It is no secret that social media platforms make a lot of money from allowing businesses to advertise and keep in touch with their customers through those platforms. Any business person will know the importance of social media and how it can make or break a business, gaining or losing you customers at the click of a mouse. A well-managed social media presence can increase the profits a business can make, since it will reach customers that will otherwise never have heard of you. By the same token, we have all heard of businesses having a complete failure on social media and ending up being boycotted after making racist, sexist, homophobic or just plain stupid remarks.
The recent updates on the main platforms — Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube — aim to make the user experience easier and more pleasant. These updates are both relevant and advantageous to business users as well as personal users, and http://thepeloton.co.uk/ can help you to understand the changes and make them work for your business.
The recent updates on Twitter are all about the look and feel of the site. You now have the option to convert to the new-look Twitter, which is somewhat reminiscent of the Facebook newsfeed. If you decide to adjust the look of your Twitter, you will need to adjust your profile and cover photos accordingly. The other update on Twitter relates to Lead Generation Cards, which are now available to all businesses. These allow you to connect with people offline as well as online by downloading your leads and related reports and metrics.
Whilst Facebook regularly updates both as a website and on its mobile and tablet apps, the most recent changes are somewhat different in that they customise the user experience for each individual. This allows personal users to see the content that is the most relevant to them, and business users can utilise this to their advantage. Facebook is now favouring social conversations, breaking news stories and genuinely relevant information to show to personal users. This means that you have to put a little more effort into your Facebook platform maintenance in order to reach your customers. However, it also means that if your posts are well thought out, newsworthy and relevant, then they are more likely to be seen. As far as the layout of the pages is concerned, photographs are now larger and more visible, so relevant and eye-catching photographs will drive traffic to your page. Likewise, videos now play automatically unless users have specified in their settings that they don’t want them to. This makes the use of video marketing even more important on the platform.
This is the platform that has remained the most constant over the years, and it is considered more of a ‘serious’ social media platform, as it is aimed at business users. The recent changes have removed the ‘Products and Services’ tab from company profiles, suggesting instead that they post regular social updates. You will need to do this to ensure that traffic continues to be directed to your website from LinkedIn.
YouTube
As with Facebook, YouTube has always had regular updates to enhance the user experience. The use of YouTube by companies needs to be very cleverly done, since nobody wants to watch entirely promotional videos. Instead, it is better to post educational, clever, useful or funny content that people will want to watch, share and talk about. The recent updates have introduced the option to put a three-second introductory video on to the start of every video played from your YouTube channel. This can be used as a tool to promote your brand, but it must not be seen by YouTube to be an advert or product placement.