One of the greatest hurdles in establishing a worthwhile, engaging and reliable social media presence is producing enough content. Many brand owners go into business assuming they can just share photos from their e-commerce shoots, repost other people’s images and share some behind-the-scenes photos and videos. The truth is it’s not enough and it won’t keep followers interested for very long- their tastes are much more savvy than that. What’s more, expand your expectations when it comes to quantity. One or two photoshoots will never spawn enough content for your social needs for the entire year. Think of this way: social media is a constant, daily form of communication with potential consumers and fans calling for strategic content planning. You wouldn’t speak to your friends about the same thing every time you saw them, would you? You probably also wouldn’t stick to a firm plan of a few topics you can discuss with your friends year-round, despite the fact that other events, happenings and interests will surely pop up before the year ends?
Approach your social media audiences as if you’re approaching your friends and you’ll be sure to produce much more interesting, posts injected with personality. Approach your social media with the perspective of a magazine that shares daily features, rather than a catalog that shares a single image from its pages per day.
Step 1. Understand Your Budget.
Understand how much money you actually have available to allocate to content planning. Most brand owners don’t know their total budgets, but it’s important to calculate your total for the entire year. A great approach is to allocate 30% of your revenue towards marketing. Next, take that amount and see how much you can afford to spend on photography and a professional copywriter for social media. You may be tempted to run your brand’s social account yourself, but that’s not a great idea. A professional is going to ensure you always look and sound on-brand, as opposed to when you update the account yourself on-the-fly between the numerous responsibilities of running your business.
Step 2. Stay Organized.
Keep up with content planning, maintain a cadence and keep the entire content production, approval and posting process very organized. In the case of social media, too many cooks ruin the pot indeed- only assign one or two people to your social account to avoid misunderstandings and chaos. Some tools that can help keep you organized include the post scheduling system Loomly as well as Google Docs for pre-planning posts before uploading them to the scheduling platform.
Step 3. Be Consistent and Authentic.
Make sure your message is authentic in every post. Change up your content to keep things interesting but it should all ring true to your brand message, brand values and aesthetics. There are many conflicting opinions on whether or not a filter should be applied to every in-feed post on Instagram, whether certain art direction trends should be used, whether certain trends should be applied, etc. At the end of the day, none of these considerations matter. What matters most is that if your social media accounts don’t look like your website, your website visitors won’t return to you on social media and site visitors from social media will be confused. Yes, on even such image-focused platforms as Instagram, authenticity and consistency should come before any aesthetic considerations.
Whether you like it or not, as the owner of a fashion company, you’re running a media company too- and content planning is a big part of your brand’s responsibilities. A lot of brands believe they can still live in the old days of simply producing excellent products and making the sale. Today, you really need to know what you represent and you have to make a concerted effort to get that message out in the world every single day.
- What is your programming?
- What exciting events or news can you share or build content around?
- What do you want to say to your audience?
Tailor your content for your audience just as respective news networks and programs do.
To recap, if you’re ready to launch or revamp your social media strategy, focus on the following:
- Make a plan.
- Invest resources (money and time).
- Be consistent.
Next Steps: Supercharge Your Social Media Strategy
- “5 Social Media Predictions for 2020”
- “5 Steps to Implementing Retarget Marketing on Facebook”
- “How to Find the Right Influencers Who Can Make the Biggest Impact on Your Brand”
Looking for expert guidance to grow or establish your social media branding? Call us at 310-957-5264 to schedule a consultation session or email hello@scalingretail.com. One-on-one support from seasoned industry professionals awaits!