Which Social Media Platform Should You Prioritize?
Especially today as people rely so much on digital media, social media is a reliable and dynamic business tool. If you're not taking advantage of the opportunities, it’s easy to fall behind. Single channels often play a huge role in product or service campaigns, boost lead generation, improve brand awareness, build trust, and offer alternative customer service routes.
To reach these objectives, an actionable social media strategy is a must to decipher which platforms work best for your business. With so many options to choose from, it can be difficult to know where your reach is most effective for your industry and business. You have:
Facebook
Youtube
Instagram
Twitter
Linkedin
These are the top five platforms, all with their own unique benefits and capabilities. Let's go over what sets each platform apart so that you have a better understanding of why your business might benefit from them.
It's no secret that Facebook is a behemoth in the social media ecosystem. With well over two billion users, Facebook’s reach is far beyond any other social media platform, and with and a robust ad platform it allows your business to capture the attention and buying potential of customers around the globe. In order to gain access to all of the benefits that Facebook has to offer for your business, you need more than just a page.
It’s best practice today for brands to create Business Manager account, house their pages within it, invite partners like agencies and create an ad account that gives you the ability to create campaigns, advertise, view analytics, etc.
Youtube
Youtube is now the world's second-largest search engine, next to Google. There's no better place to post a wide variety of video content, as Youtube gives you both incredible functions and searchability as well. Video content has become increasingly popular as more and more businesses realize just how well this medium converts.
There's no shortage of what you can accomplish through Youtube, and business owners can utilize this search engine/social media platform to post:
Informational + educational content (listicles, how-tos)
Product or service videos (demos)
Behind the scenes
Testimonials
Interviews
Advertisements
Entertaining Videos
Animations
And more
There's really no limit to what you can accomplish through well-crafted video content. Hot tip: Facebook considers YouTube its competitor, so posting YouTube links on Facebook won’t get you very far due to its prohibitive algorithm!
Instagram is the premium platform for sharing captivating visuals, whether through photos, videos, or graphics. Business profiles can take advantage of awesome advertising tools and capabilities, along with easy-to-digest analytics that makes tracking progress a breeze. It’s the fastest growing social media platform and recent stats show that 1 in 3 people have bought something just from seeing an ad on Instagram and that number is only increasing.
A news sharing platform, a microblogging tool,, a conversation incubator — Twitter can be a great piece of your business's social media puzzle. Get a handle on what's going on in your industry or what people are saying about your brand through Twitter via its second-by-second picture of trending topics and important conversations. The real impact comes from joining in and offering value to these conversations.
One of the most-used and critical aspects of Twitter is customer service interactions and requests. This is the platform where customers will raise concerns with a product or service, or even request help from a brand regarding their experiences. Of all the social media platforms, Twitter requires the most responsiveness — and utilizing the conversational nature of the channel to help out customers is a prime function.
As a business owner, you’re likely fairly familiar with Linkedin and all that it has to offer. It's the go-to social media experience that companies have used to make important hiring decisions. The landscape has shifted over the years, and Linkedin now has much more to offer businesses as a social platform. With more and more individuals and businesses using this platform to post important news, information, or stories about their business lives — it's become a much more "lived-in" space.
You can use Linkedin to offer incredible value through more targeted advertising campaigns, network with others in your industry, share content, and build thought leadership within your space. B2B brands will especially have success here.
Honorable Mentions
Two honorable mentions are Snapchat and Pinterest. The reason why we're not giving these "top spot" attention is because they've increasingly become niche social media platforms for businesses.
Snapchat serves an audience on the younger side, with a demographic that targets ages 12-24. It's a way to share quick videos that only last 24 hours — and it lost a little steam when Instagram introduced "stories," which is essentially the exact same function.
Pinterest gives your "posts" a little more lifespan (averaging around three months per pin) and can be a great way to build SEO through referral traffic. The demographics also skew heavily towards women 35+ — so if this matches your buyer personas, it can be a great fit!
Which Platform Makes Sense for Your Business?
Now that we've covered some of the basics regarding each of the most popular social media platforms, it's time to determine which is a good fit for you. Let's go through some questions you can ask that will help point your business in the right direction and better inform your overall content strategy.
Where Are Your Competitors?
Sometimes the best place to start is by seeing where others like you are occupying. While it's definitely important to gauge where your audience spends their time, it's also crucial to know where your competitors are. At the very least, this sets the bar for not only the where but also the what.
You can gain insight into where others like you are posting and what type of content they create. You'll also be able to see how frequently they're posting and a snapshot of the impact they're making.
What Type of Content Makes Sense?
Every business can use a myriad of content on their social channels — so it's not necessarily a question of limiting yourself so much as it's a question of what makes sense for your audience and a specific platform.
Suppose you're looking to take advantage of written content such as white papers, news updates, or thought leadership. In that case, you'll want to utilize a platform that has optimal readership and sharability within that type of medium, like Linkedin. Facebook is also an option if the editorial content is less technical or industry-specific.
If you're looking to get the most out of video content, options abound depending on your objectives. If you plan on creating a lot of videos, YouTube is your best option as it gives you the ability to gain subscribers and searchability within its platform. However, every platform allows for video sharing capability, so determining which is the best fit for your content really comes down to audience selection.
So, what about images or graphics? Well, look no further than the premier visual social platform: Instagram. Here you can tell your brand's story, highlight team members, share awesome visuals or show off products or services through well-crafted imagery.
What Are Your Limitations?
So if you want to get the furthest reach out of social media — you'll want to be on as many channels as possible. However, that doesn't mean you're going to be able to. Managing a robust social media calendar is by no means a simple or hands-off process; in fact — it's quite the opposite.
We'd recommend starting small, with one or two channels that make sense for your business. If you feel like you have some wiggle room, you can start adding new platforms that fit your goals over time. The biggest issue we see is that businesses open up shop by hopping on every single social media platform without consistently posting or engaging with their audience. This leaves gaps that are difficult to fill.
These are great for scheduling and getting snapshots of crucial analytics regarding the post's performance and engagement (Sprout Social is our preferred platform). They also allow you to cross-pollinate posts, which means posting the same type of content on more than one platform. We'd recommend doing this is if you’re a smaller operation looking to take advantage of multiple platforms without creating countless pieces of the content week by week. However, these cross-posting should make sense. We wouldn't recommend posting the same type of content on your Linkedin as you would on Instagram — as the messaging and audiences is vastly different.
Wrapping Up
Meeting your audience, customers, and potential consumers where they're most comfortable is a business owner's greatest tool when it comes to social media. Once you know where your audience is active, it's all about creating engaging and consistent content to inform, entertain, build trust. You don’t have to be an expert -- that’s why we’re here to help.
