Your Guide to Ecommerce Social Media Marketing
Having a social media presence is essential to building and increasing brand awareness, driving traffic to your website, and increasing leads and sales.
But your accounts are not just platforms for sharing content and interacting with visitors to achieve those goals. From Facebook to Instagram, social media can be a powerful way to market your products and services to your followers.
Canadians are heavy users of social media. A 2019 report found that 75% of women and 62% of men use it on a daily basis. And according to PayPal’s Social Commerce Trends Study, 47% of Canadian users shop on social media and spend an average of $ 77 per month.
But despite these statistics, many small business owners still don’t understand the value of using these popular platforms to sell. That’s why I created this guide – not just to help you understand the importance of ecommerce social media marketing, but also to give you practical tips for driving traffic, leads, and sales.
Organic social selling
First, it is important to understand that there is a difference between social selling, using paid ads, and using a platform as a marketplace.
Social selling means you are organically connecting with sales prospects and nurturing relationships to hopefully convert them into customers. It’s about building relationships and credibility naturally by getting to know your potential customers.
You can do this by asking them interesting questions, answering their questions quickly, and always responding to comments or complaints. The more trust and loyalty you build, the better your chances of turning a follower into a paying customer.
For example, one of our clients, Rose Marie Swanson, asks engaging questions to connect with her audience.
Sell in a social media market
However, selling on a platform or market is a bit different. It means using the platform’s selling capabilities to actively market your products. Two examples are shown below.
Facebook Stores
If you have a Facebook business page, you can use Facebook stores. This new feature allows you to add products, organize them in different categories, communicate with customers, and see data about things like views and clicks.
And because Facebook owns Instagram, customers can also access your store on IG. People can find your Facebook stores on your company’s Facebook page or Instagram profile, or through Facebook Ads or Stories.
READ: Selling on social media without pushing people away
Social media is one of the best marketing tools out there: you can grow and reach a large audience with content and ads, and the people who like and / or follow you are your fans, so they are already you. objective group.
However, people may be reluctant to sell on these platforms. You really have to approach this in the right way or you could alienate your audience, causing them to unfollow or unfollow you because they expect a two-way conversation and engaging content, not to get marketed.
Read more on our website.
Instagram posts that can be purchased
Canada got this fantastic functionality in 2018, allowing companies to tag brands and products in their organic Instagram posts. Your audience can tap on it to see more details and then click to buy the product.
To take advantage of this feature, you will need to set up an Instagram business account. And your business profile must be connected to a Facebook catalog.
Use paid ads
In addition to social selling and marketplace selling, you can also use ads to drive traffic to your account page or website.
Depending on the type of small business you have, you can choose to run paid ads on:
• Facebookâ € ¨
• Twitterâ € ¨
• LinkedInâ € ¨
• Instagramâ € ¨
• Google Ads / Display Ads on the Google Display Networkâ € ¨
• YouTube (and video ad placements) â € ¨
Keep in mind that you don’t have to stick with static images when it comes to using these paid advertising options. By using social media marketing for e-commerce, you can embed videos in your ads to make them more attractive.
Within each platform there can be multiple ad options. For example, on Facebook you can choose between carousel ads, slideshow ads, collection ads, Messenger ads …
An example is the Canadian grocer SPUD.ca, which combines social selling (which offers valuable information) with product marketing in its Facebook ads.
It can be challenging not only to understand all ad formats, but also to set up and manage accounts and budgets. This is why it often makes sense to hire a professional marketing company for your small business.
No matter why you are considering social media for e-commerce, it is essential to put in the time and effort to ensure that your communications are not only engaging, but empathetic as well. Learn more about using empathic marketing on our website.
I hope my ecommerce social media marketing guide has inspired you to effectively sell your products and services.
For the success of your business,
Susan