Do you use your social media to keep up with friends and family, while others use it as a way to make money? Unsure of how to use the power of social media for your business?
Or are you doing well offline and have now made the conscious decision to grow your business online to add another stream of revenue or to simply move to online marketing?
Well, either way, this is a great decision because online marketing is the future, and I’m here to help you get started. In this blog post, I will share with you my eight steps that will help you amplify the power of social media and scale your service-based business. Ready? Let’s dive in.
Why Online Marketing?
With more customers (and businesses) shopping and researching products online, it has become critical for companies to recognize digital marketing’s vital importance.
Let’s look at the numbers real quick: “54% of social browsers use social media to research products and 71% of consumers who have had a positive experience with a brand on social media are likely to recommend the brand to their friends and family.”
So, it is clear that online marketing is vital for ANY type of business.
Compared with traditional marketing, there are various advantages, especially the fact that online marketing is a low-cost entry. You can actually get found and seen without spending a dime.
Another key advantage about going online is that once you have a strategy (that you have tested and know it is working), you can automate most of it and make a lot of money while the Internet works for you.
Either way, whatever your incentive for going online is, you have made the right decision, and here are my eight strategic steps to help you get started, scale, and reach that 6-7 figures business goal.
Step 1: Choose your platforms
Now that you have decided to go online, the first thing you need to do is decide which platforms to use. But you want to be very careful not to become overwhelmed.
You don’t want to be on every platform. You need to decide which ones work for you. And there is so much to choose from. Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Youtube, even Snapchat, TikTok, and the list go on.
In deciding which social media platform works for you, you have to consider two factors: the type of business that you already have and your personality and key strengths.
So, let’s say you are an amazing photographer. In this case, you would want to choose among the visual social media platforms like Instagram or Pinterest.
Or let’s say that you are really good with words. In that case, you might consider Twitter. Or if you love video, then YouTube and TikTok might be good for you.
Besides personalities, it also matters what kind of business you are in. Let’s say you have a food delivery company. You probably, want to be on Twitter, or maybe that should be your first choice.
Nonetheless, when deciding which social media platforms to use, I would suggest keeping it small and starting with a maximum of 2-3 social media platforms. Don’t overwhelm yourself with more than three platforms.
However, if you decide that you want to be on more than three social media platforms, you may want to repurpose your content. Content repurposing and content scheduling (with tools like Later and Hootsuite) are two great ways to make sure that you always have content on your social media while saving your most precious resource – time.
Step 2: Grow Your Social Media Platform:
Now that you have decided on which social media platform you want to be on, the next thing that you have to do is to grow your presence. In other words, you have to get found and be seen. And a great way to grow your social media is through using the power of content creation.
And how do you amplify the power of content creation?
Well, the first thing you should do is to decide on what kind of content you want to create.
For instance, if you are a product-based business, then you would want to create content that shows your products and the way they work.
If, on the other hand, you have a service-based business, then you would want to show your skills, and a good way to do so is to educate. Teach your audience something. This will keep them coming back to you to learn more while you also show off how good you are at what you do. It is a win-win situation.
If you are a product-based business, you know that people purchase either because they think that the items you are offering are beautiful or useful to them.
With service-based businesses, it is a different story. People purchase because they have trust in the person that is offering the services. And it is highly likely that this person has already established authority by providing educational content about how to do XYZ.
Pro Tip: You can teach people how to hire people in your field or call out industry myths. People will learn what to look out, while also seeing why you stand out from the competitors.
Of course, there are many ways to get people on your page, but providing educational content is a strategy that works really well. You can create educational content by creating videos, creating captions, text, and infographics, on your platform to show how good you are at what you do.
Pro tip: Create content that your ideal target audience needs, not just what the general public needs.
When creating educational content, you have to make sure that it is something that correlates with what your ideal potential clients will be interested in.
Let’s say you are a professional photographer and your ideal clients are beauty and fashion brands. What type of educational content would you consider?
Well, there is no point in creating content that teaches the beauty brand how to become professional photographers, as your client does not want to be a photographer. They would most probably want to outsource photography to a professional rather than trying to become one.
So, perhaps you would create content that helps them do their amateur photography or content that teaches them a few tricks (like how to use the light/filter more effectively, etc.).
By creating that type of content, you have been very helpful to them, and you have established your authority. So, when they need a professional photographer, they would most probably choose your services.
Step 3: Social proof and referrals
So, you have created fantastic content for your audience to show how good you are at what you do, but there are other ways to prove that. And that is social proof.
To get social proof, you can get reviews from past/current clients and get endorsements from influencers, celebrities, or experts in your line of work. When I say influencers, I don’t mean just Instagram influencers. I mean people that are influential in whatever field that might be related to what you do.
Social proof and referrals have a tremendous value in helping you establish your brand and credibility. Because people are more likely to buy from you if they see others who have already worked with you, are happy with your services.
Remember, the potential client that you are trying to get his attention is trying to decide why your service is better than the other 4-5 services that he is researching. In that case, social proof helps a lot.
And something that you want to look closely at is referrals. Whether online or offline clients, you would want people that trust you to refer you to another client.
Step 4: Engage
So, let’s say you have this amazing content on your page, you have proved your authority, you got social proof, and people are starting to come to your social media platform. Awesome! But what should you do now?
The answer is: you want to keep them active on your social media platform!
Remember, the competition is really tough out there. There are maybe two or three or four people doing something similar to what you do, so you want to keep that audience that you have worked very hard to gain. Therefore, you want to respond to their comments and engage with them on their own profiles.
Remember, the keyword here is consistency.
You need to be consistent. You don’t want to disappear for weeks and then come back, hoping your potential clients are still there. You need to keep them active. You need to engage with them. They should remember you. You need to be showing up on their profile.
