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Branding Marketing Communications Education

How to Stay Relevant to Business Students During Fall Enrollment

How to Stay Relevant to Business Students During Fall Enrollment

The fall semester is starting for most universities any day now, and many community colleges may be feeling like they fell short of enrollment goals. We know that over the past two years, community college enrollment has fallen, with an 11.3% decline being reported in 2021. But don’t give up on your enrollment numbers just yet. Consider the following tips on how to increase enrollment in community colleges as you make a last push for fall numbers or look towards the spring semester. 

Tip #1: Incentivize Enrollment 

With inflation eating into students’ budgets, they may feel like they can’t keep up with enrollment costs over time, even if they could afford a semester or two. Consider incentivizing enrollment today by offering grants that would cover tuition costs for one or two courses during a semester down the road. For example, students at Alamo Colleges District who complete 18 or 24 credits in the academic year receive one to two courses, respectively, tuition-free in the summer.  This model could help offer under-enrolled students set aggressive goals and stay on pace toward graduation. 

Tip #2: Refine Your Value Proposition for Students 

At a time when students may be questioning the value of a degree, it’s important for them to understand how their education would apply to real-world success. When marketing to college students in 2022, be sure to communicate how their path will lead to a brighter future. Some ways to communicate this could be through sharing alumni stories on social media, posting articles that speak to student successes and using hard data to back up any messaging about your programs and degrees. 

Tip #3: Optimize Your School’s Content Marketing Strategy  & Website 

Even though teens prefer consuming video content on social media, you can’t underestimate the power of a strong content marketing strategy. In fact, 64% of college prospects would rather consume content through text and articles on college websites.

Be sure to consider SEO when posting content or articles on your website—optimizing for local searches can be a powerful way to attract students that are more likely to enroll soon. With your website, you should also make sure it’s intuitive, easy to navigate and optimized for mobile.

And finally, another area to consider in your marketing mix is SMS—they have a staggering 98% open rate. Once a prospective student opts in, a well-timed message might be just the thing to help them take the next step. 

Tip #4: Improve Conversions with Responsive Chatbots 

Responsiveness to student inquires can be paramount to keeping a prospect engaged. Students are eager to hear back when they engage with a university, and according to recent a study, colleges and universities are actually 10 times more likely not to reconnect with a student if they fail to respond within five minutes. To ensure you get back to students in a timely manner, consider a chatbot that would be able to reply to frequently asked questions or escalate the question to a representative. 

If you’re looking for more ideas on how to connect with prospective students, Push is here to help with years of experience building enrollment campaigns for two- and four-year colleges and universities. View our work and contact us to see how we can help take your marketing efforts to the next level. 

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Marketing Communications Digital Media Fun

Using Real-Time Social Media Assets to Promote Beverages During the Summer

Using Real-Time Social Media Assets to Promote Beverages During the Summer

Summer is in full swing, and with the temperatures rising, people are looking for ways to cool down. If you’re a beverage company, that means an audience that’s primed to be even more receptive to your message. To really take advantage of the opportunity to share the story behind your brand during this time of year, we’ve put together the following tips to tap into insights and reach consumers who are ready to raise a glass. 

Tip #1: Pick an Actionable Hashtag for Endless User-Generated Content

If you have a popular beverage business or extra Instagram-worthy can or bottle, your customers may already be sharing your product across social media, so it only makes sense to capitalize on this user-generated content with a branded hashtag. If they’re not already sharing images of your product, a social media campaign that incentivizes them to do so could be the perfect solution. 

Promoting a branded hashtag and UGC not only gives you access to an unlimited supply of images and content, but it gives your audience a reason to interact with you on social media. A noteworthy example is the Sparkling Ice campaign that invited people to cast their vote on a mystery flavor for the chance to win prizes, including a VIP trip to a music festival. Coca-Cola’s #ShareACoke is another great retail and social media campaign example of a branded hashtag campaign that was an extremely successful extension of a larger brand campaign.

