Most businesses have come around to the idea that social media marketing can have immense value for their brand. Unfortunately, businesses aren’t always sure what that value is. That’s where social media goals come in.
Setting a social media goal doesn’t have to be complicated, but it does help to have a structure to guide you.
Set goals that get you where you need to be by making them “SMART”. They are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound.
1. Specific
What exactly do you want to achieve? It’s fine to start with a general direction, but your ultimate goal should be as precise as possible.
2. Measurable
How will you know when you’ve achieved your goal? If you can’t find a few quantifiable indicators to define success, your goal might not be specific enough.
You’ll want to think about which social metrics you can use to measure your success.
3. Attainable
Did you set a realistic social media goal? If your goal is to reach a million dollars in sales, and you just launched your business yesterday, you haven’t set a very good goal. Try starting that journey of a thousand miles with a really strong first step.
4. Relevant
Does the goal fit into your overall plan? Each goal should be a focused piece of a larger picture.
Useful goals are relevant to a problem that needs solving. Consider conducting an audit of your current social media activity. This helps you better understand where you are and where you need to go.
5. Time-bound
Can you achieve the goal in a specific amount of time? If you can’t come up with a timeline for your goal, that might be a sign that the goal isn’t specific or attainable enough.
9 example social media goals
The social media goals you set should always reflect your organization’s specific needs. But many goals can be applied to almost any social media campaign.
The following examples will help you frame your work in concrete, actionable terms. All you have to do is make them SMART for your brand.
1. Brand awareness: Building brand awareness means increasing the number of people who are aware of your brand.
This goal is best in situations like launching a new product or breaking into a new market. It never hurts to make people more aware of your brand. But brand awareness is usually the first step to bigger things.
2. Brand reputation: Trust in your brand is one of the most precious commodities you can generate with your social media marketing. Goals to manage your brand reputation aim to influence your public’s attitudes about you.
3. Traffic to your website: Sometimes you just want to get eyeballs on your website. Your website is a key element in your social media presence. It connects a click on an advertisement to the rest of your online presence.
Increasing website traffic is a good goal to use when you’ve got your online presence in place and all you need is people to use it.
4. Community engagement: Engagement refers to any form of visible interaction with your brand on social media. Likes, comments, and shares are all forms of engagement.
Improving engagement can target the quantity or quality of your audience’s interaction with you on social media.
5. Boost conversions or sales: A conversion is when a user takes some kind of action on your social media posts or website. This can mean signing up for a newsletter, registering for a webinar, or making a purchase.
Say your brand has a strong social media presence that isn’t translating into a healthier bottom line. Conversion goals are especially useful in situations like these.
6. Generate leads: Not every interaction will result in a sale. To keep in touch with potential customers, you might want to set a goal to generate more social leads.
The leads that you generate can be any information that helps you follow up with a social media user. That includes names, email addresses, occupations, employers, or any other information they share.
7. Deliver customer service: Your social presence isn’t just about attracting new customers. It’s also a place to keep the customers you already have. Goals to improve customer service on social media can take on a variety of forms, including:
- Establish a new customer support channel on social media
- Reduce wait times
- Increase customer satisfaction
8. Gain market insights with social listening: If your biggest need right now is to find out what you need to know, you might want to set a goal to improve your business’s social listening.
Social listening refers to a two-step process. First, you track social media activity relevant to your brand. Then you analyze that information for insights about your industry.
9. Attract candidates for open positions: Using social media to fill open positions in your company is another kind of conversion. In this case, you’re targeting a particular kind of user interaction: submitting a resume.
If you follow the advice in these social media marketing goals, you’ll be well on your way to making SMART social media goals. Even if you don’t succeed, a SMART goal helps you learn from your mistakes. You’ll be putting yourself in a win-win scenario. Either you succeed or you gain valuable information.
SOURCE: Hootsuite
