Tag Archives: digital marketing

Why Great Customer Service Is One of Your Best Marketing Tools

Infographic comparing new customer acquisition with retaining existing customers

When we think about marketing our businesses, it’s very easy to focus on finding new customers.

We think about social media reach, getting more followers, attracting website visitors, creating lead magnets and getting our products or services in front of people who haven’t bought from us before. And yes, attracting new customers is important.

But there’s another group of people who are often overlooked when we’re planning our marketing: the people who have already chosen to buy from us. Your existing customers already know you. They’ve experienced your product or service. They’ve made the decision to trust you with their money. That means you’re not starting from scratch.

And in a world where customers have endless choice, great customer service can be one of the most powerful ways to turn a one-off customer into a loyal one.

Finding new customers

Of course, you need a steady flow of new customers to keep your business growing.

The first step is to think carefully about who you actually want to attract.

Rather than trying to appeal to everyone, think about your ideal customer.

  • What do they need?
  • What do they value?
  • What problems are they trying to solve?
  • Where do they spend their time online and offline?

The more you understand the people you want to reach, the easier it becomes to create marketing that speaks directly to them.

Where will you find them?

Once you know who you’re looking for, think about where they are. That might be Facebook or Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, local community groups, your email list, Google, events, markets or recommendations from other businesses.

And remember, you don’t necessarily need to be everywhere.

Being visible in the right places is much more useful than trying to be visible everywhere.

Give people a reason to choose you

Your marketing needs to answer a very simple question: “Why should I choose you?”

Perhaps you solve a particular problem. Perhaps your product saves someone time, makes their life easier, gives them a special gift for someone they love or simply brings them joy. Perhaps your service gives them expertise they don’t have themselves.

Don’t just tell people what you sell. Show them how it helps them.

Your blog posts, social media content, emails and website can all demonstrate your knowledge and help potential customers before they ever make a purchase. That builds familiarity and trust – and people are much more likely to buy from a business they feel they know and trust.

Collaboration can help too

You don’t always have to find new customers entirely on your own. Think about other businesses whose customers might also benefit from what you offer.

  • A maker selling beautiful handmade candles might collaborate with a wedding photographer, wedding planner or florist.
  • An artist might collaborate with a framer.
  • A coach might work alongside a complementary service provider.
  • You could recommend each other, create a joint offer, run an online event or simply introduce your audiences to one another.

Good collaborations are about creating value for everyone involved – including the customer.

And that’s an important theme running through all good marketing: relationships.

Don’t forget the customers you already have

Here’s where I think businesses sometimes miss an opportunity. We put so much effort into getting someone to make that first purchase that we forget what happens after the sale. But the customer journey shouldn’t end when someone clicks “buy”. In fact, that’s when another part of the relationship begins.

  • Thank them for their purchase.
  • Make the buying process as straightforward as possible.
  • Communicate clearly.
  • Deliver what you promised.
  • Check that everything arrived safely when appropriate.
  • Make it easy for them to contact you if they have a question.
  • And if something goes wrong, deal with it promptly and honestly.

None of these things are particularly complicated, but they can make a huge difference to how someone feels about buying from you.

Turn a purchase into a relationship

Good customer service isn’t about constantly trying to sell something else to your customers. It’s about showing them that their custom matters. Get to know what your customers actually want. Listen to their questions and feedback. Pay attention to what they buy and what they ask for. Then, when you have something genuinely useful or relevant to them, tell them about it.

That might be a new product, a complementary service, useful advice, a helpful blog post or something they didn’t know you offered.

Let me give you an example…I once employed a general builder to rebuild a wall around my garden after it had been damaged by a storm. While he was doing the work, he mentioned that he was qualified to service gas boilers. When it was time for my boiler to be serviced, I called him.

Why? Because he’d already done a good job for me. He was reliable, friendly, turned up when he said he would and left everything tidy. He’d also made sure I knew what else he could do.

He hadn’t aggressively tried to sell me anything. He had simply done a good job, provided good customer service and made sure I remembered him. That’s the difference.

What about customers who’ve disappeared?

Sometimes customers stop buying from us.That doesn’t necessarily mean they’ve had a bad experience. Their circumstances may have changed. They may have had other priorities. They may simply have forgotten about us. So, if you have customers who haven’t bought from you for a while, why not get back in touch? An email or message reminding them that you’re still there can be enough.

You could share something new you’ve created, introduce a new service, send them a useful piece of content or simply ask how they’re getting on. If appropriate, you could also ask for feedback.

Not every customer will come back, and that’s OK. But you can’t fix a problem you don’t know about.

Customer service is marketing

This is something I have talked about for years, and I still believe it wholeheartedly: Customer service is part of your marketing. Every interaction someone has with your business contributes to their impression of you:

  • Your social media might attract them.
  • Your website might convince them.
  • Your product or service might make the sale.
  • But your customer service can be what makes them stay.
  • And when someone has a genuinely good experience with your business, something wonderful can happen.
  • They come back.
  • They recommend you.
  • They tell their friends.
  • They leave a review.
  • They mention you on social media.

They become someone who is happy to hear from you because they already know the value you provide. You don’t have to create a complicated loyalty programme or constantly offer discounts to achieve that. Sometimes it’s simply about being helpful, reliable, friendly, responsive and doing what you said you would do.

In a world where businesses are constantly trying to attract our attention, being the business that makes customers feel valued can be a very powerful way to stand out. So, this National Customer Service Week, perhaps don’t just ask yourself:

“How can I find more customers?”

Also ask:

“What could I do to make the customers I already have want to come back?”

Because your next great customer might already be one of your existing ones.

If you have any questions about this or would like to have a chat about your business, feel free to contact me.

Content Buckets: More Ways to Plan Your Content

Person reviewing analytics beside text: Which metric is the most IMPORTANT? Reach vs. Impressions – Does it matter? Stop stressing over Vanities! Am I looking at the right numbers? Engagement Rate: A key indicator? Followers are just numbers? How to prove ROI? Which one REAL success? Is CTR important? Save time: Track only vital stats Data overwhelm! Likes are vanities! Traffic to Followers are just numbers? Stop stressing over Vanities! Can I ignore SHARES?

In my previous post, I explained what content buckets are and how they can help you organise your social media and content marketing. The idea is simple – choose the types of content you want to use, then put different topics and ideas underneath each one. This gives you a bank of ideas to work from instead of having to think of something completely new every time you post.

In this post, I’m going to look at some more content buckets and then show you how you can use them to plan your autumn and Christmas marketing.

Conversational content

Conversational content is very similar to engaging content, but it’s more about encouraging two-way communication. Social media is about posting content for your audience, but also listening to them and interacting with them.

You could:

  • Ask questions and respond to the answers
  • Comment on other small businesses’ posts and start conversations
  • Host a live Q&A
  • Ask questions during a live session
  • Follow up on the results of a poll with another post

For example, if you ask your audience which Christmas product they’d like to see you create, don’t let the conversation end with that post – or poll, however you decide to do that. Use the results.

Talk about what people chose, ask another question and perhaps explain what you’re going to do with their suggestions. One piece of content can then lead to several more.

User-generated content

User-generated content is content created by your customers and shared on social media or other channels. It can be incredibly valuable because your customers are helping you promote your business.

It could include:

  • Testimonials
  • Reviews
  • Customer photographs
  • Social media comments
  • Customer posts
  • Customer stories

For example, if a customer sends you a photograph of one of your handmade products in their home, ask if you can share it. You could tell the story behind their purchase or simply use the photograph to show your product being used in real life.

The great thing about user-generated content is that your customer has done the creating for you! Just remember to ask permission before using someone’s content for your own marketing.

Listicles

A listicle is simply content presented in a list format.