Whichever hashtag you choose, be sure to consider your audience’s lifestyle and existing behavior online, make sure the hashtag is actionable and choose a hashtag that includes your brand’s name.

Tip #2: Utilize Facebook Networks and Sponsorships To Engage a Captive Audience 

Beverage brands are also going beyond ideas for retail and POS marketing campaigns to create content specifically for social media. This may take the form of leveraging existing relationships and sponsorships. If your beverage brand sponsors or partners with another brand in another industry, consider ways to rethink your beverage or packaging to engage another customer base. 

For example, to support Liverpool FC, beer company Carlsberg created a special red beer to match the team. To promote the campaign, Carlsberg leveraged the power of global fan Facebook groups to generate excitement for the new beer. As noted by the Digital Marketing Institute, this type of collaboration can be very effective in keeping a brand front of mind long after the campaign ends. 

Tip #3: Capitalize on the Senses with Instagram Reels

You already know that as the most visual social media platform, Instagram is the perfect fit for your brand, but don’t forget to explore the potential of Instagram Reels. With Reels, you can really drive home the sensory experience associated with your product like pouring, drinking, bubbling, brewing and more. Reels will also help boost your engagement and you can repost them elsewhere across social media, like TikTok. Overall, leveraging the short-format style of Instagram Reels can be an effective way to promote your beverage brand.

For more inspiration on the types of content to create, we have a few helpful tips on how to  boost engagement using photography and short videos here. You can also check out ongoing work we’ve created for brands here. And don’t hesitate to reach out to see how we can help take your beverage brand to the next level. Cheers!

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Marketing Communications Trends Education

3 Ways Small Universities Can Grow in 2022

3 Ways Small Universities Can Grow in 2022

Small universities provide students with a great environment to foster lifelong relationships, broaden their worldview, hone their craft and prepare them for the next step in their lives. But over the past few years, it’s been harder for these institutions to provide this experience for their students due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Like everyone else, they were constantly pivoting to find the best ways to keep their students safe while still providing them with a valuable education.

Some of those changes implemented during the height of the pandemic were out of necessity, but some were beneficial to students, especially those at small universities. As we move further away from this time, it’s important that universities use the information they learned from the pandemic to continue to improve their operations. Using our expertise in the higher education space, we’ve compiled a few ways universities can continue to innovate on their current experiences.

Embrace Your Size

A huge benefit to being small is the ability to make changes quickly and pivot back if necessary. This means it may be easier to rethink course structure or your academic calendar based on students’ needs. With a smaller student body, you may also be able to tap into their feedback more and actually apply those changes as you see fit.

Stop Chasing Rankings

An important skill that a young person can learn is that comparing yourself to others is an unfulfilling plight. This is something that many universities could benefit from as well. Rather than focusing on the competition, it’s important that institutions look inward and align their values with their students and faculty. Spend the resources that are put towards boosting your rankings on your faculty and students and celebrate their hard work and success. Yes, knowing your peer institutions and following their efforts and success can be very helpful, as well as having a finger on the pulse of the broader national higher education landscape, but focusing on your own academic program quality and student successes will reap your university the biggest rewards.

Celebrate Your Value

Higher education provides students with a great opportunity to receive an education that will prepare them for the first step into the career of their choosing. While this value is apparent to those that are in the industry, it isn’t as obvious to the public. It’s especially important that smaller universities are effectively communicating their commitment to affordability, convenience and career-readiness learning to prospective students. One way of showcasing this is through case studies, providing a look at how past students have found success post-graduation and how the university prepared them for that initial step.

