Maximize Your Online Presence: 3 Reasons Why You Must Invest in a Social Media Agency Running social media takes a lot of time, energy and a specific set of skills that might not apply to every business owner. Rather than devote the time you could spend on your own craft/skill set to social media, you can let a social media marketing (SMM) agency handle that for you
By Morissa Schwartz Edited by Micah Zimmerman
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Social media is a part of our everyday lives. In the past decade, it has taken over much of our time, from scrolling through the posts of family and friends to meeting new people and engaging with the world around us. But as we all know, social media is also the crux of the evolving online business world. As a business owner and operator, you know that marketing is essential for keeping your business afloat. Combining the two and staying up to date with where social media is going is critical.
Why is social media marketing so important?
Social media marketing is all about imparting your business's influence on the consumer world. Content sharing, whether through photo, microblogging or video, is paramount to engaging with your current and potential clients. Social media provides a unique opportunity for clients to share your content with others, drawing more people towards your goods and services organically and through targeted advertising. Customer data reports are easier to collect online, meaning you can get more insight into your target audience, purchasing trends in your business and consumer activity at large so your business can stay relevant.
Related: 8 Must-Have Social Media Marketing Tools For 2023
Why do you need a social media marketing agency?
Running social media takes a lot of time, energy and a specific set of skills that might not apply to every business owner. Rather than devote the time you could spend on your own craft set to social media, you can let a social media marketing (SMM) agency handle that for you. This means you and your company will have a more productive and profitable time in the day to work on what you love rather than what needs to be done to promote your business. Social media can also be unwieldy, so getting a professional in the field can help you and your business keep up with the best practices and get the biggest bang for your buck.
What makes a good social media marketing agency?
The baseline of hiring a social media marketing agency is having someone who will manage and post on your company/business's social media accounts. This already sounds great, but this should not be where their aid ends. It should be where it starts. After all, literally, anyone can post anything online. What is important is catering to their strategy and combining it with other strategies to your business's unique social media needs to bolster the purchase of your goods and services.
1. Search engine optimization
The social media marketing agency should post your photos, tweets and videos and include keywords to optimize consumer engagement. Agencies prioritizing SEO will be much more effective in getting people to see your content, no matter the social media platform.
Related: 5 Ways to Change SEO Strategies in an AI Search Engine World
2. Content-based engagement
An excellent social media marketing agency should prioritize creating good content that targets a specific audience. SMM (social media marketing) presents the unique opportunity to engage with and create a community around your goods and services in real-time. This means that you need content that engages customers and community members who already follow your business, as well as potential new clients. Your SMM agency should be able to create or collaborate with you to create content that will draw your intended audience in again and again.
3. A great production team
Not every SMM agency will provide you with a production team for graphic and video content. This is inherently troubling, as visual content is the crux of most social media, including TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook. If an SMM agency is meant to save you time and money, leaving the creation of visuals up to you or a third party feels entirely unhelpful.
Keeping the ethos of your company in mind while choosing an agency is important. You want to feel like you are seen and appreciated by the agency you choose. Your agency is there to help you and work as a collaborator to further your business, not an entity with complete control over how your business is perceived. Social media marketing should be an extension of your business and, subsequently, your mission!
We hope this has inspired you to take the social media plunge. With the right team behind you, there is nothing you can't accomplish!