If there's something we hear all the time as Social Media Managers dedicated to helping small business owners see powerful results through organic social media marketing, it's questions like, "but what results will I see?"
There are usually two kinds of business teams who are extra curious about this: First, are small business owners who hate managing their social media feeds and are sick of racking their brains for content, and genuinely just want to know what they're going to get out of all the time and effort (that they really don't have) they pour into their social media marketing. And the second is businesses with marketing teams who are really metrics-focused (and as controversial as this is, they're always focused on the wrong metrics-- they care more about a vague average engagement rate and vanity metrics over the overall psychology and strategy of long-term social media marketing that actually works.
And while no matter who's asking, our answer always goes something like: It's different for every brand and business depending on marketing goals, individual target audience and your industry or niche, we thought we'd whip up a couple of blog posts with recent real client results to give small business owners a bit of an idea of what social media marketing might be able to achieve for your small business.
So first up is our recent Redland Bay client who was interested in Social Media Management for their business. This was an initial three month partnership where they utilised our bespoke (and powerful!) strategy and full-service management to oversee all aspects of their social media marketing.
This partnership was extended for a further three months before I finished up for maternity leave, so please note the following results were achieved over exactly a six month period of Coastal Social Club overhauling their social media content and strategy.
Client: Redland Bay business (based in Victoria Point, Redlands Coast)
Service: Social Media Management ('Powerful' package)
Goals: Increase brand awareness, growth of online community, content creation (within five pre-existing content pillars), and driving more sales.
Key Challenges: As one of many of its kind in the Redland Bay region where this business was located, the biggest key challenge for us entering this partnership was standing out from their immediate competitors and positioning them as the go-to amongst the very similar and generic content being produced within this industry across all competitors. We wanted to help position this brand as market leaders and not just one of many of this kind of business that locals could choose on any given day, but through content ensure that members of the community were encouraged and influenced to actively choose to visit, and spend their hard-earned money with this brand. With these as goals, we created a tailored strategy specifically designed to target, attract and convert ideal clients across all areas of the customer journey map. We also achieved this by overhauling content creation and ensuring a sharp increase in UGC and original content produced at the place of business.
Strategy: ln addition to the in-house marketing strategy provided (which included marketing goals and content pillars) we crafted a tailored social media strategy to meet overall marketing goals and overcome the key challenges we'd identified.
This strategy included:
✹ Comprehensive competitor research to identify weak points, gaps in the market and potential opportunities to supersede them on social media
✹ A tailored content plan
✹ An in-depth engagement plan
✹ A focus on community, connection and value
Key Metrics and Results (all organic):
Targeted Facebook followers gained: +370
Targeted Instagram followers gained: +278
Average organic engagement rate on Instagram and Facebook during Coastal Social Club management: 40%
Average engagement rate of main competitor: 0.2%
Average engagement rate on Instagram and Facebook prior to Coastal Social Club management: 1.5%
Average engagement rate for businesses and brands (at time of partnership, according to Meta): 4.3%
So before investing in social media marketing services for your small business, ask yourself what exactly it is you'd like to achieve through hiring expert help... Is it more followers? Higher engagement? To position yourself as the leader in your industry or location? And is it something you want to wipe your hands of and have taken off your plate, or something you'd like tools to help you transform?
Have some clear goals in mind and then if you're ready to turn your social media from "oh, you know, it's just something you gotta have these days so it pops up when people search for us" into a powerful marketing tool, hit us up! We're obsessed with helping small businesses achieve the results usually only afforded to the big guys with full-time marketing teams and can't wait to work some marketing magic with you!