There is no point in investing so many efforts in content creation, getting social proof, and then just disappear.
You can engage with your audience through DMs, Instagram stories, you can do pools, etc.
So, make sure you are engaging with your social media audience consistently, and this is going to make them more likely to follow you, more likely to see you in their feed, more likely to search for you. Just stay active and keep them engaged!
Step 5: Create Your Own Data
The next important step is something that even some established businesses forget, and that is you don’t own that social media platform.
Let me repeat that- you don’t own your social media platform.
Anything can happen. Google can blacklist your website, or Twitter could take your page offline for any reason (it could be people reporting you, you might be breach something unintentionally, etc.). What are you gonna do?
Well, you are out of business UNTIL you turn your followers into your own data. And a good way to do this is through building email lists. Imagine if all of the social media platforms disappear one day, but you have a very healthy good email list, then you are still in business.
Even if you change your business tomorrow and still have that email list, it helps a lot. And you have to make sure that you are nurturing your list, and there are so many ways to do so.
For instance, you can do giveaways. That will require people to enter an email address in exchange for free material like an ebook, or free video, or any other kind of freebie that is attractive for your ideal customers.
You can even do pools online. This way, to get answers to the pool, people would have to enter their email address.
There are so many ways to grow your email list. And maybe I should write a separate blog about this topic. But the point is that you want to grow your list, and that should be a priority to your strategy.
Step 6: Be ready to compete
The next step is to be ready to compete. And I say this because when it comes to online marketing, the competition is furious (I know I am repeating myself, but I cannot stress enough the importance of this point).
Everyone is online, and you can find so many people in just a few seconds search, So how do you make sure you stand out? The first thing is to make sure you identify your USP (unique selling point)!
Identify your USP. Why do you stand out from the crowd? Why are you different? Why should your customer choose you over the next person?
Remember, when you do a Google search, at least 12 people come up. When you do an Instagram search, so many people come up. So what should they choose your service over your competitors?
You need to find out your unique selling point, and you need to stick to it. You need to make sure it is very clear in all of your marketing.
Your unique selling point can be your pricing, it can be your knowledge, it can be your style, it can be so many things out there, but you need to figure it out for yourself by answering this question: why should people come TO YOU?
The answer should be short and sweet because people don’t have a lot of time. When a client is researching YOU (plus probably 5-6 other competitors), you need to make it very clear why you stand out.
It can be the content that you provide. Or your unique selling point can be how good you are at a very small part of what you do because sometimes this matters as well. You don’t have to be the Jack of all trade; you can be really good at a small part of your service, which can be why people would choose you rather than your competitors.
So, find your unique selling points and make sure you make it very, very clear to your potential audience.
- Step 7: Pricing
Now the next thing to do is to look at your pricing. If you are too expensive, compared to your competitors, most likely that potential clients will go with your competitors. Nonetheless, I am not asking you to reduce your prices and price yourself out of profit. You don’t want to do that. Instead, what you could do is to perhaps consider a bundle.
Pro Tip: Focus on value rather than price. Unlike product-based businesses, you don’t have to worry about inventory cost, so bundle up your services to create more value for that price rather than reducing your individual price, which may affect your profit.
Let’s say you are selling a service for $50. But if your client takes 3 of these services, he can get it for $100 (instead of $150). Now that is a good deal. And I can tell you for sure – people love to get a good deal.
Another point when you are offering a bundle (especially if it is a high-value item) is to offer payment options to make it more affordable (hence, attractive) for clients.
Online space is a competitive one, and a great way to reduce price while still making a profit is by offering bundles.
Remember- it’s all about value! So, if you are giving your clients more value for less, they most probably would choose you (over their competitors).
Low pricing is not a cure for getting seen online. It is not about the cheapest. Some people don’t want the cheapest. They want the better. And I have to warn you – if you consider being the cheapest, you would most probably have to constantly reduce your prices in order to stay competitive. And what is more, the chances of getting low-value clients (you know, the ones with big expectations and paying you as little as possible) are high!
So, focus on value, and then decide what price to go with that should attract more potential clients to you.
- Step 8: Convert your online audience into clients!
Now to the exciting part, which is the strategy. The strategy that will allow you to convert your online audience into clients. This is really the exciting part because it means that you have done your work well, and people are now on your social media platform/s. Now what you need to do is to convince them to book your services.
How do you do that? You have to be very strategic. Try to get people into the DMs or into your mailing list so that you can talk with them there. Try them to book a call with you.
You can offer something very simple, like a quick free audit. Once they agree on that, you can find ways to upsell your higher offers.
The keyword here is strategic.
If your social media followers are not paying clients, why are you spending so much money trying to build that audience and platform?
What is the point of having 100 000 followers if none of them is paying you? Even with fewer than 500 followers, you should be getting consistent clients from your social media.
To turn your audience into paying clients, you need to keep testing what works and what does not work. You need to constantly improve your strategy. Test and see if you can add something new or delete something that is no longer needed.
To turn your audience into paying clients, you have to do your research, do some trials, and see what works and what does not. Remember, keep testing and trying.
In conclusion
Those were the 8 steps that I used many times for every business that I have started and scaled. If you are ready to scale your business, but you are still a little unsure, I can help you.
But let me tell you something – you have to be committed! If you are only interested (you have that attitude of let’s see if that will work), then it won’t happen unless you get committed (that attitude of I will scale my business no matter the obstacles)!
If you’re serious about a real transformation in your business, and you are committed to scaling it, let’s talk. Book my FREE 10 K months game plan strategy call session HERE, and let’s talk about how I can help your business grow! I will be honored to walk this journey with you!
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