There are a lot of opinions on the effectiveness of organic social media in converting followers into leads and clients. While many marketers are skeptical, Forefront’s digital team has learned from experience – managing social accounts for dozens of clients, and learning from the best in the industry at INBOUND 2023 – the power of these channels. Far from being a waste of time, organic social is one of the only marketing initiatives that both attracts and retains clients.
In the context of this article, social media content refers to company-generated posts that are not promoted via paid advertising, while social media strategy involves optimizing for platform algorithms and using best practices to maximize the ROI of such content.
Where most B2B fintechs fall short on organic social media is the latter: strategy. Firms are so focused on sharing their content that they often neglect the specifics of how their audience prefers to be communicated with. This leads to underperformance and missed opportunities. With so many companies pumping out an onslaught of content with little to no strategy, it’s not surprising that the misconception that organic social media does not convert followers to prospects is so widespread.
While curating valuable content is essential, creating a deeper, more meaningful connection with your audience means monitoring, listening and responding to conversations happening in your space.
When we think of relationship building, we typically measure success using metrics like follows, email subscriptions, form fills, etc. – in other words, ones that focus on the direct benefit to your firm. This one-sided relationship – consumers engaging with firms – is not enough. Instead, brands need to take their audience relationships to the next level by engaging followers in meaningful discourse and responding directly to their requests, praise and feedback. With this, organic social media becomes a two-sided relationship, building human connections to back up the impressions.
There are two primary means of fostering this deeper engagement: social monitoring and social listening.
Social monitoring is simple: firms scan for conversations they are tagged in and reply to the people and companies who engage with their content. Social monitoring goes a step beyond simply posting content and helps build trust between firms and their followers. When people know that a company they follow is open to input or responsive to concerns, they are more likely to think of that firm as reliable, authentic and worthy of their time and attention.
In the words of Brooke Sellas , Founder and CEO of B Squared Media: “Commenting [from a brand account] has one of the highest ROIs of all social media efforts.”
We’ve covered monitoring, but what about other conversations happening on social media? Your firm might not be tagged in these exchanges, but they can still be highly relevant to your business.
Social listening is the answer. Proactively finding opportunities to engage with and insert a brand’s voice into relevant conversations serves as another compelling touchpoint for followers who are considering purchasing from the company. It also introduces the firm to non-followers, expanding the audience. Engaging actively and meaningfully in industry discourse increases brand awareness, deepens trust and warms prospects for the sales team.
If you’d like to learn more about Forefront’s social media capabilities – organic and paid – please reach out here or to info@forefrontcomms.com.
Enjoying our limited series “Insights from INBOUND”? Check out the insights from our previous installment HERE.
