According to Statista, the current figure for daily active social media users is 3.78 billion – almost half of the world’s entire population! And this number is only forecasted to rise more and more in the coming years.

With such a vast audience at your fingertips, using social media as a valued tool should be an essential part of your marketing strategy. If you’re unsure of how to tap into the world of social media, or you’d like more information its potential, here are some of the main ways it can benefit your business.

Brand Awareness

With over half the world’s population using social media, there is no greater place to spread brand awareness. Platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn all have huge audiences which you can use to grow a loyal following of clients. And it’s not just existing consumers who will support you – 83% of Instagram users say they discover new products on the platform.

Make It Personal

Investing in the power of social media means that you can create a unique online presence to showcase the personality of your company. People are much more likely to buy into your products and services if they feel they connect with you on a personal level.

Humanising your company by creating business accounts on various social media platforms, allows you to demonstrate a richer and more authentic side of your business. This, in turn, helps with customer loyalty and retention.

Invest In Influencers

Creating partnerships with famous influencers is an efficient way to generate leads. If you’re a small business looking to expand quickly, there’s no better way to get your brand out there than using an influencer to give you a shout out to their loyal followers, encouraging them to invest in your products or services.

We spoke to Dan Conboy, Managing Director at Statement, on how businesses can effectively utilise influencers for their brand: "You either need to create it yourself by doing something bold and different or you need to attach yourself to someone who's doing it already. If you have a specific target audience, then why not collaborate with influencers to create a community and ultimately hype around your brand?"

Promotional Ads

Social media isn’t just great for giving your business an online presence and raising brand awareness. It’s an essential tool when it comes to marketing ads. Whether you want to push your products or let customers know about a competition you’re running, Facebook Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn provide business tools where you can promote your ads to target audiences. Whether you want to do this organically or with spend to reach further people, simply create the ad you wish to post and then select the demographic and audience you wish to target.

Provide Excellent Customer Service

These days, many customers take to social media platforms to report problems such as faulty items or delivery issues, or sometimes they may just want to direct message you in the hope of a speedier response. There are lots of online customer service tools that can help you keep your customer queries in one place, making it easy to monitor them and reply promptly.