You see these all the time and I’m a fan of using these in my content…

  • 5 ways to…
  • 10 tips for…
  • 7 things you need to know…
  • My top 5…
  • 3 mistakes to avoid…

They’re popular because they’re easy to read and give people useful information in a format that’s easy on the eye!

Listicles are really useful for seasonal marketing too.

Think about:

  • 5 Halloween products your customers will love
  • 10 Christmas gift ideas
  • 7 things to do before your Black Friday promotion
  • 5 stocking fillers
  • 3 last-minute Christmas gift ideas

Success stories

Success stories show how your product or service has helped a real customer. A customer story focuses on their experience with you and your business, while a case study tends to look more closely at the situation, the solution and the results.

You could:

  • Create a success stories page on your website
  • Write a blog post about a customer story
  • Create a case study
  • Share testimonials
  • Share customer photographs
  • Use video testimonials

This type of content helps potential customers see what it’s actually like to buy from you or work with you. And it can be particularly effective during a sales period.

Instead of simply saying, ‘Our Christmas gift boxes are now available!’, you could tell the story of a previous customer who bought one as a gift and explain why they chose it.

You’re still selling, but you’re doing it through a story.

Promotional content

Of course, promotional content is important. At the end of the day, your business needs sales. There’s nothing wrong with telling people what you sell, showing your products and letting people know about your offers.

It only becomes a problem when almost all of your posts are promotional or selling. If someone follows you and constantly sees ‘Buy this’, ‘Sale ends today’ and ‘Last chance’, they may eventually stop paying attention.

Your promotional content works much better when it’s surrounded by content that provides value, builds trust and helps people get to know your business.

I’ve always advocated the 80/20 rule – 80% engagement and only 20% selling, but you don’t need to follow a rigid rule like this and I’ve changed my tack a bit over the past year. I’d say that now it’s much more important to think about the following questions…

  • Are you helping people?
  • Are you entertaining them?
  • Are you starting conversations?
  • Are you showing them who you are?
  • Are you demonstrating your expertise?
  • And, of course, are you also giving them opportunities to buy?

Product content

Product content is the text, images, videos and other information that tells your audience about what you sell. Whether you sell a handmade product or a service, your content should help potential customers understand:

  • What is it?
  • Who is it for?
  • What problem does it solve?
  • What are the benefits?
  • Why might someone choose it?
  • How can they buy it?

When creating product content, make sure you:

  • Speak directly to your target audience
  • Focus on the benefits as well as the features
  • Use good-quality photographs or images
  • Show the product being used where possible
  • Give people the information they need before buying
  • Make it easy to find out more or make a purchase

Now let’s make this seasonal

This is where I think content buckets become particularly useful.

We’re heading into one of the busiest marketing periods of the year, with Halloween, Black Friday and Christmas all coming up. It can be tempting to think you need completely different content for each occasion. Actually, you don’t!

Your content buckets can stay the same. You simply change the topic and message to fit the season.

For example, your Halloween content could include:

  • An entertaining Halloween post
  • A behind-the-scenes post showing what you’re making
  • A poll asking your audience to choose their favourite design
  • An educational post relating to your product
  • A customer story
  • A product showcase
  • A fun Halloween question

Then, as you move towards Black Friday, you can start talking more about your offers, products and services while continuing to provide useful and interesting content.

Christmas gives you another opportunity to use those same buckets with new topics — gift guides, customer stories, product demonstrations, behind-the-scenes content, Christmas tips and, of course, your seasonal offers.

The framework stays the same – it’s the topics that change. That’s what makes content buckets so useful.

One idea can become several posts

You also don’t need to create completely different content for every marketing channel. You can easily repurpose different posts for other marketing tactics. For example…

  • A blog post can become several social media posts.
  • A customer story can become a newsletter.
  • A product photograph can become an engaging post.
  • A question from your audience can become a future blog post.
  • A Christmas gift guide could become a blog, several social posts and an email to your subscribers.

You’re taking one useful idea and making it work harder for your business. Your content buckets are your starting point.

If you’re struggling with what to post, try this.

  • Write down 5–10 content buckets that suit your business.
  • Underneath each bucket, write down as many ideas as you can – the topics.

Don’t worry about creating the actual posts yet. You’re simply building your content bank. Then you can start mixing them up across your social media and other marketing.

And when Halloween, Black Friday and Christmas come around, you can look at those same buckets and decide how you can use that type of content to talk about the season you’re working on

That is much easier than starting from a completely blank page. Your content buckets give you the structure. Your seasonal marketing gives you the topics. And that means you can create a marketing strategy that is varied, interesting and, importantly, still gives you plenty of opportunities to sell your products or services.

If you’d like some 1:1 coaching around content marketing for your specific business or would like help with your wider strategic marketing planning, please feel free to email me or message me on social media.

Featured image generated with the help of AI.

The Metrics that matter – and what you can ignore!

Person reviewing analytics beside text: Which metric is the most IMPORTANT? Reach vs. Impressions – Does it matter? Stop stressing over Vanities! Am I looking at the right numbers? Engagement Rate: A key indicator? Followers are just numbers? How to prove ROI? Which one REAL success? Is CTR important? Save time: Track only vital stats Data overwhelm! Likes are vanities! Traffic to Followers are just numbers? Stop stressing over Vanities! Can I ignore SHARES?

One of the biggest problems with Facebook and Instagram insights is that there are so many numbers to look at. When you’re run off your feet, running your small business, there’s just not enough time in the day to look at every single one – and the good news is that you don’t have to!

You don’t have to be a social media data analyst as well as everything else! You simply need to understand enough about the numbers so you can make better marketing decisions.

There is no single most important figure!

There really isn’t – it all depends on what you’re trying to achieve with your social media posts.

  • If you’re trying to grow your audience, follower growth and reach may be useful.
  • If you’re trying to build engagement and community, comments, shares and saves become more important.
  • If you’re trying to drive people to your website, link clicks matter.
  • If you’re trying to generate enquiries, messages and website visits will be more important than likes.

So, the first question to ask yourself is ‘What am I trying to achieve?’ Then you know where to start.

Metric 1 – Reach

Reach is worth looking at as it tells you how many people your content was shown to. But don’t think that just because you have a higher reach, that it’s a better post. That’s not necessarily true. A post can reach thousands of people and generate absolutely no meaningful response.

A different post might reach a much smaller audience, but result in comments, shares, website visits or enquiries.

Reach tells you about visibility – it doesn’t tell you about value. 

Metric 2 – Shares  

For most businesses, shares are one of the most interesting things to keep an eye on, because they mean that someone has thought that your post is worth passing on to their followers.

Why might it be shared? It could be that it’s funny, inspirational, useful, relatable or because they think it might help their followers. Whatever the reason, the point is that it’s been shared – they didn’t just scroll past.

So, if you get shares, look at the post and see why – what made people want to share it? Then you can think of ways to create similar content with the same qualities.  

Metric 3 – Saves

Saves are another useful metric – it again shows that you stopped the scroll long enough for someone to read your post and think it’s worth saving for later. Saves are often the result of educational or inspirational content.

If you get a save on your posts, it’s worth looking at it and finding out why – again, you can then create similar posts in future.

Metric 4 – Comments

Comments – this is my favourite metric! It shows that your content has started a conversation, or someone might be asking a question or sharing their opinion of what you’ve written.

Comments give you useful information about what matters to your audience. Look at the type of comments you get…It’s inevitable, you’ll get the odd ‘love this’, ‘cute’, or just ‘have a good day’. But you’ll also get comments such as ‘I’ve been struggling with exactly this’, or you may get a question asking for more information or giving you an example of their experience.

These comments can help give you more ideas for future content and spark a two-way conversation – or both. Your audience is telling you what they like, dislike or what they could really use help with.

