We all know about the various different social media channels – lots of us use them in our personal lives, to stay in touch with friends, find inspiration or to support us in our careers – but when it comes to business, the platforms you invest your time and effort on will be determined by who your customers are, the industry you’re in and what you sell.

You might be tempted to jump on every social network in the hope of maximising your reach, but by doing this you’ll likely spread yourself too thin and dilute your message. It’s much better to focus on a few key channels that you know are favoured by your target market and put your energy into building a loyal and engaged following on these. Social media isn’t confined to the usual 9-5, it’s 24/7, and you’ll need to be, too. Finding the time to manage your social presence is tough.

By sticking to just two or three channels, you’ll have more time to develop a much broader understanding of how they work. It’s not unusual for the likes of Instagram and LinkedIn to release regular updates that often come with new features to try. By using just a few key social outlets, you can keep abreast of these changes and apply them to your marketing strategy. Have a play around and work out what content your target audience likes to see.

But it’s not just about knowing what new features have been added, it’s also about knowing what has been taken away. For example, many social media channels use hashtags as a way for you to share and discover content, but in order to protect their communities, each platform has a list of banned hashtags. If you use these, you could be penalised. This could be anything from your content not showing up for that particular hashtag, through to your account being banned. There are some hashtags that are permanently blocked, while others are only blocked temporarily. While it’s obvious why some have been banned, others can appear quite innocent.

Another way of determining which social media platforms you should use is to look at what and how you sell. If you sell directly to consumers, consider using platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest. These channels are making it easier than ever for customers to buy. With ‘product tags’ you can reveal product details like name and price, and drive traffic to your website to complete a purchase. In the US, Instagram users can now buy from select businesses using the ‘checkout’ function without even leaving the app. It’s likely that Facebook, which owns Instagram, will roll this function out worldwide in the coming months. 

If you are selling a service rather than a physical product, or if your business is B2B, the likes of Twitter and LinkedIn could work well for you. Here you can share news and insights from your industry and establish yourself as a thought leader. So consider the type of content you’ll share and this will also help you to determine the most suitable social channels.

Once you’ve made your choices, take a look to see if your competitors are using these channels for their own marketing. If they have active accounts that receive a lot of engagement, that’s a good sign you should be on the channel too.

At Vista, we use our social media expertise to help you decide which channels will deliver the best return on investment for your business. As expert brand builders, we create meaningful and lasting relationships with customers, carefully curating content that weaves through every online touch point and drives a connection to our client’s business. We provide fast and effective customer service to keep customers happy and loyal. Our expertise in content marketing - incorporating SEO into traditional PR methods, social media and paid social means we deliver integrated campaigns that build brands online, drive sales online and help our clients achieve their business goals.