Starting your own business is exciting, there is so much to do and so much to learn. An important part of getting your business started is marketing and in today’s world, that means Social Media. It is free advertising, and it is the way people shop and look for services now, so it is critical that you get involved. 

Don’t rush in.  It’s best to do some planning first and get to grips with what you need.  Here is a quick breakdown of how to get started. 

1. Branding 

You will need a logo and a general theme (colours and fonts) to represent your business. When you come to create your business profile on Social Media, it is best to have these in place, so you can create your Brand straight away.  Create some paragraphs and sentences that really describe what you are doing. These will be useful to fill in your profile details.  Have you got your website, email address and phone number ready to use? 

2. Who are you talking to? 

Take some time to think about who your potential clients are? 

Where will they be on Social Media?  Young and trendy – then you need to go to Instagram. A bit older – then you need to head to Facebook. Targeting business owners – then try LinkedIn.   

How do you talk to them – what tone of voice do you use? Do you speak very formally, or do you use lots of emojis? 😊 

3. Collect images to use 

Take images of your products, your work environment, yourself, inspiration images of your life etc. If you struggle with this, do look out for copyright-free image sites like unsplash.com or pixabay.com. 

4. Do some research 

Go and look at similar businesses to yours. See what they are doing, get inspiration. Take notes of the words, images and types of posts they are using. 

5. Now to dive into the world of Social Media 

Start with one platform at a time, try to get that one set up fully before starting another one. You don’t want to spread yourself too thin.  Most platforms take you through a step by step procedure to set up Business Pages, prompting you to fill in and action certain things.  Take your time and click into everything, fill in everything and explore everything that you can do. It will not break, and everything is fixable and removable. So be brave and try everything. 

6. Start posting 

Deciding what to tell your potential clients can be a bit overwhelming. Do remember that Social Media is social, you need to be chatty, informative, interesting and fun. Don’t just sell, sell, sell – people will get bored and wander off.  So do one sales post a week and then do an instructional/interesting piece that relates to your business and do a fun piece showing who you are and why you love doing what you do.  Mix it up, make people want to follow you – and ultimately spend their money with you. 

7. Take it further 

Once you are comfortable with a Social Media platform, do push your boundaries.

On Facebook, join the local groups and start posting in there.

On Instagram, try doing reels and stories.

On LinkedIn, reach out to someone and start a chat. Be brave, chat to people, join in and be Social. 

Take a deep breath and get your business out there.

Remember it’s not like normal marketing – you can delete, edit, amend and change everything, so get posting and let everyone know you are there.  

This article was written by Fiona Service of Litus Digital