Metric 5 – Link clicks and website visits

If you want to achieve driving more traffic to your website, this is the metric to look at. You might post something that gets 50 likes – you might post something that only gets 10. But if the second post generates 8 website clicks and the first doesn’t generate any, which one is more useful to your business?

This is another reason why likes shouldn’t automatically be your measure of success.

Metric 6 – Profile visits

This tends to be more linked to Instagram – profile visits can tell you that your post has sparked curiosity. Someone saw it and thought that they need to check out your business – so they go to your profile to find out more.

BUT, if lots of people are visiting your profile, but very few are following you or contacting you, look at your profile.

Is it clear? Does it clearly explain who you are, what you do/sell, or what you help people with? Does your personality shine through. Is there a clear reason why someone should want to click on your website to find out more?

Sometimes your insights don’t just tell you what’s working – they also help you find out where you need to improve things.  

Metric 7 – Follower growth

Ok, so I know that I have said before that you don’t need to become obsessed with follower growth – and you don’t, but it does matter.

It matters in that it’s useful if your growing audience are potential customers. But 2,000 random followers aren’t necessarily better than 500, if those 500 genuinely like your business and want what you sell or offer.

Remember too, that net follower growth gives you a more realistic picture that simply looking at how many new followers you’ve gained. Look at this metric more as a trend than a daily score. Are you gradually attracting the right people?

Now – what can you ignore?

OK, maybe not so much ignore, but more you can stop being obsessed about!

Likes – they’re not meaningless as they are a useful indication that someone enjoyed your content. But they don’t tell you everything – and there are people who scroll through Facebook and Instagram and just stick a like by every post.  

Don’t be disappointed if your post doesn’t get lots of likes, it might still generate website visits, profile visits, enquiries or sales – and even shares and saves. You need to look at the bigger picture.

Impressions – This is a number that can be useful, but if you’re already thinking the analytics you already know about are a lot, you could discard this one. Impressions are useful if you’re trying to understand how often content is being shown. It only tracks visibility – let me give you an example. Your post shows it reached 100 people, but impressions say 300. Your reach is the actual number of people who were shown it – impressions are the number of times it was looked at, so could be multiple times from one person. It could be that on one particular day; your post appears in the same person’s feed every time they go into it. This will count as 1 reach, but multiple impressions. So, not really an accurate number.  

Don’t worry about…

  • The fact your engagement rate went from 4.2% to 3.9%. It will fluctuate every day.
  • Don’t worry if your reach dropped slightly from one week to the next.

Your audience behaves differently every day and from week to week. You know that there will be some weeks that you see businesses you follow in your feed – other times, you won’t see any that you know or follow. This all affects your numbers.

  • The algorithm changes
  • People go on holiday
  • School holidays happen
  • The weather changes
  • Life happens

All these things affect the numbers…surprisingly! My advice is to look for patterns, not tiny fluctuations. 

Don’t worry about your follower count from yesterday. You may have gained three followers; you may have lost six. Your follower count isn’t going to tell you much about how your marketing is performing.

This is one statement I always remember from some training I did early on about social media…

You’re building a business, not taking part in a popularity contest.

This is so true! I see businesses posting that they got an award from Facebook for starting conversations or for putting out engaging content. I’m going to share something now – I HAVE NEVER EVER had any of these in the whole 14 years I’ve been in business – NOT ONCE!

It used to really bother me – now it doesn’t – I’m happy for those of you who do, but I’m happy that my content is liked because my audience say so and react! That’s not to take away from those who do get these recognitions – I’m pleased that small businesses get noticed – and Facebook absolutely should do that!  But if, like me, you don’t get those accolades, don’t let it worry you!

Finally, here is a summary of what you should track… 

  • If your goal is visibility – look at Reach
  • If you goal is engagement – look at comments, shares and saves
  • If your goal is website traffic – look at link clicks and website visits and check you have those links in your profile or bio.
  • If you goal is audience growth – look at follower growth and net follower growth.
  • If your goal is enquiries – look at messages, profile visits and website clicks

Finally, if your goal is sales – you need to look beyond the metrics and look at your marketing and how it actually contributes to sales. For sales, marketing is the most important metric of all – your strategy, your content, and how it all fits together.

Remember – your aim isn’t to create one lucky post, it’s to understand your audience well enough to create more of the content they actually want to see – and that’s where your metrics help. 

If your goal is more sales, I can help you look at your marketing strategy and help you build a workable one, along with a content strategy and your customer journey – all in easy to follow, step by step instructions.

Message me if you want to get your marketing on track for more sales.

Marketing Made Simple. 

Bringing your Brand Identity to life

Desk with planner, pencil case with pens, coffee mug, plant, and open laptop

In my previous post, I looked at the basic foundations of your brand identity, and covered who you are, what you stand for, who you want to attract and what you want your business to be known for.

This post goes a bit further and brings it all together. Your customers need to be able to see, hear and experience your brand – and that’s where all those familiar branding elements come into play! 

Your business name

Your name is often one of the first things people encounter, so it’s worth giving it some thought. You might use your own name, particularly if you’re the face of your business or offer a personal service. I did this with my business, as I decided that with a marketing business, people are more likely to remember my name than some fancy marketing name!

There isn’t a right or wrong way to name your business – it’s just important that it feels appropriate for what you do, so your audience can recognise you and the brand you’re building.

Your business name doesn’t have to explain everything you do – you can use it to just create enough curiosity, then your website, online shop, bio and marketing on social media explains what you do in more detail.

Your visual identity

This is the part most people think about when they hear the word branding.

Your visual identity might include:

  • Your logo
  • Brand colours
  • Fonts
  • Photography or imagery
  • Graphic style
  • Patterns or illustrations
  • Packaging
  • Website design
  • Social media graphics

These elements should work together to create a recognisable look. Your branding should reflect your business, not whatever happens to be fashionable on social media this month.

For example, a vintage-inspired business might use completely different colours, fonts and imagery from a bright, contemporary jewellery brand.

Your tagline

I’ve talked about this recently on my social media pages. A good tagline can communicate something important about your business in just a few words.

Mine is Marketing made simple.

It’s short, but it tells you something about what I do and, more importantly, how I want to do it. I don’t want my audience to feel that marketing is complicated, intimidating or overwhelming. My tagline isn’t just a catchy phrase. It reinforces part of my brand positioning.

When you’re thinking about yours, don’t try to cram everything you do into one sentence. Instead ask yourself…What is the one thing I’d love people to remember about my business?

That’s a much better place to start.

Your tone of voice

Your brand also has a voice.

Are you:

  • Friendly and chatty?
  • Calm and reassuring?
  • Quirky and playful?
  • Straight-talking?
  • Inspirational?
  • Knowledgeable and professional?
  • Warm and nurturing?

Your tone of voice should feel natural. For example, there’s no point deciding your brand is fun and quirky if every social media post sounds like a formal business report!

Your voice should be consistent across your website, emails, social media, packaging and customer communications. That doesn’t mean every sentence has to sound identical. It just needs to have the same ‘feel’ about it – in other words, your brand personality!

What is your brand personality?

Here’s where branding gets particularly interesting. Imagine your business was a person. What would they be like? Would they be:

  • The colourful, energetic friend who is always suggesting something fun?
  • The calm, dependable friend everyone turns to for advice?
  • The sophisticated one who always knows what’s stylish?
  • The quirky one who sees things differently?
  • The warm, thoughtful person who makes everyone feel welcome?

These characteristics can help define your brand personality. And this is much more useful than simply choosing a few words or phrases because they sound nice.

Your personality can influence your photography, colours, language, social media content, packaging and even the way you interact with customers.

The very important customer experience!

This is the part that’s sometimes forgotten, but my goodness, it’s probably THE most important thing – in my opinion anyway!

You can have beautiful branding, a gorgeous website and a brilliant social media feed — but if your customer experience doesn’t match, your brand won’t feel authentic.

