Do you want your business to grow to the next level? In that case, you will be happy to realize that we now live in the age of information, and a wide variety of tools are available for businesses of all sizes to attract customers. One way to grow your business is to use social media sites. While these sites are primarily designed for individuals to connect to each other and share ideas, they are also a very powerful promotional vehicle for businesses. When done right, social media campaigns can raise awareness about your brand, and allow you to present your products and services to people who would have an interest in them. Here is how you can use social media sites to their fullest potential:

Establish a Presence

Everyone has to start somewhere, right? The first step to using social media is obviously to set up your accounts. This means creating a profile for your business on the main networks, such as Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

When you create your profile, you would naturally include your business name, a short description of what you do, plus your contact information, such as your business website and phone number. For your display picture, you would normally use your company's logo. Once your presence has been established, you can then personalize it further and add some content to it.

Learn About Each Social Network You Use

If you've never created a business page before, you may want to take some time learning about each social network that you've joined. For example, if you've never used Twitter before, you may want to learn more about how the microblogging service works, how to add images to post, how to retweet, as well as how you can follow people and get them to follow you.

Educate yourself on the features of your account, such as the options that you can personalize. This will allow you to get a clearer understanding of how you can interact with your page visitors and followers. A lot of information is available in the help section of each site, but you can also read some free advice on numerous blogs and forums as well.

Add Great Designs to Your Pages

You should seek to make your social media pages as unique and attractive as possible. Different social networks allow different levels of personalization. For example, Twitter lets you add a background image to your account, while Facebook lets you add a cover image. Choose images that represent your business well and that will be attractive to your visitors. You can even hire a graphic artist to design custom images that you will use on your pages.

Remember, Content is King

This is true for your website or blog, but it is also very important for your social media pages. If you want people to be interested in what you have to say, your posts should be more than just self-promotion for your business or its products.

You can create content that your targeted audience (those most likely to become your customers) will relate to. This can be information about your industry, product reviews, news, infographics, etc. The content itself can be hosted on your website or blog, which will help increase traffic to them.

Offer Promotions and Discounts

Surveys indicate that one of the most popular reasons as to why individuals follow businesses on social networking sites is to see if any discounts or special promotions are available. This means that you can turn your pages into very powerful marketing vehicles, simply by offering promotions on them that aren't available through other channels.

If you have an e-commerce site, you can insert the discount links into posts, or create a coupon code that can be used for a discount, free shipping, a free product, etc. If you don't have an e-commerce site, you can create printable coupons and post them on your pages.

Get More Followers

Once you've created your page and added some content to it, one of your main concerns would probably be how to get more people to follow you or to subscribe to your page. There are a few techniques that you can use, but first, you should know that companies that offer to sell you fans or followers are best avoided.

Why? Because very often, despite claims that you will get “100% real people who are interested in your business,” these followers are often simply bogus, coming from either fake accounts or accounts that were compromised. Simply put, you will be wasting your money if you buy them.

But there are plenty of legitimate ways to get people onto your pages. Include social media buttons on your main website, your blog, as well as any other sites that you run which are related to your business, such as mini sites that are specific to certain products that you sell. You can also include your social media links in email messages that you send to your clients or email list subscribers.

If you have a blog or post articles on your website, you should also include social media buttons on them. This will make it easy for individuals to share your content with others, and if you're lucky enough, it could become viral.

Use Video

Remember that video sharing sites, such as YouTube, are also a form of social media. While it is possible to upload video directly to Facebook and Twitter, it is best to use YouTube and simply share it on your pages on various networks.

This allows your business to have a channel on YouTube, where you can add links to your site (thus bringing you some SEO benefits) and it also creates a place where your followers can find all of your company's videos in one place.

You can create a variety of short videos and share them with the world. The most effective kinds are instructional videos, that show what your products are, how they work, and what benefits they can bring to your customers. You may also add some video testimonials from satisfied customers. Finally, you can also create videos where you provide commentary on issues that are related to your industry.

Video works great because it enhances your brand's credibility. A potential customer that sees your videos will be reassured that you are indeed a real business that sells real products. This will increase the chance that they will go check out your main website and even buy one of your products.

When using videos, try to keep them short, typically under 5 minutes. Of course, you should also ensure that both the audio and video are of good quality, otherwise, you will simply receive sarcastic comments questioning why you can't afford a better camera or asking whether you filmed this with a potato.

Do you need help promoting your business through social media? Marketing Ignite can help you with their vast experience in online marketing. No matter what type of business you are running, they can develop social media campaigns that can help you reach their goals. Check out their website at www.marketingignite.com

Contact us today and receive a free consultation.