Explore Immersive Technology

Due to the pandemic, nearly every student has now become familiar with an online class and how they differ from the traditional in-person class. For some students, their class structure didn’t stray too far from what they were used to in their in-person classes. But for others, it was a difficult transition. Many students who participated in labs missed out on valuable hands-on experience that you can’t get through a computer screen. The introduction of virtual reality (VR), the Metaverse and augmented reality (AR) combat this issue, providing technology that can immerse students within a scenario that an on-person classroom may not even provide. Students now have the ability to communicate and collaborate in their own virtual office, rather than a Zoom call. And with this technology still in its infancy, who’s to say that students won’t be able to put on their VR headset and walk the streets of Ancient Rome for their history class?

How Push Can Help

At Push we are always looking for new, innovative ways to market and support higher education institutions. Check out our work and get in touch to let us know how we can help you meet your goals. 

Categories
Restaurant Marketing Communications Trends

Branding Opportunities for Multi-Location Restaurants 

Branding Opportunities for Multi-Location Restaurants 

Restaurant marketing is always changing, and when you have multiple locations, keeping up with how to best promote your restaurants can seem even more daunting. Today’s marketing trends lean towards local, with an emphasis on highly-targeted messaging.  Here we break down a few local marketing must-dos plus other trends that will help you gain a competitive edge. 

Update Information on Your Restaurant’s Website

One of the most important things you can do to increase your visibility online is to make sure your website is up-to-date and informative, as over a third of diners find restaurants through websites. The best website design includes relevant local content for each of your location’s pages, including location data, hours of operation, the address and the business name. Photos and information on local offers and specials can also go a long way in helping you show up in Google’s search results.

Take Full Advantage of Mobile Local Search

Speaking of search, you really can’t underestimate the power of it. Invest time and money if needed to make it work for you—and you will reap the benefits. As a multi-location restaurant, you likely compete for high-volume search terms like “bbq near me” or whatever is applicable to your restaurant. 

Let’s look at a few things you can do to improve your rankings:

  • Make sure your Google Business Profile listings are compete and accurate as Google prioritizes listings with no errors or inconsistencies.  
  • Ask for reviews on your Google Business Profile—your search result will also be prioritized if you have good reviews of 4+ stars or more.
  • Increase the number of mentions of your restaurants across the web and one your website. The more citations you have, the higher you will show up in local search. 
  • Post text and photos directly to your Google My Business listing. Keywords in that post can be found when a customer searches for a certain term. 

Step Up Your Social Media

Another important platform to attract new customers is social media, of course. It’s reported that more than 84% of all customer impressions happen on location pages for multi-location brands, rather than the brand’s corporate site.

As a multi-unit restaurant, make sure each of your locations has its own social media presence to engage with local audiences. Localized social media posts can also help to boost your SEO rankings. Another advantage of local restaurant pages is that you can get a great ROI on paid media posts if you have the budget to expand beyond your organic reach. In addition to local pages, don’t forget to embrace user-generated content and encourage your guests to share photos or use a branded hashtag. 

Go Back to Branding Basics 

If you’re not sure where to start when opening your second restaurant, don’t be afraid to take what worked from your original marketing strategy and try duplicate it for this new location, especially if it was a success with customers the first time around. Just be sure to keep a consistent look and feel across all locations to help strengthen your brand. You could also consider standardizing your menus at each location and promoting the most popular dishes that made you famous in the first place. But no matter what, don’t forget that the proof is always in the pudding—and whatever marketing tactic you use won’t be effective unless your food and service are at the highest quality they can be.

Looking to give you marketing efforts a boost but not sure where to begin? With years of experience helping multi-location restaurants succeed and grow, we’re here to help! Check out our work and don’t hesitate to get in touch. 

Categories
Restaurant Branding Digital Media

Using Photography and Short-Format Videos to Promote Food and Beverage Products

Using Photography and Short-Format Videos to Promote Food and Beverage Products

Advertising by its nature is a visual medium, but with the proliferation of social media, the impact of photo and video really can’t be underestimated. As early as 2018, an estimated 84% of communication was visual, and it’s no surprise that video content generates the highest engagement of all online advertising. Video also has enormous persuasion power. In fact, 84% of customers say a brand’s video convinced them to buy a product or service. And it’s reported that people share videos twice as much as any other form of content. 

