With social media use up drastically this spring due to Coronavirus and social distancing, it can be overwhelming for a business to decide which social media site is the best place to advertise. From media sharing sites, to photo sharing sites, to blogs and forums there are lots of options. However, because there are so many different platforms, not all are the same. Each different platform offers different strengths and different weaknesses. That is why, it is important to find the site that best suits your company’s needs. Here is an overview of some of the best places for your company to advertise on social media.
The main reason that LinkedIn is a great place for your business to advertise is because LinkedIn is made for professionals. The people using this site are likely educated, well-connected and interested in what different businesses have to say and offer. Not only does it have professional users, it provides a database of over 433 million user accounts – that’s a lot of people. In terms of advertising, there are options. LinkedIn allows the advertiser to target ads too which is a plus.
While Facebook users are a less defined group than LinkedIn, since the site isn’t just for professionals, the ability to reach a large amount of people through advertising on this site is obvious. And even though the site isn’t centered around professionals, there are still tons of professionals that use Facebook. Like LinkedIn, Facebook also allows advertisers the ability to target a specific audience. There are many different ways to do this including the more basic way of targeting by gender, age, geographic region, etc. However, there are other ways to target too. According to a post on Hootsuite, advertisers on Facebook can “use [their] own data and combine it with Facebook’s data, to better target those people who have visited [their] website before.”
Additionally, Facebook has a split ad testing tool which “allows you to find the best audience for your ads to see which performs best.”
Instagram’s ad platform has become quite robust (as it’s part of the Facebook ad platform too). The ad capabilities are similar to those of Facebook, but the audience is slightly different, so don’t expect the same exact results. What’s cool too, is that you don’t even have to have an Instagram account to advertise on the platform because of the Facebook ad umbrella!
Twitter has 310 million monthly active users, so like LinkedIn and Facebook, it has the potential to reach a large amount of people. Twitter works differently than the other two sites but when using it as an advertising tool, there are multiple ways to effectively reach an audience. A few ways to utilize Twitter as an advertising platform is to look at different options such as promoting your account, promoting your tweets, and promoting trends. Each one is a little different but each of them helps target the audience and get attention for your business. Promoting a trend will get the most viewership and attention but it depends on your individual company needs and budget. Additionally, there are many professionals on Twitter because they use it as a personal learning network or PLN where they can share and read articles on certain topics. Therefore, if you’re offering a relevant service or product to professionals, this is still a great place to catch their attention.
Always Evolving
Social media ads are constantly evolving, making it a huge opportunity for most brands. As you partner social media ads with pixel codes and retargeting strategies, you can make moves toward omnichannel campaign strategies. As more and more people are utilizing social media to stay connected this year, let’s be willing to take advantage of these opportunities in our digital ad strategy!