Investing in social media marketing is a great idea but there are some things you should do before you start spending. Here’s our guide to what you need to do before investing in social media marketing.

5 Things To Do Before Investing In Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing is a great way to grow your small business but to get the most out of your investment there are some things you should do first. Here are 5 things to do before spending on social media.

Do Your Research – Before taking any action, it’s a good idea to do the research that will allow you to make good decisions. Some of the questions you’ll want to answer are:

• What’s already working for you? How are your customers using your website, email marketing, etc?
• Will participating in social media will have an impact? What will it be?
• Why do you want to use social media?
• How are other businesses in your industry using social media?
• Are people talking about your brand? Is the discussion positive, negative, or neutral?
• Who needs to be involved in your social media strategy?
• Does it make more sense to do your social media marketing in-house or to outsource it?
• Do you know what a listening program is? Are you using one effectively?
• Take An Audit – After you’ve done your research, the next thing you’ll want to do is take an audit that addresses the following questions.

How do you feel about opening a dialogue with your customers?

• What will be the biggest obstacles to implementing a social media marketing strategy?
• What can you do to evolve what you’re already doing instead of starting from scratch?
• Who’s really great at interacting with your customers with enthusiasm and passion?
• Are there any internal communications issues that need to be addressed before implementing a social media marketing strategy?

Set Your Goals – If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll never know if you get there. That’s where goal setting comes in.

• How will you measure both qualitative and quantitative success?
• Who are you trying to reach? Why?
• What do you hope to achieve from interacting with your audience?
• What are you giving your audience that goes beyond just your product/service?
• How often will you measure your progress/success?
• What tools will you need to monitor and measure your progress?
• What data will you need to gather both before and during your program?

Plan Your Resources – Do you have the resources to carry out your social media marketing strategy? This is how you figure it out.

• How much time and money will this take? Do you have it available?
• Will you need to spend on technology, development, tools, human resources?
• Who will the key people be and what will they be doing?
• What technology, IT, software, or infrastructure will you need?
• How about provable results? Is it okay if you don’t see an immediate and direct return on the investment? Is this a short-term or long-term investment?
• Can you keep part of our resources available to respond to evolving needs and unforeseen obstacles?
• If it works, then what, will you scale up the program?
• Do you have enough flexibility in your roles and responsibilities to shift them to respond to what you learn from the interactions with your audience?

Write It Down – Last but not least is writing it all down in a formal plan/strategy document that you can use as your guide for carrying out your strategy. Here are some tips for crafting your document.

• It should include goals, action steps, due dates, and milestones so that you can measure your progress and monitor results.
• Make sure it captures everything from the other steps in this guide.
• Don’t just set it and forget it. Make it a living document that you modify and evolve as you implement your strategy and gain insight into what’s working for you and what isn’t.

Social media marketing can be an essential element of any modern business strategy but it’s important to take the steps discussed here before making an investment. Whether you plan to take care of your social media marketing in-house or hire a specialist or agency to do it for you, spending without planning isn’t likely to give you the results you’re looking for.