Think about every point where someone comes into contact with your business. These are called ‘touchpoints.

  • Your social media.
  • Your website.
  • Your packaging.
  • Your emails.
  • Your product descriptions.
  • Your checkout process.
  • Your thank-you message.
  • The way you deal with questions.
  • The way you handle a problem.

All these things contribute to how people experience your brand.

If your branding promises warmth and personal service, but a customer receives a cold, automated response to a problem, there’s a disconnect. Your brand needs to feel the same wherever people encounter it

Consistency – that old chestnut!

Consistency doesn’t mean boring, although I have heard it described that way! Some think that consistency means everything needs to look the same – it doesn’t!

Consistency doesn’t mean using the same template for every social media post or putting your logo on everything you produce. It means creating recognisable patterns, using:

  • The same general visual style.
  • A familiar tone of voice.
  • Similar values.
  • A consistent customer experience.
  • Enough repetition that people begin to recognise you.

That’s when your brand starts doing some of the marketing for you. Someone sees your colours, style or way of writing and immediately knows that it’s you.

Your brand identity checklist

Before you decide that your branding needs a complete makeover, take a look at what you already have.

Ask yourself:

  • Does my visual identity reflect my business?
  • Does my tone of voice sound like me?
  • Does my tagline communicate something meaningful?
  • Does my social media look and sound consistent with my website?
  • Does my customer experience match the promises I make?
  • Can someone recognise my content without seeing my name?

And finally:

  • Does my branding appeal to the people I actually want to attract?

If the answer to some of these is ‘no’ or ‘not really’, don’t panic! It doesn’t mean you need a complete rebrand. You just need to think about a few small changes that make everything fit together, so it’s more recognisable.

Conclusion

Your brand identity isn’t something you create once, upload to Canva and forget about. It’s something you build and reinforce every day. Think about your brand with:

  • Every post.
  • Every email.
  • Every photograph.
  • Every conversation.
  • Every package you send.
  • Every customer interaction.

And eventually, all those little pieces start to become familiar to your audience and start adding up to something much bigger – the way people recognise, remember and feel about your business.

And that’s when your brand starts to become much more than a logo.

If you’re feeling a bit stuck with your brand and need to talk it through to make it clearer in your own head, contact me and we can have a chat about how I can help.

Feature image generated by AI

What is digital marketing and how does it work in 2026?

Home office desk with laptop showing analytics dashboard, smartphone on stand, notebook with notes, coffee mug, and small plant.

A Simple Guide for Small Businesses on a Budget

Running a small business in 2026 means one thing is almost impossible to ignore… digital marketing.

The good news is that you don’t need a massive budget, a marketing agency, or mega technical skills to make digital marketing work for your business.

Most small businesses can grow faster by using simple, low-cost online marketing strategies consistently. So, what are they and how can they work for you?

What Is Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing is the process of promoting your business online.

Instead of using traditional advertising like newspapers, flyers, or billboards, digital marketing helps businesses reach customers through:

  • Search engines like Google
  • Social media platforms
  • Email marketing
  • Websites and blogs
  • Online videos
  • Paid online ads
  • Messaging apps

The goal is simple. Help more people discover your business, trust your brand, and become paying customers!

How Does it work?

Right now, digital marketing is more automated, more personalised, and more focused on helpful content for your audience.

Customers expect businesses to:

  • Be easy to find online
  • Respond quickly
  • Share useful information
  • Have a professional website or social media presence
  • Offer smooth online experiences

If you really struggle with creating posts, writing captions, writing emails etc, AI can help. But for me, the key word here is ‘help’. I wouldn’t advocate using it all the time as it can be really obvious if you’ve used AI to write for you – and you need to still keep your tone of voice and your personality. Whilst AI can kind of replicate that, it’s not quite you, so make sure if you do use AI, you check all facts (it can often be wrong) and ensure it sounds like you.

Types of Digital Marketing

There are five main types of digital marketing. They are:

Social Media Marketing

Social media involves using your content to attract and engage your potential customers. This might be through…

  • Product photos
  • Short videos
  • Tips and tutorials
  • Customer reviews
  • Behind-the-scenes content
  • Special offers

People spend hours every day on social media. Good content helps your business stay visible and build trust. But, don’t spread yourself too thin – you only need to choose one or two platforms, where you know your customers hang out.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO helps your business appear in Google search results.

For example, if someone searches:

  • “best bakery near me”
  • “affordable plumber in London”
  • “dog grooming services”

SEO helps your business show up.

Google looks for websites that are helpful, fast to load, easy to navigate, trustworthy and relevant to their search.

Simple SEO Tips that will help your small business

  • Create a Google Business Profile
  • Use clear page titles
  • Add your location to your website
  • Write helpful blog posts
  • Ask customers for reviews
  • Make your website mobile-friendly

SEO takes time, but it can bring free traffic for years.

Content Marketing

Content marketing means creating useful information that helps potential customers.

This could include:

  • Blog articles
  • Videos
  • Guides
  • FAQs
  • Tutorials
  • Email newsletters

Content is the thing that really matters. Customers don’t want to see you constantly selling to them, they want to be educated about your products or services, see behind the scenes, find out more about you as a person – people trust businesses that have a mix of different type of content instead of constantly selling.

Helpful content builds credibility and improves SEO at the same time.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is still one of the cheapest and most effective digital marketing methods.

You collect customer email addresses and send:

  • Newsletters
  • Promotions
  • Updates
  • Helpful tips
  • Event announcements

Email still works well, because unlike social media, you OWN your email list. I know I’ve said this before and it is so true!

With your own email, algorithms can’t suddenly reduce your visibility and your account can’t suddenly be restricted or shut down. People sign up to your newsletter BECAUSE THEY WANT TO. They want to hear from you and find out more about you, your business and what you can offer.

Many email tools offer free plans for small businesses, such as MailChimp or Mailerlite, until you reach a certain number of subscribers, which really helps.

Paid Advertising

Paid ads can help businesses reach people quickly. You can choose from:

  • Google Ads
  • Facebook Ads
  • Instagram Ads
  • TikTok Ads
  • YouTube Ads

You pay to show your business to targeted audiences, for example, people in your local area, customers interested in your services or people searching for specific products.

If you decide to go this route, start small. You can pay as little as £5 – £10 a day, which can help you test what works for your business.

I personally don’t use ads, as I’ve found I don’t have to, but I know a lot of businesses do use them and it works well for them. Is this something you’ve tried? Let me know in the comments how you found it?

What Has Changed in Digital Marketing

There are a few trends that have changed over the past year. Here are some examples of the newer trends that you might want to look at.

AI is everywhere!

AI is the obvious one – you can’t miss it! You can’t go on any social media platform without seeing AI content. Some of it is so obviously fake, but if you use AI, you want it to still look and feel like you and your business, so you must be careful how you use it.

Most advice floating around about AI is to use it as a helper and NOT a replacement for real human connections. I use it for research, but I always check the facts and ensure that anything it finds for me is written in my own tone of voice. It can be useful for:

  • Researching content
  • Writing content
  • Creating images
  • Answering customer questions
  • Scheduling marketing campaigns
  • Analysing customer data

It’s up to you how you use it but always remember: Customers still value authenticity.

And that’s all I’m going to say!  

Short Videos Perform Best

Short-form video continues to grab attention on social media platforms.

Quick videos on TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts often reach more people than traditional posts.

You don’t need expensive equipment. You can usually get a short video done quickly and efficiently using just a smartphone and good lighting. That could be via a ring light or natural light from a big window, or film outside!

Local marketing still works

Many customers prefer supporting nearby businesses. That might be for many reasons but could include no postage costs, if they can pick your product up in person, or just that they prefer to support local businesses.

