Social media is now an essential marketing channel and can no longer be ignored.
There are many businesses that are not successful in social media marketing, and it is time for that to change.
Social marketing requires a significant amount of time and effort to be effective. This is because it relies on social interactions, which are complex and require skill to navigate.
Use the following resources to develop the skills needed to be effective on social media.
Social Media Marketing Free Resources
1. Social Media Explorer
The SME agency provides strategic services and also operates a blog with a team of social media and marketing experts. The SME blog is well respected and provides valuable insights, and some of the authors have written popular books on aspects of digital and social marketing.
2. Scott Monty
Internet marketing expert Monty has a lot to say on the subject of social media. His articles provide an insightful look into the world of digital marketing. If you’re not familiar with his work, be sure to check out his series of posts called “This Week in Digital.” These posts will help you stay informed about all the latest social media news.
3. Social Media Examiner
The Examiner is not to be confused with Social Media Explorer. It is one of the top blogs for social media with valuable tips and data for social marketers. If you could only choose one social media blog to follow, the Examiner should be your choice.
4. HubSpot Marketing Blog
This blog is the perfect place to stay up-to-date on the latest social media news and learn how to use each social network to its fullest potential.
Social Media Publishing Templates
5. Social Media Content Calendar Template
You’ll want to organize all of your social media content in an offline calendar before you load it into a publishing tool. This free template linked above allows you to sort your content in a spreadsheet by day, time, and social media channel. This will help you track everything you create and when it’s being promoted.
6. Social Media Calendar Templates
This social media template is designed to help you track your social media campaigns by social network, engagement, holidays, and paid promotion.
7. Airtable’s Content Calendar
You can use a project management platform, like Airtable, to help you track the progress of your social media calendar in real time. Airtable comes with a content calendar format that you can use to fit your business.
Social Media Marketing Courses
8. Developing an End-to-End Instagram Marketing Strategy for Your Business
This course from HubSpot Academy will teach you how to create an Instagram marketing strategy in a quick 95 minutes. It is split into 3 lessons, contains 13 videos, and has 3 quizzes to test your knowledge.
9. Putting Social Media to Work for Your Coaching Business
You can’t be a successful consultant without learning how to market your business online. The Udemy course linked above will show you how to use social media to get more clients in your industry.
10. Developing an End-to-End Facebook Marketing Strategy
This is an hour-long course on Facebook marketing. This course will teach you the basics of Facebook marketing.
Social Media Marketing Videos
Videos are a close second to books as my favorite medium for learning. Being able to hear from experts on any subject as if you’re face-to-face is powerful. These videos will not only show you how to do social media, but you’ll also get insights into the why and what as well.
11. The #AskGaryVee Show
If you want to know about social media marketing, you need to listen to Gary Vaynerchuk. He is an expert on the topic and he always has great advice. If you have a question, be sure to send it to him and he’ll answer it on his show.
12. TED Talks: Social Media Marketing
If you aren’t in love with TED, you might want to check your pulse. This is a playlist of videos from TED Talks on social media. While you may not be able to take away much actionable advice from these videos, if you want to become an expert on social media, they will give you insight into the deeper subject, such as “the hidden influence of social networks.”
13. Learn Social Media Marketing
If you’re new to social media and want to learn through structured lessons, Lynda’s massive library of social marketing courses is a great option.
Social Media Podcasts
If you would like to learn more about social media while you relax, podcasts are a great way to do so. The podcasts listed below will help you develop your social media skills.
14. Social Media Marketing Podcast
Each week, Michael Stelzner from Social Media Examiner interviews a leading social media marketing professional to bring you success stories and expert tips.
15. The Social Toolkit
This podcast is perfect for anyone who wants to stay updated on digital tools and software for social media marketing.
Slideshows & Infographics About Social Media
If you learn best by looking at pictures, these slide presentations and infographics are excellent resources for learning about social media.
16. The B2B Social Media Palette
This SlideShare explores the channels and tools you need for successful B2B social media marketing. It provides guidance on finding the right tools and channels for your specific audience.
17. The Complete Guide to the Best Times to Post on Social Media
It’s important to time your social media posts carefully so they don’t get lost among all the other updates in your audience’s feeds. Mastering the timing of social media posts is critical to effective marketing.
18. 58 Social Media Tips for Content Marketers
This slideshow provides essential information for anyone who wants to use social media to promote their content. It covers the essential methods for social media marketing, and is a must-read for anyone in this field.
Social Media Tips
1. How to Turn Social Media Conversations Into Leads
If you’re looking to transition from using social media for fun to using it for business purposes, this is the guide for you. It explains the basic strategy of social media marketing and how you can use it to achieve your goals.
You’ll get a strategy that:
- Builds your brand
- Creates great content
- Engages with social users
- Generates leads
2. The Best Tools for Turning Social Media Chatter Into Customers
Now that you have a plan, you need the appropriate tools to carry it out. You should try out a variety, and this book has a great set to start with.
It describes different types of software suites, from free and basic ones to more expensive ones designed for businesses. It provides links to each type of software so that readers can easily find and compare them.
3. 50 Best Social Media Tools From 50 Most Influential Marketers Online
This post from Aaron Orendorff interviews 50 influential marketers and asks for their most valuable tools. This sets out a strategy and offers tools to support that. This post offers advice from experienced marketing professionals.
4. Get Started: Social Media Guide for Small Business
Small businesses may find social media marketing to be a challenge. They may not have the budget to hire someone just for this task and may have to squeeze it into their other marketing efforts.
