your ads are delivered to the right people. If you target your ads wrong you could end up wasting money and time on an Ad that doesn’t perform, so get a good idea of who it is you want interacting with your business and clicking on the links you have included within your ads.  

 

You want to consider such things as: 

 

• Where your audience are located – if you have a physical location, you may only be looking for people who live around the area your business is in. If you offer an online course, or sell online, you may choose to target multiple cities, the entire country or a global audience. 

 

• Their age – knowing how old your audience are will allow you to tailor other elements of your campaign such as your copy and graphics. Facebook typically lets you target users from the ages of 18 – 65+. 

 

• Their gender – Whether your business is created for everyone or you create products or courses specifically for women or men, you can use this to design your ad creative and target the correct people. 

 

• Their interests – What does you audience like? What personality traits do they possess? For example, if you run a sports company, you can target people who are interested in fitness or a specific sport. This can help to narrow your audience to those most likely to show interest in your ad. 

Next, you want to consider creating your visual elements. These must convey the message of your ad, stand out from the crowd and help to capture the attention of those scrolling through their feed. Your ad must be branded so it can be easily recognisable alongside your business – helping with building brand recognition too – using your logo, colours, fonts and tone of voice in your visual elements to create a cohesive campaign. You can use an image in a single or carousel format, or if you’d rather, use a video to help convey the message of your campaign – however, keeping these videos short, sweet and to-the-point can be much more powerful at retaining interest from your audience than a longer video. A/B testing can be helpful too – creating different variations of you visuals or using a video, single image and carousel and testing them to see which works better can help to shape your future campaigns. 

Now, you need to think about writing your copy. Your copy must be compelling, answers the pain points and wants of your audience by providing value to them, and encourage them to take the next steps via your call to action. Be direct with your messaging, get to the point and don’t make it too long – like your visuals, your copy must grab the audience’s attention straight away.  

 

Ensure it’s written in your brand voice, and works with the visual elements you’ve created. You can also decide to A/B test your copy, using different styles, lengths and messaging to see what your audience best responds to. 

Once you get these basic things set into place, you can begin to consider such things ad formats, placements, and reviewing each element of your campaign. If you’re creating ads, then these four things are key to know and get right before you begin running your campaigns. 

 

✅ Content Calendar – Having a content calendar can help you stay on track, especially for small businesses who’ll likely not have the time to spend on their social media marketing or have the money to hire a dedicated marketing department. Scheduling tools allow you to prepare posts to go out at the optimal times and days for your business – helping you avoid putting something together at the last minute and lets you consistently promote your campaigns, events or launches. 

 

✅ Brand Voice and Style – How do you want to sound and look to your audience? Writing your post in your brand voice and creating visuals that align with your brand’s style help to craft your online identity. Consistent posting in this voice and style allows you to build recognition and trust with your audience. 

 

✅ Variety – Content variety helps you to cater to different wants from your audience, and can help you to boost your engagement. With what you should already know about your audience, having a couple of different styles such as videos, static posts and carousel posts included in your content marketing allows you to mix things up whilst keeping your consistent style and messaging. 

 

✅ Add Value – Your content must provide value and hook your audience in – tips, how-to’s, behind-the-scenes or simple entertaining posts can all work depending on how you want to portray your business online. Think about the brands you purchase from and have interest in, consider how their marketing caught your attention, and then take look at your own business and how you can have a similar appeal to your target audience. 

Monitoring your data is extremely important, as it lets you know how you’re performing on social media and allows you to make changes and smarter choices. Here’s what you should have on your analytics checklist: 

 

✅ Engagement Rates – Engagement is a vanity metric, but it is still handy to measure as it points to how users are interacting with your content. High engagement can show that your audience is resonating with what you post, and minimal engagement can help you discover where things need to change in order to improve your performance. 

 

✅ Reach & Impressions – Track how many people are seeing your content, and how often. This will give you a good idea if it’s performing, reaching the right audience and if your visibility is good across the platforms you’ve chosen to post on. 

 

✅ Click Through Rate – If you’re including links or running ads, click through rate is an important metric to monitor. It lets you know how many people are clicking through to your landing page, and then from you can monitor whether they’re taking any action on the page. 