For a small business, this means that…

  • Local SEO matters more
  • Customer reviews matter more
  • Google Maps visibility matters more

For small businesses, local digital marketing can often perform better than national campaigns by big businesses.

Digital marketing on a limited budget

Digital marketing doesn’t have to be expensive – in fact, there are many free tools out there that can help you. The key is to keep it simple.

Online presence

The minimum you should have should be…

  • A simple website
  • A Google Business Profile
  • One active social media page

Your website should clearly explain:

  • What you offer
  • Who you help
  • How customers can contact you

Focus on Helpful Content

Have a mix of content to keep your audience’s attention.

Simple content ideas include:

  • Tips
  • Tutorials
  • FAQs
  • Customer reviews/photo/success stories
  • Product demonstrations
  • Short videos – packing or unpacking a product/ talking to camera about your business or introducing yourself.

I always bang on about 80% of content being entertaining, engaging, inspirational and only 20% selling.  

Having a mix of content helps people get to know you and your business and builds rapport and trust.

Reviews

We all know how lovely it is to get reviews and recommendations – it’s happy dance time! Positive online reviews help build credibility quickly, so never be afraid to ask your customers to put a review on your social media page, or on your Google profile. It all helps build that trust and most people will look at a review before they buy, so they’re really important..

Use Free or Low-Cost Tools

There are lots of free tools you can use. Here are just a few:

  • Canva for graphics
  • Mailchimp/Mailerlite for email marketing
  • ChatGPT for brainstorming content ideas
  • And you can use Meta Business Suite on Facebook to schedule your posts for Facebook and Instagram.

Don’t forget your analytics

Regularly check up on how your posts/emails/website is performing by looking at the insights or analytics.

Pay attention to:

  • Website visits
  • Phone calls
  • Messages
  • Sales
  • Email signups
  • Social media engagement

This will help you see what works and what doesn’t. Then you can repurpose popular posts and you get to know exactly what your audience likes.

Common mistakes that we all make

The biggest mistake that most small businesses make is to spread themselves too thin by trying to be on too many platforms or taking on too much all at once. This can quickly lead to overwhelm and burnout. And none of us want that.

Start small!

Here are some other examples of mistakes that small businesses make…

Posting without a plan -Random posting usually produces weak results.  It’s a good idea to know what you want to post – create a simple weekly schedule – maybe have a weekly theme. Consistency matters more than perfection.

Selling too much – This is my age-old advice – 80% helpful content and only 20% selling. Your audience follow you because they like what you do – but they don’t want to constantly see you selling to them. They want to know more about you, your business and how your products or services can help them. If you just sell non-stop, you’ll lose followers and people will scroll by your posts.

Ignoring mobile users – Most customers now browse on smartphones. Make sure that your website and content, such as blogs and emails work well on mobile devices. Most hosting platforms will have a button you can press to check this before you publish.

Conclusion

Digital marketing doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive. A simple strategy would be to…

  1. Build a simple website
  2. Set up your Google Business Profile
  3. Choose one social media platform
  4. Post helpful content at least three times per week, every day if you can
  5. Collect customer reviews
  6. Build an email list
  7. Track results monthly

If you have a budget, you could think about small ads to test if they work.

For small businesses, success often comes from doing the basics consistently:

  • Showing up online
  • Creating useful content
  • Building trust
  • Staying visible
  • Connecting with customers

The businesses that win are not always the ones with the biggest budgets.

They are usually the ones that stay consistent, helpful, and easy to find online. Start small, learn as you go and you’ll get there.

If you want help with any aspects of your digital marketing, drop me a message or email and we can have an informal chat. I offer a free 30-minute consultation.

The pros and cons of neuromarketing

In my last blog, I talked about neuromarketing, what it is and how it works. So, we know that neuromarketing helps brands to improve customer engagement and enables businesses to personalise experiences and to predict how successful certain marketing campaigns will be. But there are also risks and limitations attached to neuromarketing – obviously, its high cost, but also interpreting the data can be very complicated and there are certain ethical concerns. So, this blog looks at the pros and cons of neuromarketing.  

Everyone tends to focus on the pros, but I wanted to look at both sides of the coin.

The pros of neuromarketing

There are several gaps in traditional marketing and neuromarketing tools can help to cover those, giving a better understanding of consumer behaviour, as well as great insights into why consumers decide to buy one product over another.

Observational research

Neuromarketing data doesn’t just come from information that customers provide via surveys etc, it also provides information from observation, such as facial expressions, eye movements, shifts of the mouse etc. Most of this data comes from the subconscious reactions of the people taking part in the research. Some argue that neuromarketing tells you more about consumers’ true desires and attitudes as opposed to controlled answers to questionnaires.

Emotional measurement

Neuromarketing measures physiological reactions, often related to emotional responses. This gives valuable data about consumer reactions to particular parts of an advertisement or video – and which part provokes a positive reaction or a negative reaction. Then advertising can be tweaked accordingly.

Reliable results

As neuromarketing research reaches the unconscious part of a consumer’s mind, the data provides a better understanding of the process behind automatic reactions. This helps researchers determine more reliable results as their analysis looks more comprehensively at consumers’ decision-making patterns.

Let me explain this a bit simpler – we can all lie consciously, but our brains can’t because we can’t control our subconscious minds. As neuromarketing accesses the unconscious mind, the data is more reliable as they are based on true reactions to products or websites/packaging for example. This information can then be used to improve things to give a better customer experience.  

Conclusion

The advantages of neuromarketing gives:

  • An enhanced understanding of consumers – how people think and feel during decision-making.
  • More customer engagement – More emotionally relevant content creates stronger connections.
  • Better personalisation of products – the insights that neuromarketing gives, help marketers tailor products, services, and content to individual preferences.
  • Helps predict successful marketing campaigns – knowing what makes consumers react positively means that marketers can use that data to ensure that their marketing campaigns perform better.
  • Reduces speculative marketing – more relevant marketing cuts through the general marketing noise so it reaches the right people more quickly.    

The cons of neuromarketing

Concerns about ethics

I think this is the one that bothers me the most. It’s about the ethical question – is neuromarketing getting inside the brain of customers…and is that a good thing?

Some would argue that neuromarketing does things that a good psychologist does – it simply ‘learns’ the behaviour patterns of consumers and the data gives smart outcomes.

Specific skills are needed

Now, no matter how much high-quality data and knowledge you can gain from neuromarketing tools, it’s necessary for someone with a scientific background to help the machines and tools to understand the data.

Technology can be taught to interpret the brainwaves and graphs, but someone still needs to make sense of the statistics and what they mean to specific market research.

Expensive equipment

Neuromarketing equipment used to be expensive, but as technology is developed, it has become more attainable to smaller companies – not quite the tens of thousands it used to cost. However, it’s still a lot of money to have to spend. This must be a consideration.  

Privacy and GDPR

Privacy policies and the General Data Protection Regulations must be considered. Businesses, no matter how big or small have responsibilities around customer data and the more technology you rely on, the higher the risk for leakage of data.

Technology must be robust enough for customers to be able to trust that their personal data is protected, but ultimately, there will be people out there who will attempt to get inside the data (and brains of customers) which interferes with their right to privacy. I know this sounds a little far-fetched, but it’s got to be a consideration.

Conclusion

The disadvantages of neuromarketing does come with its own limitations and strategic risks.

  • The cost – specialised neuromarketing tools and experts make it expensive to run.
  • Ethical concerns – Using brain data brings up issues around privacy and customer manipulation.
  • Complicated analysis – whilst machines can be programmed to look at data, interpreting brain signals still needs advanced knowledge and tools.
  • Not always relevant – results from lab settings don’t always apply to all everyday situations.

So, although neuromarketing is going to become increasingly commonplace, there are still quite a few issues to be ironed out, and it won’t be easily available for all businesses. It can be a very powerful took, but it comes with challenges related to cost, ethics, and interpretation of data.

