7 Things to Consider Before Your Next Social Media Campaign

Social media typically ranks among the top three sources of website referrals for most brands. And it's affordable. Regardless of whether you have a budget of $0, $1,000 or $100,000, you can achieve your social media marketing goals with smart content and targeting. Related: 7 serious social media mistakes that brands still make The beauty of social media marketing is its umbrella of benefits. Its ROI isn't restricted to the website conversions you see from social media referrals. It extends beyond that to include expanded brand awareness, mindshare, and the delayed effect of your social media campaigns on future purchase decisions. To create campaigns that deliver those benefits, you need to consider certain critical elements. Here are 7 things to consider before your next social media campaign. 1. Goals & outcomes What does your brand want to achieve with social media? Defining this is necessary to set a sufficient budget, choose the right social media platforms, and create the right content. Once you have your goals, it's important to focus on discovering what your customers' goals are, so you can "figure out how your social media strategy connects both," as Lee Odden, CEO of TopRank recommends. If you want people to pay attention to your content, the narrative should focus on them and not you—what value can you add to their lives? Which of their problems can you solve? To create such a narrative, you need clarity on your goals and your customers. For instance, consider stem cell corporation LifeCell. Their goal was brand awareness among expectant mothers whose primary goal would be the safety and happiness of their children. So, they created posts that focused on the precious moments mothers share with their infants, like this one. 2. Target social networks It's never a good idea to spread yourself too thin by managing too many social media platforms. Especially if you're a small business with limited budget and capacity, you're better off choosing one primary social platform, so you can publish tailored content and fully participate in the responses you receive. To identify the best social media platform for your brand, you could simply survey your customer base or analyze your competitor's social media presence. Choose the platform where most of your customers are active and where your competitors are receiving the best response. Alternatively, you could cross-post your social content to effortlessly create a multi-platform presence. Doing this manually is time-consuming, but an automation tool can simplify the process. 3. Campaign timeline Every social media campaign needs a definite timeline: a start date, an end date, and a publishing schedule. Without this, you won't be able to connect your campaign to definitive results. Also, a timeline adds urgency and scarcity to whatever you offer during the campaign. When creating a social media timeline, think about working in stages. Each stage can have its own content direction and outcomes. All of your plans can be documented on a campaign calendar. You can be more efficient by scheduling posts in advance, so you can review your content on a queued-up calendar and make any last-minute changes when needed. 4. Social media automation Like a brand, running a consistent campaign is no joke. If you have time-sensitive plans, think about using a third-party tool for your publishing. There could be other features that matter to you, so it's important to conduct some research before you decide to invest. One example is DrumUp, a "set it and forget it" tool that can help with social media campaign management. If you decide to it, you can bulk-upload your social media posts from spreadsheets to libraries within the tool. Then, you can either custom-schedule your posts or queue up an automatic posting schedule. You can review upcoming posts in a calendar format and edit them any time before they're published. 5. Graphic design Next, it's time to create the actual content. For a coordinated campaign, you probably want to keep in mind the big picture when creating individual posts. You could begin by clarifying your core message. Once you have, you can create a "bucket of ideas" to work with for individual posts. Keep in mind your ideal customer's journey—how they move from awareness to conversion. You can then decide which format to create your posts in. Visuals work wonders when it comes to social media, where attention is sparse and distraction is plenty. If you aren't sure what type of content you want to use, you could simply ask your audience, like IBM did. Worried about what your content will look like on different platforms? Use social media templates to make sure your graphics are on-point. Lucidpress has a whole gallery of social media templates sized to perfectly fit the platform of your choice, from Facebook and Twitter to Pinterest and Instagram. Upload your images and brand assets to your library, then edit the content with your brand colors and fonts. Creating social media graphics in Lucidpress is quick and easy, so you can have a full campaign designed in minutes. Read more about designing social media graphics in Lucidpress here. 6. KPIs & tracking Unless you continuously track the response to your content, you won't have any points of reference to refine your strategy. As people interact with your content, you can extract useful data based on their engagement. This data can prove useful in instances that aren't related to social media marketing, such as product development and marketing on other channels. Additionally, set KPIs alongside your goals, so you can measure your progress and assess the effectiveness of your efforts. Most social media platforms offer deep analytics, and there are third-party tools you can use to mine data. One of the tools I find useful is SimplyMeasured, because it offers several insights (in report format) for free. If you can't log in to the tool on a regular basis, you could instruct the tool to send automated reports via email. 7. Logistics Whether you're a small brand with limited resources or a big brand with a large team, it pays to plan responsibilities in advance. Who will manage your social media campaign? Who will create the content, track the response, and interact with followers? Some companies misjudge the amount of work involved in social media management. Content creation, community management, and analytics are demanding tasks that need people who can hustle, people who can stay on-point throughout the duration of the campaign. If you intend to outsource the work to an agency, you still need to track its progress. I recommend using Trello or Asana, so you can manage the review and approval process without having to waste time on calls and meetings. Wrapping up Finally, it's important to consider roadblocks in advance. Social media is a constantly changing landscape, so be prepared to forecast and preempt potential disasters. Check whether the dates you've selected clash with any meaningful holidays, and consider whether your content has the potential to bump into sensitive issues. By considering this in advance, you can set yourself up for success. Ready to make a social splash? Try Lucidpress to create gorgeous social media graphics for your brand—no expert design knowledge required.