With customers, friends, celebrities, and just about anyone. It offers news and breaks stories faster than any traditional media channel can.  Social networks connect people around the world, regardless of marketing budget, money in the bank, or other economic factors. Its level playing field makes it perfect for building a community of engaged people. It is vital to remove the layer of impersonality that usually exists between consumers and companies. Providing your followers a glimpse into the heart of your business is a great way to increase engagement and trust. These are key targets when implementing a branding strategy and social media is ideal for going beyond the hard sell of marketing and creating brand awareness.Social media is a powerful tool for small businesses on eCommerce platforms to use for brand visibility.

Through social media, your business can:

Be more approachable – Social media can be contributed to on the fly, which makes it ideal for reacting to changing situations and responding to customer queries or concerns in real-time.

Talk to your customers – Customer service is an important aspect of running a business. However, this doesn’t have to mean a stuffy call centre and rigidly scripted responses. Allowing your team to interact with your audience can create relatability and give your brand the perception of being more human.

Understand the demographic – This makes it a great opportunity to gain nuanced information that will help inform other marketing efforts. Social media is the ideal way to discover more about the gender, age, and location of your customers, as well as information about their likes and dislikes.

Discover the social network that best suits your business

There are now dozens of social networks around the world. The most popular, like Facebook and Twitter, open up a huge audience, but their sheer size makes it difficult to make an impression. The smaller networks, such as Instagram and Google+, have a smaller number of users, but it can be easier to catch the eye in a niche market.

Competing networks are also great for promoting your posts on the others. Post on Facebook, then tweet about. Post a great image on Instagram, then add it to your Google+ profile. There are many ways to utilise social media and it is a matter of testing to discover the ones that work best for you company.