Winston Dosouza

Are you one of those business owners who haven’t discovered the hidden power of social media marketing yet? Are you wondering how some businesses are thriving by just having a powerful social media presence? How they have made it through scratch just playing the content game right? Social media marketing is a magical tool that gives your business wings to fly. With just a few high-impacting creative ideas and presence of mind, your brand could crack the social media game just like any other successful brand.  All you have to do is start and have a little patience. Further, you will not only create an established brand name but also have some fun along the way. Have you ever wondered what social media strategies these powerful businesses use to make their brand name on the platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter?  How have they managed to have millions of followers? What content ideas do they use that do the trick for them? Why does their target audience consume their content like a little child consuming candy? Well, look no further than here.  In this article, we will open a pandora’s box of information that will help you build your business name, increase sales and conversions, and make your audience fall in love with your brand. So, let’s jump in! 1.Presence On The Right Platform: Your ideal audience is present on the right social media platform. Let’s get that straight first. Be it Facebook, Instagram or Twitter, or Tiktok.  But here you have to do a little research to know who your target audiences are. Where are they most likely to be available? Which platforms are they most likely to be using?  Do some digging into understanding the buyer persona of your consumers.  Is your brand more in creating business networks? Then LinkedIn is the platform for you.  Is business being of fashion-related products? Try Facebook, Instagram, and Tiktok.  In today’s world, everything and everyone is on social media so you will always find your audience hunting for good content, just with a little research find the platforms to reach them. 2.Set Some Goals: If you think just having some social profiles of your brand and posting once in a while is enough, then sorry to burst your bubble!  Set small goals in the beginning. 500 followers in the first month, experimenting and creating more engaging posts, interacting with the audience and resolving their issues, increasing conversion and sales through Instagram organically.  Gaining more traffic to the websites through social media channels. As it is rightly said, “A goal properly set is halfway reached.”  So, set some goals and work towards achieving them. And social media marketing takes time. 3.Content Is The King: Well, this is something that you have probably heard a million times and we couldn’t highlight this enough! Your content is the pillar of your brand.  The kind of messaging you use could make or break your brand’s reputation. And if you do the right content marketing people start to connect with your business.  You not only built a happy relationship with the audience but also do a little branding along the ways that give your business a boost.  Which brand comes to your mind when you think of buying milk power? Is it Amul?  What comes to your mind when you have a sudden craving for ramen noodles? Is it Maggi?  How about which glue to buy for your little art and craft project? Fevicol, did we get that right? That’s the art of subconsciously establishing your brand name in the minds of the people. And this is the kind of recognition you can create for your brand among your target audience with the right content marketing strategy. And remember your brand messaging should be simple, but at the same time significant. 4.Influencer Market: So, if you are yourself present on social media you are probably familiar with the term ‘Influencer’. Influencers are those people who have a huge number of followers on social media platforms and they have created a fanbase of followers.  Their followers love their content and get influenced by them.  Influencer marketing in the last few years has stolen the spotlight and brands are taking advantage of this and collaborating with these influencers for their benefit.  Every other day you would see influencer brand collaboration posts. Even celebrities are collaborating with them to promote their movies! And influencers are there from niches.  So, whatever you sell there are influencers out just tailor-made for your brand.  5.Engage And Interact: Create more traction on brands’ social pages by creating more engaging content on your page, being more interactive with your audience on a real-time basis, answer to their queries, messages, and comments.  Do it more creatively. The more creative you are the better connection you create with your audience.  Zomato tries to respond to all their comments. They happily encourage it. Whenever someone has a query and a complaint instead of ignoring it or deleting it (which we highly recommend not doing) go above and beyond to resolve the issue.  This shows how highly you treat your customers and every time someone goes through the comment section, they see how much you care as a brand. Not only that, as a brand we could also engage with other people’s content. 6.Keep Up With Trends: It’s either dancing to trending audio or a sudden transformation. Reels have the market. They so creatively expressed spread like wildfire.  One person does it and two days later it’s all about that particular trend. Posting more trend-related reels is the best way to catch the interest of the audience.  We have seen it ourselves how some Instagram pages have gained thousands of followers by creating and posting reels. 7.Stories, Live Videos, Highlights: Social media platforms have so much to give that could help you build your brand if you know how to use it right.  There are stories, live videos, a highlight section and so much more. When you use

