How to use social media to your business' advantage during a worldwide crisis

8 Jun 2020

In today's time, businesses heavily rely on the use of social media to advertise their products and services. It's an advertising tool which has changed the digital advertising landscape forever but as advertising budgets are slashed as the world recovers from the effects of Covid-19, potential customers are spending a large amount of time at home scrolling social media pages and cutting this avenue of advertising could be a big mistake.

Photo by Will Francis on Unsplash.

While more and more people work from home in a bid to flatten the curve, scrolling culture has become a norm and according to Facebook, about 80% of users will look for business on their platform. Now, as more businesses pull their advertising spend, your ad has a higher success rate than ever before as the market isn’t as saturated as it once was – and it’s important to use this to your business’ advantage.

But do you know if your business is social media ready? Here are six tips to make sure that your social media pages are a good representation of your business.

1. Spend a little extra time

Put a little extra time in ensuring that your pages are complete and have the correct information. Your bios should be short yet descriptive and the potential customer should understand what it is that you are offering. Make sure that your address or location is correct and visible so the user knows where are you based and the most important part, your website address is available.

2. Use all the features to your advantage

Platforms such as Facebook and Instagram have features that can greatly benefit your business. One of those features is the shop, Facebook and Instagram give you the opportunity to list products, descriptions and prices and link this directly to your online website.

3. Real-time feedback

Make sure your automated responses are up to date and enabled. This will make sure you respond to your clients timelessly even if you are unavailable.

4. Sometimes you have to spend a bit of money

Social media advertising can be extremely beneficial in getting your products and services to a wider market. Social media platforms make paid for advertising quite easy for the first time user that is looking for a simple campaign.

5. Plan it out

Planning out your content is a great way to ensure that you consistently have new and exciting posts on your pages. If you are not going to have time when things return to normal try out a few scheduling tools.

6. Quality is key

Try and have high-quality images of your products. Spend a little time figuring out the features on your smartphone, clean your lens, set up a nice shot and you should be good to go.

About Kriya Gangiah

Kriya Gangiah is undoubtedly one of South Africa's most diverse media personalities. The vivacious presenter, actress, MC and businesswoman, has come a long way since presenting youth television on Craz-E in 2009. Honing her skills in the media industry over the years, Kriya found herself heading up the Digital Strategy at Jacaranda FM. Now, Kriya owns her own company, a digital marketing agency called [[http://www.kri8tivemedia.co.za/ Kri8tive Media]] that specialises in getting your brand noticed.