7 Key Steps to Social Marketing Success in 2024

What’s working in the social marketing space this year?

Do we all need to join Reddit or marry a TikTok influencer? Maybe.

Will Generative AI transform all aspects of marketing? Absolutely!

Here is my advice on the critical social media marketing action steps to implement this year if you want to gain more visibility for your business and attract more customers and clients.

1. Make More Videos

Really? I have been advising my clients to do this for over 7 years. The major platforms are still rewarding this content form through their algorithms and showing it to more followers and even to non-followers. This makes sense as human beings process images 60,000 times faster than text. However, one of the real reasons the social media sites want more video content is that they are running out of advertising space. Ads made for video content are short television commercials by another name which will enable Meta and the other platforms to attract precious budget dollars previously earmarked for television promotions.

ProTip 1: Create long videos that can be segmented into short clips. All the major platforms have or will be introducing video editing features that help social media marketers take longer videos and turn them into short-form videos to upload as TikToks, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts.

OpusClip is an AI tool that can repurpose long form talking videos into shorter video clips. Don’t forget LinkedIn allows videos less than 10 minutes to be uploaded directly to the home feed.

Be sure to use software to properly caption the videos and try to outline logical mini-segments before you begin filming. This will help you have enough content to populate the social feeds for several days and weeks.

If you are working with a videographer, make sure he/she knows how to create effective social media content, not just documentary or talking head videos. Remember to shoot the videos in a vertical format.

ProTip 2: Vary your content on all platforms, especially on Instagram.
Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, recently stated that he expects Instagram’s algorithm to change so that more photo content will be distributed to followers. This is how IG got its start, and it is still one of the best vehicles for increasing engagement on the platform. After all, do we really start conversations on a Reel? Upload multiple photos in a carousel with text Hooks and Calls-to-action included on the photos. This will help you turn simple product photos into lead generators.

2. Study TikTok

Why should you study the content and popular trends on TikTok if your audience may not be on the platform? The answer is that for better or worse, Gen Z (72 Million) is turning to TikTok almost as often if not more, than to search engines for advice and product recommendations related to skin care, fashion, cooking, fitness, lifestyle, anxiety, job search and investment strategies among many other topics.

I did write for better or worse. Unfortunately, the site is filled with misleading and at times inappropriate advice. Yet, TikTok influencers are among the most popular and prominent promotional vehicles for marketers. Their content approaches and ability to entertain and engage their followers in an authentic way showcase the best practices for brands and businesses to test on other social platforms.

3. Invest in Influencer Marketing

The creator economy is on fire. According to Statista, brands are expected to spend in excess of 35 Billion dollars in advertising in the influencer market. An EMarketer report projects that Influencer marketing budgets will grow faster than social advertising spending this year.

Did you expect “influencer fatigue” to cause brands to shift dollars towards other promotional strategies? This is not happening yet, as the platforms are rewarding influencer content and offering additional incentives to keep these creators posting on their sites.

ProTip: If you have a limited marketing budget, consider collaborating with nano (1K-10K Followers) and micro (10K-100K Followers) influencers in your top geographic and demographic markets. This strategy allows businesses to focus on possible customers rather than large passive audiences.

Did you know there are several thousand influencer marketing agencies and dozens of online influencer matching platforms? The social media sites are also trying to match brands directly with influencers. Remember to do your homework and select influencers that will appeal to your target customers and support your brand values.

4. Revisit and Revamp Your YouTube Strategy

Since video is such an important content form, it makes sense to produce, distribute and promote content on the number one video platform. This offers businesses the benefit of engaging with a wider audience and enhancing their search engine optimization results at the same time.

YouTube videos will appear in search as YouTube is owned by Google. Encourage your fans to follow your YouTube channel and engage in conversations with them. YouTube’s audience is growing as cord cutters turn to YouTube to stream television shows and watch both long and short form videos on their televisions.

5. Build and Nurture a Community Around You and Your Business

Marketers are known to preach, “They come for the content but stay for the community”. How do you attract an audience that keeps coming back for more?
The first step is to have a social media manager that uses a variety of conversational tactics to interact with fans, respond to comments and foster engagement.

Enlist the help of creators to provide opportunities for followers to share content that is funny, meme-oriented and/or informative with their friends. Sales professionals, service providers, tech enthusiasts and industry experts can host and join group discussions through Facebook, Discord, Telegram, WhatsApp, Reddit, Slack, Twitter communities and even LinkedIn (hopefully these will improve in the future). Conversations and relationships are easier to develop in smaller rather than mass public spaces.

ProTip: Encourage employees to contribute content and act as ambassadors for your business.

Remember to keep the focus on your customers’ needs, wants and interests. Show them you really care, which is critical in this era when customer satisfaction is at an all -time low. Create Swiftys (Alpha fans or Stans) who will sing your praises on social media and follow you to the ends of the earth.

6. Spend Time Each Week Polishing Your Personal Brand

Regardless of your professional pursuits, it is critical for everyone to find a way to project and promote our expertise and value through a digital footprint. Speaking engagements, guest blog posts, podcast interviews, television appearances, industry publications and awards, book collaborations and social media posts, comments and livestreams are some of the ways to elevate the visibility of your personal brand. Don’t neglect this as your employees, employers, colleagues and competitors are watching.

                      AND OF COURSE

7. Leverage Generative AI (ChatGPT and AI platforms using its API) to Improve Productivity

You can’t spell marketing today without including Artificial Intelligence. Of course, this topic can fill numerous posts, presentations and books. Yes, you will gain a competitive advantage if you use generative AI to plan, create and produce social media marketing and advertising content. It is awesome and amazing!

Right now, it is critical to know more about your target market than AI tools so you can identify mistakes, hallucinations (made-up responses) and inaccurate conclusions. We are all receiving good and bad outputs from generative AI programs. They will improve over time but now it is like having a freshly minted intern, eager to please but often wrong.

The more specific the prompts you provide, the better the output. Prompt engineering takes practice. However, Beware of putting proprietary data and client information into a generative AI program as this data is not protected. The platforms are introducing ways to block the inputs from remaining in their networks.

I don’t believe this will really protect your information.

Be sure to experiment with this introductory list of generative AI tools and let me know which ones you find useful.
ChatGPT by OpenAI, Bing Chat, Google Gemini, CoPilot by Microsoft, Jasper.AI Quillbot and Copy.ai, and image generators such as Midjourney and Dall-E2. Ocaya.com is a tool that offers copywriting, graphic design and social media distribution in one platform.

Finally, I have a personal fear that generative AI programs will stifle creativity, allow for fake content that irreparably harms individuals’ reputations and turn marketers into data input operators. Until there are guardrails in place, do consider learning as much as possible about the technology, hire those who can master it and always include human inputs, analyses and edits in your final outputs.

Final Thoughts

If integrating Generative AI, Influencer promotions, YouTube Shorts and community building through the mainstream and secondary social media platforms while simultaneously building a personal brand sounds complicated – it’s a good time to reach out to #PickRobin’sBrain.

Today’s marketers are faced with a rapidly changing environment fueled by constant technological advances and disruptions. Many find it helpful to have a trusted guide to create the most effective plan for them and keep them, their colleagues and their vendors updated on the state of play with generative AI, social media and influencer marketing. I am ready to help.
Here’s to #MarketingSuccess and #MarketingMagic in 2024!