Is your Instagram growth frequently getting affected? One of the critical reasons for this could be the functioning of the Instagram Algorithm. While executing your marketing activities on Instagram, considering the algorithm is of crucial importance.  For making the platform better for its users, Instagram keeps on adjusting its algorithm for introducing new features. This straight away means that you need to keep up with the updates and the changes in the algorithm to achieve desired marketing results on  Instagram. If you crack the code of how the Instagram algorithm works, you may achieve great organic reach and growth. On the other hand, you may also end up with your content getting lost in the crowd if you have no idea of how the algorithm works. Instagram is not only used by social media users but also used by brands to build brand awareness and establish a social presence to reach their audience. A photo and video sharing popular platform, Instagram, has over 2 billion active users worldwide. This does not take a genius to understand why are businesses, especially B2C, want to use Instagram to achieve their marketing goals such as reaching their potential target audience.  The importance of understanding the Instagram algorithm cannot be overemphasized. So let’s quickly jump into what is it and how it works. What Is Instagram Algorithm? The Instagram algorithm is usually referred to as a single algorithm, but in fact, there are multiple algorithms which are the processes and classifiers, each one of which has its specific purpose.  Using this technology, Instagram gives you a personalized experience in your Newsfeed, Explore page, Reels, and so on.  The main goal is to make you stay for a longer time on the platform by showing and pushing the content that you are most likely to see, based on your interests, preferences, engagement history, and many other factors.  In simple words, the Instagram algorithm filters content and curates the one that we are most likely to consume.  How Does Instagram Algorithm Work In 2022? Keeping the base that the Instagram algorithm curates the content it thinks that we may like, we need to understand the below factors based on which it ranks the content: 1.Content posted: The content that is posted becomes a post. It could be a photo, video, reel, guide, Instagram Live, and so on.  The Instagram algorithm identifies the type of post and decides who is more appropriate to consume this content. It will also show the content that is more recently posted. 2.User activity: The Instagram algorithm identifies your activities like who and what you engage with.  It affects the order of the content that you see. This is why when you like or engage with someone’s posts you are shown more of their content. 3.User Interests: Based on your experience with the app, the algorithm stores the topics of the posts that the algorithm believes that you are most interested in.  You can manage your interests by heading on “Manage Interests” under the Menu at the top right-hand side corner.  The content you see shall depend upon the interest that you select. 4.Engagement history: Instagram records your history and gives the relevant content to consume. Also, Instagram tells you why are you shown a particular post.  When you are in your newsfeed, you can tap on the three dots which will further be shown an option called “ Why are you seeing this post?”.  Further, Instagram will show you a list of reasons for showing you a particular post.  Instagram Algorithm Hacks For Organic Growth It is not enough to emphasize how important it is to understand the functioning of the Instagram algorithm to get the most out of your marketing efforts.   Organic reach is an important marketing goal that every business needs to achieve as more reach will provide more followers and engagement.  These metrics are paramount to measuring the results of your marketing efforts. Hence, achieving organic growth on Instagram is significantly essential.  Below are some essential Instagram growth factors that can help you achieve organic growth: Instagram growth factors: Let’s dive deep into these factors and understand how you can grow organically with the below Instagram algorithm hacks. 1.For giving quality content: Understand your audience and produce high-quality content. This is important because when you produce quality content the audience is most likely to relate to it and hence, such content is pushed organically. Therefore, conduct surveys on a regular interval basis. It is recommended to conduct these surveys once every two weeks and try to understand what your audience wants. It can be done by creating polls, conducting Q&As, and so on. 2.For post frequency: Here you can utilize the same high-quality and relatable content and repurpose it by diversifying.  For instance, if you create Reels, the same content could be utilized for carousels, stories, or posts. Every time there will be different audiences consuming different formats of content. This way you can reach more audiences organically. 3.For trust score: Instagram ensures that your content is safe and adds value to the platform and your audience. Therefore, Instagram gives a certain trust score to your content. For an instance, whenever some content gets removed for a violation of a particular guideline, you may get some flags. Some of these flags can be removed over some time, while some are permanent.  For example, you can remove ghosts/dead followers if any, to remove some temporary flags.  This can help you give organic growth. 4.For social signals: These are the real and quality engagements interactions or signals such as likes, comments, shares, view duration, session time, and so on.  These engagements are crucial to achieving organic growth. You can increase these social signals in two ways:  On-platform and 2. Off-platform On-platform: This is one of the simplest ways to encourage users to revisit your profile after engaging with them. Ensure that you have an optimized account for a good follower conversion.  Also try to get the people having same

