If you’re just getting started in the world of social media, then building a strong foundation for your social media platforms is essential!
Building any social media brand from the ground up is never easy. If you start on the wrong path, you can quickly find yourself lost in the weeds of social media irrelevance. The perfect way to ensure that you end up with a robust social media presence that pays dividends for years to come is to get your social media brand off to a great start.
In the following article, we’re going to be talking with Omar Del Villar, one of the founders and owners of Go Giveaways and the sole owner of Echelon Smiles. He’ll be giving us some personal tips about how he successfully helped build his social media accounts to over several hundred thousand followers.
Why Are People On Social Media?
Before you start focussing on building your social media brand, it’s essential to understand why people are checking out their social media every day. Long gone are the days of smashing people in the face with products. People want to be entertained on social media. They’re going there to check out what their friends, families, and favorite celebrities are getting up to.
“People want to learn about you. Your story. What led up to you creating the product or brand. They need to feel invested in the story behind the brand. They aren’t just buying your product; they’re buying the story behind the product.” Omar Del Villar.
You need to create a compelling story to back up your brand. Consumers need to connect with you before they buy from you. Some of the success stories which have been built around brands include Airbnb. Think about it, without the customer and the success stories of people living their best life while staying in Airbnb homes and accommodation. The brand would be lifeless.
Think About What’s Trending on Social Media!
2019 was the year of the video. Think about it. Facebook live, Instagram TV, Snap Chat, and YouTube. They all have one particularly important thing in common, video. Video may have been a massive trend in 2019, but it’s continued into 2020 and looks like it’s going to carry on into 2021 and beyond.
“People want to see the real you. They don’t want to see carefully staged photos. People want to see you, doing you, living your best life, and they want to see it in the video. There’s a reason so many celebrities are posting little video snippets of their lives to fans. Every day people are looking to connect with the people they follow, and they want to see the real person behind all the staged photos, makeup, fancy clothes, and million-dollar photoshoots.” Omar Del Villar.
When you’re thinking of creating some content, think about video. It doesn’t have to be every day or overly complicated. Just start taking some small video snippets relevant to your brand and your story.
The Five P’s of Social Media Branding
When it comes to any social media brand or account, it’s easy to start posting like crazy and then sitting back after and thinking about what you’re doing wrong and why aren’t you getting any engagement with your posts. In the following section, we’re going to look at what the five p’s are and why they’re so essential to any branding.
“The five p’s of social media are plan, produce, publish, promote, and prove. If you follow them closely, there’s a much better chance that your social media will be a success!” Omar Del Villar.
1. Plan – Settle down and come up with a plan for your social media. Think short term and long term. Be prepared to change your plan as goals and targets are changer or met. Before you even start producing content, you need to work out what your goals are, who your ideal target audience is, when they’re online, what content they like, and how to engage with them. Who is going to create the content? Is it you, or will you have a team? When are you going to post it? And how frequently? There’s a lot to think about in the planning stage of building a brand.
2. Produce – When it comes to producing any content, plan it out. Create a lot of content for the weeks ahead. If you plan on posting on certain days to take advantage of #weekdayhashtags, then create a few weeks in advance and then have some other content to fill in the gaps. Every piece of content that you create should serve a purpose and be part of your plan.
3. Publish – When it comes time to post, think about when you’re posting. Certain days are better than others. It’s more expensive to boost posts on certain days when more people are on the platform. Are you posting yourself, or are you using publishing tools? Which platforms are you creating content for? Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Snap Chat, or YouTube? Look at the content you create and plan around the platforms you plan on publishing it.
4. Promote – Promotion can be an expensive endeavor if you aren’t sure what you’re doing. There are a variety of people that can assist with promotions and when and what posts are the best to boost and when you should boost them. Just randomly paying to promote any old post is a sure way to cost you some serious money while seeing very little in the form of returns.
5. Prove – This is where you need to spend some serious time. Look at your goals and your plans. Are you meeting your goals, or is more work required? The great thing about any social media platform is that it gives you clear and accurate metrics once you understand how to interpret them. Go into the posts and see which content performed the best out of everything that you posted. What worked and what didn’t. Have a look at the times when they were published and the days. Were certain days better than others? Was a specific time of the day better? Which keywords or hashtags did you use? What got the most likes, shares, comments, or engagement?
Setting yourself realistic goals when you first start building your brand is vital to success and staying motivated.
“I didn’t aim to have 150-200k followers overnight. I set small goals and rewarded my success along the way. Start at 100, then 1000, then 10,000, and continue moving the goals. With a little bit of hard work and commitment, you’ll have an amazing social media brand and presence in no time at all. Good luck!” Omar Del Villar.
Creating a Powerful Social Media Brand Conclusion
Thanks for checking out our article on how to successfully build a powerful social media brand from the ground up. If your planning on starting a new business or have a new product and looking for tips on how to create social media content that will consistently bring in new leads, then be sure to stay tuned for more articles.