So for brands with highly visual products, like beverages, it only makes sense to use these mediums to their full potential. Here are a few tips for how drink brands can tap into the unique opportunities that exist within the beverage marketing space and how to boost engagement using photography and short videos. 

Embrace the Platform 

When thinking of beverage product video ideas, don’t be afraid to fully take advantage of the social media platform that the content will be posted on. Videos should be entertaining and, by and large, fun. Utilize music and even humor if it’s right for your brand. Keep things short—more than half of videos created by businesses that are less than 90 seconds are watched to completion. And don’t worry about needing expensive equipment or an expert editor. The camera on your smartphone should be able to shoot high-quality video and you can utilize the robust editing tools native to the platform or those offered by third-party apps.

Test Recipe Videos

Recipe videos have been only growing in popularity, and TikTok is helping to fuel that trend. When trying to decide on the content for your beverage product videos for marketing your brand, consider what your spin on recipe videos could be. It might a recipe that uses your beverage, a snack to enjoy with your beverage or a fun combination of the two. Either way, keep in mind that most viral recipes are five ingredients or less, and it’s been reported that 80% of top videos are 20 seconds or less.

Utilize Influencers

If you’re struggling to come up with beverage product marketing photo or video ideas, you might consider working with social media influencers. They’re a great way to raise brand awareness and have highly creative and high-quality content out there promoting your brand. Influencers will take care of production and editing, which can be attractive to brands that might not want to take that on themselves. Most importantly, influencers have a built-in audience to connect with your brand, allowing you to reach more new customers. 

If you’re looking to up your photography or short-form video game, but aren’t sure where to start, we welcome you to check out our work. We’re full of ideas on how to take brands to the next level with exciting content, and we’d love to chat to see how we can help you do the same. 

Categories
Social Branding Lifestyle Trends Education

The Future of Education Marketing in the Metaverse

The Future of Education Marketing in the Metaverse

As you know by now, the idea of the metaverse has started to gain more and more popularity as many leading companies and brands are starting to shift their attention to the newest frontier, Web 3.0. This next evolution of the internet sees online experiences evolving, creating communities where users can immerse themselves within a virtual world or brand.

Metaverse Marketing

Although the term metaverse has just recently gained mainstream relevance, there have already been versions of the metaverse that companies have been collaborating with. Games like Roblox partner with brands like Gucci and Vans to create visual worlds that users can explore to learn more about the brand. 

Tips for education marketing in the metaverse

But these virtual experiences aren’t limited to just businesses—education marketing in the metaverse can give prospective students a better understanding of your school and what you have to offer. Here are some tips for education marketers on how to effectively leverage the metaverse to promote your institution.

Tip #1 – Prospective student meetings

Through the power of the metaverse, enrollment teams will have the ability to meet with prospective students in virtual rooms, instead of being separated by hundreds of miles.

Meta, formerly Facebook, is already using settings like this in their new virtual technology called “Horizons Worlds,” providing users with virtual spaces where your avatars can meet with others. These virtual experiences can create a sense of intimacy that is lost on a video or phone call.

Tip #2 – Virtual campus tours

Bring your campus to life in the metaverse and allow prospective students to take a tour of your campus. Virtual tours can include a game day experience, giving future students the best seat in the house for the big rivalry game. You can show how your school’s traditions are truly unique and allow the guests to take part.

Research shows that students who visit a campus before applying to a college are two times more likely to matriculate. These experiences are essential to the admissions process, and taking it to the metaverse allows potential students to be fully immersed into the campus no matter where they are.  

Tip #3 – Virtual in-class learning

With the power of VR (virtual reality) and AR (augmented reality), your online learning experiences can be transformed to immerse students in their education. 

