Social Media Marketing

It's hard to imagine social media started back in 1996 with the gigantic boom they've had in the past decade, more so in the past year with the pandemic limiting actual physical socialising, as such now their is roughly 3.96 billion people currently using the different apps/services available to keep in contact with friends and family with the average person having about 8.6 accounts (Dean, 2021).

This is why most companies now consider social media platforms a big part of their marketing strategies.

But just having a platform isn't enough. It has to actually look appealing to the person coming across it so that they may become interested then perhaps become a customer. That is why it is important to have profile page that actually looks good, now this can be tricky as each different platform has their own scaling sizes for text, cover images, profile images, posts, pictures, videos and buttons so it is important to have a thought out design for each platform you are going to use (Dean, 2021).

Granted having a profile page that looks all nice and shiny doesn't really matter if nobody is coming and looking at it. So how do you get people to come your way?

One of the best combined ways to be engaging is to actually engage with your fanbase regularly and to hashtag/tag your posts. This means instead of just firing off posts as things happen, you like/favourite replies, you retweet/share those replies maybe with an answer or you can just simply reply to their comment. Doing all this can help people build a personal connection to your company/brand instead of just seeing it as a faceless company (Eckstein, 2021). And by hashtagging/tagging your posts as you send them out will help people who are looking for that particularly kind of maybe niche content find it as it is now linked to the relevant subject tagged worldwide (Bagadiya, 2021).

Another thing to keep in mind when posting on social media is when to time your posts. As it is often said, Timing is everything. If I as an indie game developer where to finish a project and then launch it the next day just as say a bigger and wider known game company launched their next title, I'd be stupid and I would get swept under the rug. Though if my project was about 99% finished just as a popular subject was being shared around, I could perhaps create a post using it to gather interest about my project. 

This would be a great use of Viral Marketing.

Viral Marketing is when a post, usually involving a piece of media, is reposted/retweeted, and shared across a social media platform (or even multiple platforms). This increases the number of views (engagement) a post will get and increases the publicity of the business at the same time. Whilst this is an amazing feat, it is also a tricky thing to get right (Fraile, 2021), just ask Burger King about their recent International Women's Day post.

Bibliography

Dean, B., 2021. How Many People Use Social Media in 2021? (65+ Statistics). [online] Backlinko. Available at: <https: backlinko.com="" social-media-users=""> [Accessed 8 June 2021].</https:>

Eckstein, M., 2021. Social Media Engagement: Why it Matters and How to Do it Well. [online] Buffer Library. Available at: <https: buffer.com="" library="" social-media-engagement=""> [Accessed 8 June 2021].</https:>

Bagadiya, J., 2021. How To Use Hashtags Effectively In Social Media Marketing?. [online] Socialpilot.co. Available at: <https: www.socialpilot.co="" blog="" how-to-use-hashtags-effectively-in-social-media-marketing=""> [Accessed 8 June 2021].</https:>

Fraile, A., 2021. What Is Viral Marketing? Examples and Advantages. [online] Cyberclick.net. Available at: <https: www.cyberclick.net="" numericalblogen="" what-is-viral-marketing-advantages-and-examples=""> [Accessed 8 June 2021].</https:>