Heat Up Your Social Strategy This Summer | Social Joey
The days are getting longer, the weather is heating up, and the last post on your company’s Facebook page was to wish everyone a Happy New Year…sound familiar? Having a regular and consistent social strategy can often fall by the wayside, but it’s something that’s extremely important for all businesses. If this is a scenario that’s all-too-relatable, look no further than today’s guide on how to revamp your social strategy just in time for summer fun!
Why Summer?
We know what you’re thinking: “Why is summer when I should focus on social?” Once upon a time, marketers thought of summer as the slow months. This used to make sense because the busier people are living their lives, the less time they have for social media. However, because the way consumers utilize their social pages has changed, the most effective way to market to them has, too!
Between stories, statuses, and shares, posting about fun events, summer activities and gorgeous vacation spots on the go has never been easier—making it a prime time to capitalize on all the action. So what’s the best strategy for heating up your social routine? If your business becomes the go-to for engaging, relevant summer content, consumers will remember that long into the winter months when they’re spending more time surfing the web!
Considering how users will consume your content, what content they want to interact with and how to create a long-lasting bond will help you connect with your customers on a personal level and set your brand apart from those that don’t adapt to the season. Here are Social Joey’s tips for keeping the summer strategy fresh:
1. Make it Mobile
Because summer is when people are on-the-go, having a mobile-centric experience is essential to a summer strategy. Users are going to be engaging with content in parks, by the pool, or on the beach, and if it’s not a user-friendly experience, they won’t stick around.
In fact, 61% of users report themselves as unlikely to return to a poorly-designed mobile site—that’s like if over half of the people hanging out at your local park decided against being your customer! Considering how pictures, videos, and your website will appear on mobile will help your business only push optimized info and promotions so potential leads aren’t lost to an unfriendly design.
2. Incorporate Images
Images have a lot of benefits for social media marketers—they’re more likely to put a pause on someone’s scrolling, and posts on Facebook that have an image receive 2.3x more engagement than those without.
The best part is, releasing images doesn’t have to take a large chunk of time out of every week to be effective. Instead, we’d recommend dedicating some time upfront to take and edit a large batch of promotional pictures of your store, restaurant, or office. This will allow you to trickle out the release of images and break up the timeline with some visual appeal—without having to add a daily photo shoot to your calendar!
Tip: Images should be eye-catching, high-quality, and consistent with the brand personality to be effective.
3. Converse With Customers
Customer interaction is one of the most fun parts of being a social media marketer, and summer is the perfect excuse to do more of it! Simple things like interacting when consumers tag your company, responding to questions on Facebook, or liking followers’ posts about your product can go a long way in establishing a customer-brand relationship and hopefully increase chances of gaining their business again in the future.
This also helps the brand increase overall social exposure, which will help boost posts in the newsfeed and accrue more followers and fans over time. Taking just a few minutes to make a customer’s day can have a big impact on the business (and it’s a lot of fun, too!).
4. Run a Contest
One of the quickest ways to boost social engagement is by running a contest. Giving everyone a chance to win is exciting, and having users post hashtags or tag friends to enter will increase overall impressions in no time.
Leftover products from a spring launch, a seasonal summer menu, or just a fun-in-the-sun prize pack are all great grand prizes to promote and can help you reach your marketing goals as well. Contests are a low-cost solution to get consumers excited and increase the business’ exposure, without taking up an excess of the marketing team’s time.
Want to know more about contests? Read our 5 Steps to Running a Hashtag Contest to learn how easy they can be!
5. Play Games
Most people associate summertime with lighthearted fun and a break from school—so reflect that in your social activity! Posting a silly staff picture and starting a caption competition, having followers submit their funniest summer camp memory, or posting pictures of area attractions and letting customers comment to identify it will get the community involved and having fun.
Despite this having very little to do with sales or product marketing, it has quite a lot to do with engaging fans and increasing customer loyalty—a long-term, highly effective sales tactic that will grow into impactful results.
6. Start a Blog
Since most of our other tips have pertained to short-form content, you might be thinking the suggestion to start a blog is a bit out of place. However, summer is actually a fantastic time to implore a hyper-local blogging strategy because of how useful it can be in getting the community engaged. Summer is when the most people are already on the go, but what if they could use your blog as a resource for where to spend their time?
Posting a guide to local parks, attractions, or events is the perfect way to set your company up as the prime place to get this information. Not only do businesses with blogs see higher lead generation and local SEO ranking than those without, but you’re also engaging with the community on a personal level to help everyone get the most out of their summer fun.
Are you curious about starting a blog, or how to incorporate these other social strategies? Let Social Joey be your go-to! We have a team of professionals who know exactly how to set your business apart—contact us today!