In recent years, online learning has seen a significant increase, but students are claiming that this new mode of learning leads to feelings of isolation. These online learning environments often lack the human interaction that in-person classes provide.

Marketing the use of VR and AR in your online classrooms can show prospective students that your programs look to provide the community and interaction that many online learning programs currently lack. Instead of students and professors being trapped inside boxes on a screen, they can walk around and interact with one of another.

Why Push?

Here at Push, we’re always looking for ways to maximize the reach of our higher education brands, and with the increasing potential that the metaverse holds, we want to make sure our brands are utilizing the technology to its fullest potential. To continue learning more about how you can grow your college or university’s enrollment, check out how content marketing funnels can grow student enrollment.

Categories
Restaurant Social Marketing Communications

How Restaurants Can Use Cause Marketing to Enhance Branding

How Restaurants Can Use Cause Marketing to Enhance Branding

Restaurant owners and marketers know more than anyone how important it is to form a strong relationship with customers. Creating shared values promotes brand loyalty and increases word of mouth. Cause marketing is one way restaurants can connect with their customers.

As a branding strategy, cause marketing is on the rise and is becoming significantly more important as millennials expect more from the places they do business with. They don’t just want a nice restaurant experience with a good atmosphere, they want to know that their hardearned dollars are doing something for the greater good. In fact, it’s been reported that 91 percent of millennials are willing to change their buying habits to support brands that rally behind a social cause.

So how can you implement cause marketing into your business? Here are five tips to take your strategy to the next level:

1. Align with a cause that actually makes sense for your brand.

Finding a cause that is the right fit for your restaurant is crucial to any successful cause marketing program. With hundreds of social causes to choose from, there should be one that speaks to the heart of your brand and even the hearts of your guests.

2. Commit to your cause.

Whether you’re giving a portion of your proceeds to a non-profit or committing to eliminating food waste by the way you dispose of unused food, you want your team to have total buy-in. Showcasing your whole team’s commitment to the cause and publicizing these efforts can help to build a connection between your restaurant and customers.

3. Leverage your cause in your marketing efforts.

No good deed should go unnoticed. If your brand is supporting a social cause, you may win some earned media through press coverage. Being a socially responsible brand can earn you an advantage over competitors. Your restaurants’ involvement with a charity may be your guests’ deciding factor when looking at their dining options. The content of this document/layout will be officially proofread prior to the final approval of the art or copy document.

4. Authenticity is a must.

If the cause chosen is one your brand is truly passionate about, it should sell itself. Let the message organically show through your marketing choices. Here are a few cause marketing examples that were well received because of their authenticity. Consumers know an inauthentic message when they see one, which could potentially result in catastrophe for your restaurant’s image.

5. Learn how Push can help with your restaurant cause marketing.

We’re always here to help you strategize and execute a strong cause marketing campaign or platform. Just take a look at the work we did for Sonny’s BBQ. Restaurant store design, marketing strategy and brand positioning are a few other ways we can help your restaurant build a strong, relevant foundation for its future. Check out more of our work here.

Not sure if an agency is right for your restaurant? Our recent article about bringing a branding agency on board might help you decide!

Categories
Retail Marketing Communications Digital Media Advice Trends

Using SMS Marketing to Get Return Customers to a Retail Shop

Using SMS Marketing

Despite recent events sky rocketing the success of retail SMS marketing, text strategy has steadily grown in the last decade. From time pressing promos to lapsing coupons, retail SMS marketing campaigns have proven to be a more effective marketing channel than email campaigns. You’re able to send short, to-the-point, high priority messages straight to the consumer’s preferred channel of communication. When it comes down to it, 78% of shoppers say SMS is the fastest way to reach them and they are six to eight times more likely to engage with text messages than emails.