The biggest challenge that most B2B businesses face is getting high-quality leads. Your B2B marketing strategy can be your compass to guide you throughout your marketing journey. If strategised rightly, you are not far to achieve an improved ROI on your marketing activities. You can use various B2B channels suitable for your business to implement your B2B marketing tactics. However, just starting with channels may also prove to be risky and make your efforts go in vain. So what is the secret formula to cooking your delicious soup of B2B marketing strategy? Here is a 4 steps guide that you can follow to develop a compelling B2B Marketing strategy for your business and achieve your marketing objectives in the most efficacious manner. Prerequisites Before starting anything it’s good to get ready with some robust preparations – the prerequisites. Have a look at these extremely important factors listed below that you need to consider and execute before jumping on the channels, resources and executions under your B2B marketing strategy. Research Almost 74% of B2B buyers spend half of their time researching online. If you are still relying only on the outbound methods of reaching your potent B2B buyers, you might be losing a lot of your B2b leads’ share in the market. Today, the B2B buyers prefer doing deep research and analysis, mostly visiting the search engines like Google and comparing to get the best. So performing resonant research and understanding what your buyers are looking for, where your business stands in the current position, what are the latest trends, what your competitors are doing to keep up with those trends and what shall be your next action steps to stand out will form a solid foundation of your B2B marketing strategy Buyer’s persona This is a very crucial aspect to be considered while implementing almost any marketing strategy. Understanding your target audience and creating an ideal buyer’s persona will help build a B2B marketing strategy that is realistic and potent to implement well. Over 71% of companies that achieve their sales and lead generation goals use buyer personas. Studying the needs, interests and behaviour, goals and challenges will help you strategise your activities that will be relevant to your B2B buyers. This will ultimately enable you to get high-quality leads. Competitive Analysis One of the most important factors you need to consider while building your B2B marketing strategy is your competitors. Analyse your competitors and consider what works best for them and what they are lacking. This helps you make wise decisions to get the best results at the same time. Analyse your competitors’ online presence Try to understand their tactics and results Do a SWOT analysis of your competitors and compare it with yours. These steps may prove to be time-consuming. But the better you do it, the better results you can expect from your B2B marketing strategy. Channels A significant B2B marketing strategy involves doing profound research, identifying channels and resources, executing and assessing the performance to make take appropriate decisions. Identifying and selecting suitable channels is a crucial step in formulating a definitive B2B marketing strategy for your business. You can consider a balance of offline and online channels for your marketing activities. Let’s dive into these channels listed below: Offline Channels for B2B Marketing Cold calling Cold calling is an invaluable channel that can be used in B2B marketing. Even if your prospect isn’t ready to buy yet, you can still use this channel as a networking tool that gives you a chance to introduce your brand. Not only does it give you a chance to get your foot in the door for future sales, but it can also give your leads time to develop further interest and trust in what you have to offer. Referencing When referred by someone who your customers know, they are 4x more likely to make a purchase. The networking nature of B2B makes referencing an effective way of getting potential customers. This ensures loyal and high-quality customers who could be retained and can be driven towards the bottom of your sales funnel effortlessly. Print According to Chief Marketer’s survey report, 9% of B2B marketers state that the print channel generates higher ROI. With wider reach channels such as newspapers and publications can be used as adequate offline channels to reach your potential B2B leads. Field Visits This is another efficient offline channel to execute your B2B marketing activities. This channel can prove to be more convincing for the leads, as the sales representatives personally visit the B2B leads and try to give their best sales pitch. Live events and exhibitions When it comes to offline channels, live events and exhibitions can be an effectual channel to reach and influence B2B leads. This may require a heavy investment, however, it may ensure you get high-quality customers. Online Channels for B2B Marketing Search engine optimisation 61% of B2B marketers stated that SEO and organic traffic generate more leads than any other marketing initiative. As discussed earlier, your B2B potential leads now have evolved and they rely more on ongoing search engines to perform searches and analysis. Hence, you need to implement the best SEO practices so that your website ranks higher and is visible to your B2B prospects. On-site SEO best practices may involve using relevant and high volume keywords, placing these keywords in the most relevant places, using optimised images and so on. Off-site SEO practices such as getting more and more high quality internal and external links can help you increase the credibility of your website and help you rank better. This channel is one of the most effective ways of getting B2B leads. Google Search Ads As mentioned above, search engine searches such as that of Google are a reliable channel to get B2B leads, appearing higher on these search engines is even more effective to reach your potential B2B prospects. Google holds a 73% share of the paid search market, as it offers all the analytics and

