In this introductory blog to a series of blog posts centered on social media advertising in the B2B marketing world, we’ll start off by briefly discussing the best practices for social media advertising. Here are a few stats to ponder when considering social media as a marketing tool. These should help illustrate the excitement behind it all.

• Social media use in the U.S. has increased by 356% since 2006.
• At the end of last year, 70% of marketers claimed they were going to spend more on social media ads.
• 65% of B2B company respondents to a recent Hubspot study reported successful acquisitions of new customers through LinkedIn.

Social media advertising is quickly becoming a game changer. There are those who are doing it right and those who are not. The following best practices are designed to lay the groundwork for what social media advertising is all about.

UNDERSTAND YOUR AUDIENCE

Every product has a message that it’s trying to convey to a certain audience that is dealing with a specific problem. You must do everything you can to understand that problem and how each product will help a specific audience. The next step is to find out what messaging method would work best to connect with the audience you’re targeting. Do you want to sound more technical, or would humor help the target audience relate more?

TARGETING

Who are your best current customers? Use all of the targeting options available to reach them. Each social platform has unique ways of targeting specific people. Understanding how to take advantage of these tools will save you loads on your promotional budget. Also, with the advent of remarketing, you can now reach these people wherever they are on the Internet.

IMAGERY

There is a balance here. Use attractive photos with high contrast to catch the eye. The last thing you want is the typical stock photo of someone with a headset, smiling with a cheesy pose. Let the creative juices flow! Think outside the box. Find something so visually captivating that the average person scrolling through their feed will have to scroll up and do a double take to see

CALL TO ACTION

If the customer doesn’t know what to do, they will just keep on scrolling. Creating an effective call to action is all about the invitation. Don’t be overbearing about. Create a way to invite with gusto and pizazz. Make the potential customer feel like they would be missing out if they didn’t click on the link.

KEEP IT FRESH

Watch the frequency (how many times individuals are seeing the same ad). If the frequency is high for the platform you are using, change the ad copy up a bit. Find another stunning image to go along with that new ad copy. This is an easy social media advertising “life hack.”

Overall, there are many keys to focus on when launching a social media campaign. Stay tuned for a more in depth breakdown of these best practices and how to apply them into each social media platform as we continue on to Part 2.

Much success,

Looking for more great reads? Check out these related articles:

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