In fact, 99% of SMS marketing campaigns are read and email marketing has failed to meet the same metrics, dropping 47% in open rate performance over the last 5 years. Through open lines of communication, like text messaging, you can make your retail shop more accessible. Social media platforms and SMS marketing allow shoppers to interact with your brand on a personal level. Sharing feedback and coming face to face with your brand’s voice in casual settings are just a couple of reasons shoppers are able to build a relationship and trust with your store.

Retail SMS marketing technique wins engagement over shoppers at every level of the marketing funnel. Whether they are prospects or existing customers, shoppers signed up for your store’s SMS marketing builds customer loyalty and fosters repeat purchases. Once you have their information, you can send new discounts or products available your shoppers might be interested in.

You can make your retail SMS marketing campaigns more successful by sending personalized and pertinent messages. Bulk text blasts are a thing of the past and are not viable in the retail industry. One-to-one messages deliver content shoppers truly want to read and have the potential to communicate your brand’s voice, values and image on a completely different level. To see how Push has helped retail stores seize their potential, check out our case studies.

So how can you push retail SMS marketing messages to drive sales? Here are four tips get shoppers back in-store.

1. Deliver discount details:

When shoppers know a sale is starting, and more importantly ending, it will drive more traffic to your store and website to purchase before the promotion is over.

2. Send can’t miss coupons:

More often than not, coupons are extremely timely. They are a simple marketing strategy to attract shoppers for saving on regular prices. But it also positively impacts your customer loyalty, therefore increasing repeat purchases.

3. Enrolled loyalty program messages:

If you don’t already have a loyalty program, you should consider setting one up for your loyal shoppers. Personalized messages are important to this audience because you are making their shopping experience quicker, easier and personal. Loyalty programs not only measure repeat purchases but connects your brand to shoppers.

4. Seasonal sale reminders:

These promos bring in big bucks and helps sustain stores during slow periods. You can also build off of these sales to increase loyalty among shoppers.

For more strategies on how to drive traffic to your retail store, check out our previous blog titled 5 Strategies to Bring Customers Back to Your Retail Shop.

Email marketing may not be completely out of the picture, but shoppers are 40% more likely to convert when they receive text marketing. If your goal is to drive in-store traffic and increase repeat purchases, retail SMS marketing is a useful resource. Short, concise and personalized text marketing, according to the voice and tone of your brand, has shown statistical success and can help your store grow in more than one aspect. 

Categories
Restaurant Branding Digital Media Advice Trends

When is the Best Time For Restaurants to Bring on a Branding Agency?

When is the Best Time For Restaurants to Bring on a Branding Agency?

Have you ever sat back and wondered, “Why are guests choosing my restaurant?” When it comes down to it, there are a multitude of options for eating out, and guests are looking for great taste and an even better experience. Details like restaurant design style, staff attitude, menu marketing and brand image work together to deliver a unique story and selling point for your consumers.

Maintaining your restaurant’s brand is as important as laying the foundation that solidifies and stimulates the growth of your customer base. Keeping a close watch on quickly evolving trends and aesthetics will help you identify when your brand is due for an update. Timing is everything. Hiring a restaurants branding agency could be a game changer for your business strategy. But what most leaders don’t know is the time to hire is now. Here’s why:

Bringing on a restaurants branding agency earlier in the game will win you more in the long run.

Designing a brand from scratch when you don’t know where to start is a tall order. Especially if you don’t know what questions to ask or how to put your mission on display for the world. That’s why it’s important to understand the value of investing in a restaurants branding agency. Hiring outside help may seem intimidating, but in actuality, the uneasiness is temporary and the pay off is epic. Some of the most eminent leaders in the restaurant industry knew having a well-defined, and relevant brand, would give them the space to run their business more efficiently and effectively. And they wouldn’t have to worry about rebranding down the line because they already have an established partnership with professionals who know how to monitor, maintain and refresh their restaurant brand.