Having a great business model along with an excellent online marketing strategy but poor marketing channels for your business can cost your time, efforts and most importantly the growth of your business. While marketing online you need to communicate your brand, products and services well with your customers no matter what stage of online marketing it is. This will ultimately help the customers to position your brand in the way you communicate with them. As a result, choosing effective marketing channels must be considered a very crucial part of your digital marketing strategy to achieve your online marketing objectives efficiently. Choosing an effective online marketing channel not only will help you achieve your marketing objectives, but also will impact your brand awareness. After all, channels are the platforms that help you to reflect your brand’s values and identity. However, when it comes to marketing channels, some businesses favour digital marketing channels, while some traditional marketing channels. While a few prefer having a perfect blend of both. Well, having a good blend of both is preferable, but having a clear understanding of what channels will work better for you depending on the reach, product type and requirements of your business is critically important. So, before discussing the effective online marketing channels, let’s have a look at which type of channels should be preferred more considering your product and its reach. Online Marketing Channels Vs Traditional Marketing Channels A survey report reveals that about 2.7 billion adults around the globe still read newspapers, while some reports also revealed the increase in TV households worldwide. This means that popular traditional marketing channels like newspapers, TVs or radio are not dead. With almost every business now marketing online, we still can’t ignore the impact of traditional marketing channels. However, in the end, it still depends on the type of product or service and its reach. If you have a business having a product or service that is generic and meant for a larger audience, you should emphasise more on traditional marketing channels along with a perfect blend of online marketing channels. There are almost 1.5 billion social media users around the world. Not only this but other online marketing channels such as emails can give 4400% ROI. Hence, both online and traditional marketing channels are impactful and efficient when it comes to marketing your business. However, if your product or service is meant for a targeted audience and comparatively not a larger one then, you must focus more on online marketing channels along with a balance of traditional marketing channels. In a nutshell, in this era of the digital world, you must have a perfect blend of both types of marketing channels depending upon your product type whether it is generic or for a targeted audience. Let’s now get back to having the best online marketing channels for achieving your online marketing objectives most efficiently. Well, this all starts with a great, clear and simplified strategy and considering certain factors affecting your choice. Let’s have a look at the same further. Key factors for choosing Effective Online Marketing Channels. Having an online marketing strategy is just like having a roadmap while going on a treasure hunt to achieve your goal. This strategy must consider the most significant online marketing channels depending on your business requirements. While choosing these channels you need to consider certain major key factors as listed below: Audience: Research and define your target audience well. This sums up knowing where they hang out the most online, what type of content they like the most, what are their likes and dislikes, and what are their interests. This will give you a gist of what type of online marketing platform will be the most appropriate to reach your target audience. Business goals: Along with your target audience, you also need to clearly define your business goals followed by your marketing goals. If you wish to increase revenue and want more conversion rates along with a good ROI, you may need to consider email marketing for your business. If your goal is to educate your audience, website blogs could be a really good channel. However, on top of all this, you first need to understand your brand well and need to clarify the values that your business stands for. This ultimately helps you get the right marketing channels suitable for your business. Budget : The results of your marketing activities will ultimately depend on your budget. There is always some cost involved in achieving certain marketing objectives. You wisely need to consider your budget and make cost-effective decisions for the success of your online marketing strategy. This greatly impacts your choice of online marketing channels. For initial stages, you may have budget-friendly channels and then gradually can go bigger as you build the momentum. Effective Online Marketing Channels Consider the below listed online marketing channels depending upon your business requirements in order to get effective results for your marketing efforts Website: Irrespective of the size of your business, you need to have a website up and running to express your brand’s visual story to your audience. Your website will speak for the brand and help to create a brand identity. Using a website as one of the online marketing channels to educate and nurture your audience is among the most effective ways to accomplish your online marketing objectives like generating leads, nurturing them and converting the same by gaining loyalty. This is possible by giving our impactful, relevant and valuable content in the form of blog posts, videos, images, infographics, etc. to your audience so that they know your brand by visiting your website every time they are looking for valuable information in your niche. Social Media: This channel is added to this list not only because of the growing use of social media platforms, but it is one of the effective ways to influence your potential and existing customers. It is also very effective to reach a good amount of your target