What do you think?

Neuromarketing and how it works!

Neuromarketing is about using neuroscience to help understand consumer behaviour by studying brain activity, physiological responses and subconscious decision making.

Have you ever wondered what makes you choose one brand over another – even when they seem to be identical? Or why one particular ad you see on TV, on social media, or hear on the radio sticks in your mind for days? The answer to this is about your subconscious thought and subconscious reactions of your brain.

Neuromarketing is a fascinating subject, which attempts to understand how consumers respond to advertising and products. It’s not just about asking people what they think, it about looking directly at brain activity and physiological responses to see what really attracts attention and triggers an emotional connection.

IT’S NOT ABOUT – mind control or finding a magical ‘buy now’ button in your brain. It’s not about manipulating people, but about gaining a clearer understanding about what they really want or need. By scientifically measuring non-conscious responses, brands can build better products, create clearer messaging and design more enjoyable customer experiences.

How does neuromarketing work?

In order to find out how the brain and body reacts when a person is exposed to marketing materials, several studies have been done. The most common method involves volunteer test subjects – and uses electroencephalography (EEG) to measure electrical activity in the brain, which helps identify moments of excitement, focus or even frustration.

Observing facial expressions for emotional responses and biometrics to measure changes in the heart rate or skin response are also tools that are used. Software then helps to analyse the data so that researchers can pinpoint exactly which elements of an ad or product are most impactful.

Traditional market research includes things like focus groups and surveys – these are of course, valuable, BUT they rely on the participants accurately giving their own feelings or intentions. Our decisions are often made based on pre-conceived ideas about certain products – or influenced by friends, family or subconscious emotions or biases.

Neuromarketing captures the reactions that people can’t or don’t consciously articulate. A survey can tell you that a customer LIKED your ad, but neuromarketing can show WHICH SPECIFIC PART of an ad sparked the most emotional engagement. So, gives a deeper understanding.

The ethics

Neuromarketing certainly has many benefits, but the ethics shouldn’t be overlooked. Although there is nothing that currently offers comprehensive neuromarketing regulations, there are ethical guidelines for those that conduct this research.

  • Participants must give their informed consent – which means they must fully understand the purpose of any study they take part in, including the risks and benefits.
  • Privacy and data security is key – participants personal data etc must be completely secure to protect the privacy of participants and compliance with date protection regulations such as the relevant GDPR regulation and other associated laws and regulations according to the country conducting the research.
  • Disclosure and transparency – I find this a bit worrying – while is it not mandatory to disclose specific neuromarketing techniques, such as eye-tracking on a website (I wasn’t aware this was a thing!) the principle of transparency is an ethical one. Brands must consider disclosing to consumers their data collection and research methods, to ensure transparency regarding the purpose and impact of the research. Then consumers can make an informed decision about participation. This means it is important to READ PRIVACY POLICIES on websites, if you suspect that neuromarketing techniques may be used.

This thought suddenly struck me – a lot of our personal devices – phones and tablets – ask for eye recognition. Does that mean that when you look at ads on that device, your responses could be recorded for research purposes? Or am I being paranoid?

Maybe I’m overthinking here! This is the extreme end of neuromarketing, and small businesses obviously would not be able to either afford or manage this kind of research.

So, how can you harness the power of neuromarketing without having a state-of-the-art research techniques and equipment?

Neuromarketing for small businesses

Neuromarketing has thrown up six basic human needs that can help with strategies for businesses.

Certainty – Consumers want to know that they can trust a brand or business. Customers like the assurance of knowing that a particular business delivers on its promises, has transparent messaging and are consistent on caring for its customers.

Variety – They say that variety is the spice of life and consumers like a bit of variety or something unpredictable. Consumers these days go from Facebook to Instagram to TikTok and engage with social media and SMS texting. Using different platforms as a small business gives your customers that variety- you can offer limited time promotions, discounts or deals when they least expect it. It might be you do this on stories only – or on Instagram only. These unexpected things excite and captivate your audience and keep them wanting more.

Significance – I’ve said this loads of times, but your customers – in fact not just customers, all of us, want to feel valued. Several small businesses have specific groups on social media to help make customers feel special, and they help by giving exclusive ‘sneak a peeks’ or offers. You can also make customers feel special by personalising brand stories and rewarding loyal customers with exclusive benefits. It’s this making them feel valued and special that can make your brand stand out in the crowd and lift your brand from good to unforgettable.

Connection – I know – I bang on about this a lot too – but connecting with your audience in a genuine way is what helps a business to thrive and grow. It’s about being transparent, authentic, and sowing that you genuinely care about them Engage with your followers through social media, responding to comments and messages and listen to any suggestions and opinions – or even ask for suggestions and opinions as this also helps them feel valued.   

Growth -Show how your products or services help your customers. You can provide educational content to help customers expand their knowledge and skills or give suggestions for how your products can be used in their homes.

Contribution – This is about how your business is conscious of its footprint in the world and that it matters to you. It might be about your eco-friendly initiatives or how you get involved in a community or charity initiative. Consumers are more likely to support businesses that align with their personal values and what matters to them.   

Conclusion

In my opinion, these are the gentler, more people-friendly ways for small businesses to use neuromarketing. It’s not about manipulating your customers, it’s more about understanding consumer behaviour and what makes people tick. This is a basic marketing strategy, but using some of the research results from more in-depth neuromarketing research can help us understand what and why consumers want to buy. Connecting with customers on an emotional level is key to building lasting brand loyalty and knowing what resonates with them helps them come back for more and give you repeat business

Contact me if you need help with your marketing.

Contact me

Into the hashtag void – the shift to social SEO

I’ve been seeing this title ‘Hashtags are dead’ for a while now. It’s not strictly true. Adam Mosseri, Head of Instagram, has said that hashtags no longer have an impact on your reach. But they do still help to categorise your posts so you can use them to find like minded businesses, peers or competitors (e.g. #marketing coach in my case). But, they no longer push your posts to increase your reach and no longer drive social growth like they used to. They don’t boost discovery…they now function more like a label. They help platforms and algorithms categorise your content and give it context, making it more discoverable in search results. 

It’s now more about prioritising SEO (search engine optimization.) I know…this makes many people immediately switch off, but bear with me and I’ll try and make this much easier to understand. 

Why bother to use hashtags in 2026

Categorise your content

Hashtags still help platforms categorise your posts and tell the algorithm what your content says….e.g. This post is about marketing tips for small businesses, or This post is giving Easter gift ideas. 

SEO – hashtags as keywords

Hashtags are now acting more like searchable keywords, so this is worth thinking about. Focus on what your audience is searching for. For example, someone might be looking for a special gift for a relative who likes gardening. So, they type in ‘gift ideas for gardeners’ 

Your post appears because you used #giftsforgardeners and #gardeninggifts. 

Your hashtag strategy needs to focus on what your audience is searching for! It’s also worth including a couple of hashtags within your actual caption, as well as a couple at the bottom. 

Target your audience

As per my previous point, you want your hashtags to reach your target audience. You want to reach those that are interested in and care about your products or services. 

If you’re not sure what your audience search for, ask them! Publish a post asking what people would search for if looking for your type of product or service. You can then type this into a search engine, such as Google, and you will get loads more suggestions that people also search for. 

You can also ask AI, by typing in ‘I am a (what you do), I help (target audience), with (their problems or pain points). What SEO keywords should I use on Instagram? You can ask the same question for other platforms such as Facebook, TikTok etc. 

Then it’s about finding which ones work best for you. 

Longevity 

If you use the right hashtags that are relevant to your content and your audience, your posts stay searchable for longer. A well optimised post can appear in searches for weeks or even months, giving your content long lasting results. 

Hashtags by platform

Instagram

Instagram likes to see hashtags for engagement.