Laying a solid foundation builds up your brand’s future

Restaurant guests want to invest in brands they know align with their own values. In fact, 64% of consumers say that this allows them to trust and build relationships with businesses. Giving your brand a personality also gives it a place to live in the market. That’s one of the benefits of partnering with Push, we have restaurants rebranding down to a science and can help you create an identity your customers can connect with.

Establishing a brand that is flexible enough to stay relevant and consistent allows it to evolve

Remaining stagnant does not foster growth or development in any aspect of the industry. We live in an ever-evolving era that dips, twists and turns at the share of one social media post. It’s important to stay aware of the changes happening around you so you can shift quickly. If you witness new trends appearing among your audience, you should trust your customers’ judgment and follow their lead.

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Bringing on a restaurants branding agency to update and maintain your brand allows you to increase your bottom line by attracting like-minded franchise partners, employees dedicated to and passionate about your mission and values and developing trusted relationships with your guests.

Interested in seeing how Push put restaurant brands on the map? Restaurant store design, marketing strategy and brand positioning are just a few ways we help restaurants build off of a relevant, strong foundation for their future. Check out our work here.

Categories
Retail Social Branding Marketing Communications

4 Ways to Use Social Media for Retail to Drive Sales

4 Ways to Use Social Media for Retail to Drive Sales

Social media platforms are very powerful tools for brands. And while their primary use is for sharing content and customer engagement, there are ways to use social media platforms to drive sales. Here we discuss 4 ways brands can use social media to make their cash registers ring. 

Identify the correct platform to activate.

Different social media platforms are utilized in different ways by different audiences. Knowing what you want to say is great, but knowing where best to say it is equally important. Your message, your offer and your desired audience should dictate which social channel you choose to activate. While not all social channels will directly drive in-store sales, all platforms should be used in ways to help you reach this goal. To get the right social media mix, you need to analyze each social channel to determine where your audiences are and how they behave on the platform. Then tailor your campaign messaging and calls-to-action accordingly. 

Use your social media channels to showcase your brand’s voice.

Social media platforms give brands the opportunity to speak directly to their followers, fans and the public at large. In fact, 60% of consumers engage with brands across their social channels  before making a purchase.  By consistently using your brand’s voice across all channels, your current and potential customers will better understand who your brand is, how you speak, and what you stand for to determine whether or not they want to engage, interact, and ultimately purchase something from you.  That’s not to say you say the exact same things in the exact same ways across all channels. There is a time and a place to let your brand’s hair down if you will. For example, Wendy’s brand voice on Twitter is notoriously irreverent, sarcastic and even combative, whereas their voice on Facebook, while still fun and irreverent, dials down the combativeness and dials up the legit customer service responses.

Make your store accessible and shoppable directly on social media platforms.

Of all the retail social media tips, this one is a bit of a no-brainer, but critical to driving sales, both online and offline: make sure customers can access your store without leaving their current social media platform. At the very least, you should provide your store’s key information on all of your social channels—URL, physical address, phone number, hours of operation, etc. But various social channels now offer ways to showcase and sell your products within their platforms. For example, Instagram allows you to create a shoppable feed where users can view and purchase tagged products within lifestyle images and checkout without ever leaving the app. Your online efforts pay dividends offline as well. After following a brand on social media, 84% of people will visit the brand’s physical store closest to their home. 

Increased Reach through paid ads.

As social media feed algorithms continue to evolve and organic reach declines, paid social advertising is a great way to reach your desired audiences. Most social media platforms provide the powerful ability to create custom audiences to advertise to that can greatly increase traffic to your business. With an effective paid social media strategy, you will be able to see tangible data and results that could provide key insights into your overall target audience and positioning in the marketplace. You can even tailor ads to specific objectives like click-throughs, reach, impressions and engagement. These tools allow you to truly streamline your message and customize your ads to make them extremely effective with the audiences that matter to your brand. 

We hope you find these tips helpful, but if you need assistance with retail social media marketing, don’t hesitate to reach out—407-841-2299.