The 7 Ways to Increase Sales Through Social Media
Lately, the internet has become a much more popular place. According to statistics from January 2021, there are 4 billion active users worldwide. Thus, 92.6% of people have accessed the internet through their smartphones at the very least.
Social Media can be a powerful tool for both your business and personal life. It is the perfect platform for connecting with current or potential customers, promoting your products or services, or simply keeping in touch with friends and family. While there are many ways to use social media, here are 10 of my favorites that have helped me increase sales through social media.
1. Offer generous offers and discounts
People like getting discounts. Discounts make people happy. Mostly because the discounted item is cheaper than it should be to start, making them feel rewarded for not buying an expensive product. But also because they get an opportunity to purchase something at the same price as everyone else, yet feels like they got a greater bargain because it seems rare that someone else pays full price unless they’re rich or just plain out doesn’t care about money.
Offering discounts is a good way to attract customers, but it’s vital that you make sure your offer is attractive enough. How? Well, for one thing, the discount has to be generous enough, so they feel like it’s actually worth buying with your discount. The most common type of discount is monetary ones.
2. Offer free shipping vouchers
Free shipping is always a good idea. Even more so when you have the opportunity to give it for free, with many stores, including those on social media, giving a slight discount on a product may not be enough to attract customers. That’s where free shipping can come in handy. While free shipping isn’t as common as offering a small discount, it can be an even more powerful incentive for customers to buy something.
However, like discounts, free shipping has to be generous enough, so it’s worth the price of buying from you. One good way of offering free shipping is by bundling your product with another product at a low sales price. Add in free express shipping, and you’ve got a customer.
3. Share personal stories, photos, and videos
People love content they can relate to. They want proof that your product is worth their money. Don’t ever assume they’ll believe you right away if you say your products are the best in the market without any proof.
Instead, show them pictures of happy customers using your products and share their testimonials or videos of people using your product. It helps that you’re not making it all about the company and your products but also showing customers that your brand is just like them in many ways.
4. Be active: Reply to comments and reply fast
Having a social media account is great for reaching out to more people, but it’s only half of the package. To really get people to notice your brand and interact with you, you need to be active on social media. That means no hiding behind a company account that’s just going to push out what everyone else has already seen over and over again while never replying to comments or questions from customers.
If you’re going to be active, be fast too. Being slow about responding to comments, questions, or inquiries from customers is only going to make them feel ignored, which will cause them to look for other brands without such a problem. That’s time and effort wasted on one customer when you could have gained five more customers in the meantime.
5. Repost content from other social media
People may stop by your page but don’t actively follow you and only “Like” something every now and then or just put it in their feed because they saw that someone else posted it first. While getting likes is important, it’s vital to get shared content as well.
The more people share your posts, the more exposure they’ll get. So instead of just clicking “Like” or offering a small comment, consider sharing their posts to your own social media timelines so even more people can see them and possibly click Like themselves.
Remember that being active on social media isn’t just about posting your own content but also reposting content from other people as well. It shows customers that you’re not hiding behind a brand account. Instead, you can engage them on social media through reposting other related contents.
6. Sponsor a giveaway
Not everyone can afford to offer a discount or free shipping, but what people do want is something for “free.” It’s why they love giveaways on social media. When you sign up for one of these services, you get access to thousands of brands sponsoring giveaways all at once, which means more exposure for your business brand.
It is effective because you don’t need to spend any money advertising your giveaway on social media. You can even pick a prize related to your product or business, which makes it easier for customers to notice and share with their friends.
Another reason why this is an effective marketing tactic is that it creates a sense of urgency among customers. They don’t want to miss out on the opportunity of getting something for free, so they’re more likely to act fast and click your brand’s social media pages faster than ever before.
7. Be consistent
You can’t just post something on social media once and expect people to flock to your store or buy from you right away. You have to be consistent by posting regularly, whether it’s a few times a day, a couple of times a week, or just one time a month, depending on what works best for your brand.
It is going to save you a lot of time and effort when having to think about what you’re going to post on social media. You’ll also save a ton of time by not putting off posting something because you don’t know what to say or when to say it.
If you want your brand name out there, create a campaign that people can follow or remember and run it on social media and your website. That way, people will be able to see your brand’s name more often and possibly click through to check out what you have to offer on your business website or purchase directly from there.