  • Use up to five, including location (if a local business), your business, industry specific and content specific.
  • Put a couple in your caption as part of the wording.

Instagram wants more than hashtags. It wants strong hooks, saves, shares and consistent posting. If your content is weak, hashtags won’t help at all. 

Facebook 

Facebook doesn’t advise more than five hashtags, but the very latest I’ve seen is a maximum of three! I’ve just found this information whilst researching this article! 

  • Use a maximum of three hashtags
  • Use content related hashtags, location tag (if a local business), your own brand hashtags, or industry hashtag.
  • Mix and match the hashtags dependent on your content. 
  • Include in caption and/or at the bottom of post.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn hashtags are mainly for topic classification. 

  • Use two to three hashtags
  • Use one broad topic and one of two more niche or relevant hashtags 
  • Put hashtags at the end of the post

B2B brand hashtags help align your content with conversations already happening on the platform. Reach is driven by relevance and engagement, not hashtag volume.

TikTok

TikTok’s algorithm is largely based on behaviour. It prioritises watch behaviour, such as how long someone watches a video, if it’s watched to the end or just a second or two. Hashtags help confirm what the video is about, but it’s the video itself that is more important.n

  • Use two to four hashtags
  • Avoid chasing trends unless it aligns with your brand
  • Mix up content topics 

X (formerly Twitter)

It’s more about readability. Too many hashtags reduce engagement. 

  • Only use one or two hashtags
  • Keep them relevant and intentional or don’t bother! 

YouTube

Hashtags should be minimal. Titles, thumbnails and watch time have far more impact on reach than hashtags.

  • Use one to three hashtags.
  • Add them in the description, not the title or at the end.

In conclusion, hashtags haven’t disappeared and aren’t dead, but they aren’t working in the way many of us expect them to.

The old mindset of packing in as many as you can is no longer relevant. In 2026, they play a much quieter role. They help the algorithm recognise your brand helping it get discovered and categorises your content. But they no longer drive growth or expand your reach. It’s more about using hashtags strategically for SEO and keywords. 

Let me know your thoughts in the comments and if you need help with your SEO or hashtag strategy, contact me for a free initial consultation. 

What is social media marketing and how does it work?

In this ‘back to basics’ article, I’m looking at social media marketing and how it can work for small businesses.

In a nutshell, social media marketing (SMM) is the use of social media platforms to:

  • build social networks and share information.
  • build your brand.
  • increase your sales.
  • drive website traffic.

It also gives small businesses a way to engage with existing customers and attract new ones.

Social media platforms all have their own data analytic tools that allow you, the business owner, or your marketer, to track the success of your postings and help you identify new ways to engage. As of April 2025, there were 5.31 billion social media identities across the world (DataReportal and Kepios), so SMM has the potential to have incredible reach.  

To ensure your content appeals to your audience, it’s important to post a variety of different posts, including text and image updates, carousels, videos and sharing other content, such as blog posts.

How can I make my SMM work?

To ensure your SMM efforts work and do what they’re supposed to do, it’s important to have the three core processes in place:

Strategy

I know – I hear groans! But the first crucial step to ensure your SMM words is to have a strategy. This is just about defining some goals that you want to achieve with your social media, ensuring you’re on the right platforms for your audience and determining the type of content that will resonate with your target audience. And of course, you need to know who your target audience is.

Your goals might be as simple as driving website traffic or increasing your brand awareness. But knowing these goals means you have something to focus on and aim for.

I’ve written a whole blog post on strategy, so pop over if you want more in-depth information. In the meantime, here’s a brief overview of what your strategy needs to include:

  • Clear goals linked to your business objectives or goals.
  • Know your target audience.
  • Conduct analysis on your competitors – look at their successes and failures.
  • Look at your own successes and failures – where can you improve or do better than your competitors.
  • Create a calendar so you know what you’re going to post and when.
  • Create fabulous, engaging content!
  • Track the performance of your posts and change things as you need to

Content creation and engagement

I’ve talked about this a lot on my social media pages, but creating engaging content is the key to your SMM. Content should be relevant to your business, and to the platform you’re posting on…and of course, to your audience.

Content can include blog posts, infographics, videos, images, and a host of other types of content.

I always recommend the 80/20 rule – 80% of content to be engaging, entertaining, educating, or inspiring. Only the remaining 20% should be focused on sales.

WHY?

I hear you!

If you only concentrate on what you’re selling, people will get bored as they know every time they land on your page, they’re going to be ‘sold to.’ And they won’t find this engaging. If you can find ways to be engaging with selling your products or services, it could work, but you need to be able to make your audience feel valued and that you are pleased they’re on your page, so engagement on sales posts is crucial.

Examples of posts for each category

Engaging – the best way to engage your audience is to have them join in. This might be a post that asks a question or an opinion; or simply a post that encourages people to chat about what you’ve posted.

Entertaining – This could be anything from sharing a funny story or joke to sharing an article you’ve seen and asking what they think. Storytelling comes into this part of your content, so introducing yourself or sharing how you got started, why your business has its name, or talk about a hobby you have. It’s anything that will keep your audience on your page for longer than the quick scroll.

Educating – this is an obvious one, but often one that is overlooked. As a small business owner, you have a wealth of knowledge in your area of expertise. So, share some of it, by creating an online tutorial, a checklist, or a step-by-step guide on something you do. You don’t want to give too much away, but just enough to pique their interest and keep them on your page to read more. A lot of my posts (as a service provider) fall under this category.

Under education would also come posts about your products from a ‘benefits’ point of view. You might have described the features of your product, (what it is, what it looks like and what it’s made from) but focus on the benefits – what does it do for your customer and you can make it sound like they don’t know how they lived without it for so long! Just be careful to be truthful and not rely on AI for your descriptions as they can be hilariously OTT!

Inspiring – Inspiring content covers quite a big area – it might be that you inspire people through motivational posts, wellbeing posts or posts about how to feel better/look better. Quotes are often inspirational so they would come under this category, and storytelling, especially if you have an inspirational story to tell, such as how you overcome all the odds to do XXXXX..

Planning and scheduling

This is very simple – ensure you plan your content, so you know what you’re going to post at least a week ahead. This helps you save time and effort, and you don’t have to react or think of something to post on the spot. Planning also means you can divide your posts into themes – it might be that one week you do a ‘Christmas in July’ week, or a week dedicated to a particular collection you create and the next week, have a different theme.

Once you have your plan and have created a week’s worth of posts/stories, then use a scheduling tool to schedule them to go out. I just use Meta, which I find works well, but there are other host sites out there who will do this too. Once your content is scheduled, you can get on with other tasks in your business.

Engaging with your audience

We all talk about this all the time. When you post content you will get responses, and these must be replied to in a timely manner. This can often trigger conversations that you sometimes take offline, and it may lead to a sale or consultation.

Schedule time to engage with your audience as this is where you can show your personality and have a good old chat. I try to engage this way in the morning for an hour – whenever I can find some time at lunchtime and then again for a couple of hours in the evening.

It’s not just about replying to comments on your content either, you also need to visit other peoples’ accounts and comment on their posts. The only thing I would say is to PLEASE do it in a genuine way – there are too many people just copying and pasting ‘Have a great day’ or ‘Happy Monday’ (or whatever day it is. These comments will not help the algorithm as these short, sharp sentences are noticed, so they may actually be more harmful to your page. I try and reply with a question in the hope I can get that person to engage, but it doesn’t always work.

So, visit and leave genuine comments – read the post properly and answer any questions.

You also need to make time to find new people to follow – this can be very time consuming as you don’t want to just follow anyone – they must be someone you’re genuinely interested in, or who you think may be your target market. 

Paid ads

I’ll admit, I don’t do this. I am lucky in that I find I don’t have to advertise as my business ticks along nicely for what I want it for.