This series from Brenda Barron shows you:
- How to Use Social Media for Small Business (Beginner’s Guide)
- How to Optimize Your Social Media Profiles
- How to Discover Your Ideal Social Media Voice
- 14 Helpful Social Media Management Tools for a Better Workflow
- How to Track Your Social Media ROI (Get Better Results).
5. 15 Ways To Get Leads On Social Media (Marketer’s Guide)
Are you looking for ways to generate leads from social media? Look no further than this guide from the Post Planner blog. It covers everything from choosing the right leads to creating a landing page that converts. You’ll also find platform-specific tips for generating leads on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
This includes:
- Lead generation ads for the major platforms
- Tips and tricks to optimize your social profiles
- Video marketing techniques that generate leads
- The best approaches for Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.
6. How to Maximize Brand Engagement on Social Media
A common goal for social media marketers is to have a back-and-forth conversation with customers and fans. An engaged audience is not only more likely to provide feedback and say nice things about you, they’re also likely to share you with their friends.
Download this guide to understand:
- Why social engagement matters
- The best tools to foster engagement
- How to build your social media strategy
7. How to Work With Influencers to Maximize Social Media Exposure
Working with influencers can help you to reach new audiences and improve your reputation.
Hiring influencers is a great way to build brand awareness. When industry VIPs talk about your brand, people are more likely to listen and pay attention. So if you can partner with one or many influencers, you can speed up the slow process of building awareness for your brand.
One great thing about these power users is that many of their followers are looking for advice on what to buy. If you’re selling products or services, a recommendation from one of them could lead to sales.
8. Social Sells – The Mini Guide to Social Selling
If you don’t have time to read an entire ebook, this guide from the Salesforce blog gives you a great overview of social selling strategy. Even though it’s shorter, it still has a lot of detail.
Salesforce’s Carl Henderson will tell you:
- What social selling is
- Why we’re in The Age of Social Selling
- What’s at risk if you don’t invest in social selling
- How to discover sales opportunities using social media
- How to use social to get to know your prospects better
9. The Sales Professional’s Go-To Guide to Social Selling
If you want to learn how to integrate social media into your sales strategy, this HubSpot post is a great resource. It provides a step-by-step guide to incorporating social media into your sales process.
Social media is becoming an increasingly important communication channel for sales teams, so it’s important that they present a professional image.
10. The Beginner’s Guide to Generating Sales Through Social Media
If you are having trouble convincing others, or even yourself, of the importance of social media marketing, then this blog post by Neil Patel is for you. He provides examples of people who have been successful at social selling, and outlines some of his favorite strategies.
There are many great real-world examples to learn from, which is always better than relying only on theory. This book, which he calls a “beginner’s guide,” provides plenty of food for thought for any digital marketer.
Twitter marketing resource
11. 8 Ways to Make Your Tweets More Impactful
This quick checklist will help ensure that you are using Twitter correctly. Since you are limited to only 140 characters, it is important to make them count.
The following tips will improve your strategy: 1. Make sure each tweet is interesting and engaging. 2. Keep your tweets short and to the point. 3. Use hashtags wisely, and only use them when they add value. 4. Use images and videos whenever possible. 5. Retweet other users’ content occasionally. 6. Engage with your followers regularly. 7. Promote your content outside of Twitter. 8. Use analytics to track your progress and adjust your strategy as needed.
This document provides an overview of the key components of successful Twitter marketing. Whether you are just starting out or looking to reassess your approach, this will give you a good foundation.
Instagram marketing resource
12. Instagram Masterclass with Foundr Magazine CEO Nathan Chan
This webinar will show you how to:
- Build a flourishing Instagram sales funnel
- Drive sales and conversions through this funnel
- Create beautiful content your customers love
- Work with influencers, or “shoutout soulmates”
- Harness videos on Instagram
This webinar will help you build an Instagram marketing strategy.
Facebook marketing resource
13. Selling on Facebook: 6 Non-Obvious Ways to Increase Facebook Sales
Basically, it’s a little like adding Etsy or Amazon to your customers’ Facebook feeds. This post from Brilliance.com’s Jonathon Ohayon begins by explaining Facebook’s Shopify integration, then shows you how to:
- Target and remarket to interested prospects
- Incorporate email marketing into your Facebook strategy
- Create engaging image galleries (“scrolling images”)
- Introduce high-performing video ads
- Use Facebook Live to your advantage
How to Start Social Media Marketing
1. Go where your customers are
If you don’t have much to put into marketing, figure out which social media platform your target audience is most likely to be using, and create content and experiences focused on that platform. You can slowly branch out to other platforms later.
2. Be helpful. Period
This rule of thumb for social media marketing indicates that you should be focused on providing your audience with interesting and useful content 80% of the time, and only promote your brand or product 20% of the time. If you can keep your audience engaged with great content, they will be more receptive to your promotional messages. Just be sure not to overdo it with the self-promotion!
3. Set realistic and measurable goals
It’s important to begin with a benchmark so that you can set realistic goals. It is also important to measure against achievable milestones to gauge performance and make accurate (within reason) predictions for strategic planning.
4. Have conversations
Don’t forget that social media is about interacting with other people. You can increase brand awareness by talking to people online, instead of just broadcasting messages.
5. Focus on quality, not quantity
This tip can be applied to so many things in the social media space:
- Quality, not quantity, of followers
- Quality, not quantity, of posts you create
- Quality, not quantity, of promotions