 

✅ Followers – Are you gaining followers or page likes? This can be a good indicator of your audience size and consistent growth can show interest in your brand – but this is also another vanity metric, so whilst good to monitor it doesn’t necessarily hold a lot of weight if you have a low follower count but high click through rate, sales, each or impressions. 

Building a relationship with your audience helps to increase brand loyalty and bring in great results. Here’s what to include in your Audience Checklist: 

 

✅ Personas – Create a target audience persona, so you know exactly the type of person you want your content to appeal to. Consider their age, gender, location, job type, interests and where they frequent on social media. Knowing this means you can then work out how to craft your content to speak their language and meet their needs. 

 

✅ Engagement Patterns – Your analytics will be able to tell you when your audience are most active, so that you can figure out when the best times to post are. Posting your content at the peak times they’ll be online can improve your reach, impressions and engagement. 

 

✅ Feedback – Your audience leaving reviews and comments can give you real-time insight into how they are feeling. Responding professionally and promptly lets you start conversations, answer questions, create relationships and solve any issues people may be having – good customer service is important, so make sure you’re keeping on top of this. It also helps you to create a deeper connection with your audience and improve your business/products in areas that they’ve had a problem with or don’t engage with – a win/win situation for you and them. 

By keeping these things in mind for your checklist, you’ll have a comprehensive guide to measuring and managing your social media performance. Revisit your checklist often, and update where necessary as your business and the digital landscape evolves. 

 

Worried that your ad is suffering from fatigue? There are some signs that you need to keep an eye on when ad fatigue begins to present itself. Here’s what to look out for: 

 

Drop In Engagement - If you’ve noticed your ads or even your business is getting fewer engagements on social media, that can point to people getting tired with your offerings. If less people are liking, commenting, sharing, talking about your business or interacting with ads, then your audience are likely getting fatigued - and you need to look into where you're losing your audience's interest in order to get them engaging with you again. 

 

Click Through Rate – Depending on your goal, a drop in clicks can point towards ad fatigue. If you previously started with a high volume of clicks (and conversions), but you’ve noticed a steep decline, then it’s clear that changes need to be made so you can continue bringing in a steady flow of new customers. 

 

Impressions – Ads are shown to your target audience, but the less they engage with it over time the less likely it is that your audience will see them. This has an impact on your impressions, and when these begin to fall you need to re-think your current ads and strategy to ensure you’re getting the best results and avoiding fatigue. 

If you think your ads are affected by fatigue, then here are a few things that can be done to fix it… 

 

Change Your Creative – People can get bored looking at the same image or video multiple times when it appears on their feed, so making small changes can be beneficial to stopping your audience in their tracks when they’re scrolling. Whether it’s freshening up images, changing colours or fonts, re-designing your graphic, adding new footage into videos or simply adding onto the graphic that there’s currently a sale or offer taking place, updating your ad can be hugely important in recapturing the attention of audience members. 

 

Rotate Your Ads – Having multiple ads that you rotate are helpful to preventing ad fatigue. Once you notice one ad is beginning to drop engagement, run the other (which should have some slight differences, even if your offer is the same). This allows you to deliver fresh ads to your audience, and you can use A/B testing to ensure you’re only delivering the highest-performers to guarantee good engagement and clicks. 

 

Look At Your Analytics – As with anything you do on social media, your analytics play a key role in explaining how your ads are doing. Tracking your ads performance allows you to see trends over time, notice when a decline starts to happen and take the needed steps to rectify any problems. When fatigue begins to set in, you’ll see this in your analytics – giving you the opportunity to make changes to boost your engagement back up. 

 

Stay Up-To-Date With Current Industry Trends – Key word research and insights into current trends within your industry or audience can be useful to know when tackling ad fatigue. Rewriting your copy to include terms that your audience are currently searching for and ensuring your copy is rich with key words will help to make your messaging more relevant and valuable to your target audience. 

If you’ve noticed ad fatigue starting to affect your performance, don’t worry – making tweaks and changes can help to reignite your campaign and spark more interest with your audience. By following these tips, you should now be able to know what to look out for and how to fix any issues you're having with ad fatigue.