But some businesses do find that paid ads work well for them. Paid ads can amplify your reach an engagement. You can target specific demographics, such as age, location, interests, and behaviours. And it can contribute to driving traffic to your website, boost your engagement and increase your sales. But you need to have a really good strategy and patience to get it exactly right…unless you want to pay a marketer to do it for you, then you’ll have an expert on board. Obviously, this option needs to have a marketing budget, and you’d need to have enough for more than just a one-off ad.

Measurement

The last point in this article about the basics of SMM, is measurement. This is something that so many small businesses don’t think about – or don’t know about.

If you use FB or IG, you can see your insights. This gives you details of your reach, how many people have engaged with a post, who is commenting and how many new followers you have. I wouldn’t get too hung up on the number of followers, but it’s important to look at your engagement. Which posts are the most popular? Have a look at those posts and the comments to find out why – then you can replicate this and get your engagement up with more popular posts.  Similarly, what’s NOT working? Again, see if you can find out why. Then you can either bin that type of post or change it slightly and try again with a different tactic.

Conclusion

Even if you’ve had your business for a while, sometimes a trip to the basics can point out something that you need to do but have simply overlooked due to more pressing issues!

I hope this has helped and if you have any questions or would like help with your social media marketing, just contact me.  

Navigating the pressure of social media – the need for constant engagement

In today’s digital world, social media has become a crucial tool for small businesses as we all strive to reach a wider audience and build our brands. Although social media gives us several benefits, the pressure to maintain that all important presence can be overwhelming. As a small business, you’ll find yourself wearing many different hats and juggling loads of different roles and the pressures of keeping your business in the spotlight on social media is so demanding, it can exacerbate the overwhelm.

Are you feeling the pressure of social media?

Does it make you feel anxious – and then when you do post or show up in a ‘live,’ do you compare yourself to others and think you could do better?

Unsurprisingly – IT IS NORMAL TO FEEL LIKE THIS! We all do!

So, how can you navigate the pressure of social media and help relieve those feelings? Hopefully, this article will help…

The Need for Constant Engagement

One of the main pressures faced is the expectation to constantly engage with your audience. This is very time consuming and at the same time, you’re trying to balance the demands of running a small business with the need to maintain this active, engaging social media presence. At the same time, you’re aware you need to comment on other posts, reply to your comments, post content that will attract attention etc. etc. and it all becomes a bit too much and can lead to unnecessary stress. So, how can you manage this while keeping a healthy balance?

The potential impact of social media

Before looking at some simple strategies to help, it’s important to understand the impact social media can have, so if you have any of these symptoms, you can recognise them.

Psychological – Studies have shown that excessive use of social media can cause feelings of anxiety, depression, and loneliness. Constantly comparing yourself to others can affect your self-esteem.

Distraction from real life – social media can become a way to escape from reality rather than engage with it – distracting you from real life responsibilities, relationships, and experiences.

Time consuming – It’s so easy to get lost in social media and hours can pass without you realising it, which can affect other parts of your life.

Strategies to help you manage your social media

Let’s have a look at what you can do to alleviate some of that overwhelm and get things into perspective.

Set boundaries

Set yourself some clear boundaries for using social media. Decide specific times of day when you will check your accounts and stick within those limits. This helps prevent mindless scrolling and helps make sure you stick to your other important tasks – business or personal.

Use technology wisely

Your devices are going to constantly ‘ping’ to let you know you’ve had a new notification – these are so difficult to ignore – after all it might be important! It never is! So, when your social media allotted time is over, switch your devices to silent or even switch them off (you may need to keep your phone on for personal reasons, but other devices can be turned off.

You can use a ‘do not disturb’ mode during work hours or personal time.  

Set Realistic Goals

Some small businesses are so hung up on their results. How many followers, reach and wanting immediate results. But the reality is, not every post will go viral (if any) and not every campaign will give you immediate results.

Define what success looks like for you and your business (ignore all other businesses – they’re not yours!). It might be that success means increasing brand awareness, driving traffic to your website, or boosting sales. Setting realistic, measurable goals and expectations, will help you focus your efforts. It’ll also help to assess your progress with very little stress.

Plan and Schedule Content

Creating and posting content can be time-consuming – and extremely stressful if you just go with the flow and do it when you feel like it, with no plan.

To alleviate the stress around creating and posting content, it’s a good idea to develop a content calendar that shows what you will post and when. This sounds complicated, but it’s not. I’ll share how I do mine. I usually plan and create my content for the whole of the following month.

See the box below – I simply write down the month and all the dates straight down the page, with the day of the week next to them. Then I fill in the days I know what content to create – like my Wordy Wednesday and Tuesday Blog – then look at what posts I can do to link information from my blog, or something from the special days of the month list I produce and post. I also think about personal posts, for example introduction to myself and business, a post about one of my digital products, a general marketing post about something I’ve seen, learnt about or in response to a question I’ve seen in my comments or online.

30 JuneMondayWorld social media day – taken from special days list
1 JulyTuesdayBlog post – insert title
2 JulyWednesdayWordy Wednesday – insert word
3 JulyThursdayPost linked to blog
4 JulyFridayGeneral marketing post/personal/ promotion of digital products/introducing next week’s theme
5 JulySaturdaySaturday shoutout – insert business
6 JulySundaySilly Sunday – joke

This gives me my content plan for the month. I then create my posts one week in advance and schedule them as this saves so much time and effort. I do sometimes go in and tweak posts by adding something I’m going to be doing or something that’s happened to keep it more personal.

I just use Meta to schedule my posts, but you can use other tools such as Later, Buffer or Hootsuite (to name a few) to automate your posts.

This helps avoid the overwhelm of having to react or think of posts on the spur of the moment.  

Make real life interactions a priority!

Spend quality time with your family and friends and take part in community events, or hobbies. Real life interactions with other people are way better than online ones and provide you with meaningful engagement that social media can’t replicate.

Practice mindfulness   

This is just about looking before you leap! Before logging into your social media accounts, ask yourself why you’re doing it and what you hope you achieve. I don’t mean when you’re posting or doing your intentional engagement at your allotted time, but when you just mindlessly go on because you’re bored – being intentional can prevent it from becoming a mindless habit.  

Keep an eye on your feed

Unfollow or mute accounts that don’t add value to your life or those that make you feel negative. Follow accounts that bring joy to your life, or accounts that inspire, educate, or entertain you.

Track your insights or analytics

Keep an eye on the performance of your posts etc. by regularly checking your analytics or insights. I don’t mean every day – I look on average once a week, sometimes less. This gives you exactly what it says on the tin – insights into what your audience likes and their behaviours. You can see what works and what doesn’t and clearly see which posts/stories resonate with your audience. Knowing that you’re on the right track helps alleviate that overwhelm and pressure.  

Look after yourself!

This seems obvious but oh so easy to overlook!

  • By setting boundaries and taking regular breaks throughout the day when you need to will help.
  • Step outside and get some fresh air and make sure you stay hydrated and eat properly. This is so easy to forget when you get absorbed in social media.
  • If you have a marketing budget or can afford it, think about hiring a social media manager to create posts and schedule them for you, or to help with some of the tasks you hate to do. This helps alleviate pressure.

Taking care of yourself is just as important as taking care of your business.

Sometimes, the only way to manage your use of social media and the negative impact it’s having on you, is to step away from it for a while. I’ve seen loads of people do this – even if it’s only for a couple of days or a week or two. Stepping back allows you to breathe, rest and re-evaluate your relationship with social media and how it’s affecting your life.

Conclusion

While social media gives great opportunities for small businesses, it also introduces a host of pressures that can be challenging to manage.

Recognising these pressures and developing strategies to tackle them can help you and your business thrive in a healthier and happier environment.

What are your thoughts on this?

If you need any help with your social media, contact me and we can have a no-obligation chat.