Does deciding what platforms to use for your social media budget make your palms sweat?

Today’s digital marketers can choose between dozens of established and emerging social networking sites. Many of these sites also offer a variety of different types of advertising.

So Many Options

For example, social sites today offer everything from “sponsored” posts, pay-per-click ads, boosts, video ads, and more.

Naturally, each business will benefit the most from their own unique blend of social platforms and advertising options. But determining the best method to allocate a social marketing budget can put your team in knots.

The Best Ways to Advertise on Social Media

It’s fair to say that most companies can only find the best places and tactics to attract new customers by testing different options.

Analytics are always going to be essential.

Since there are so many social media choices, businesses often don’t know where to start. If you aren’t sure which platforms to try first, you can learn from the experiences of other businesses that are targeting markets similar to yours.

B2B (Business-to-Business) or B2C (Business-to-Consumer)?

To get started, look at the type of audience you are trying to reach.

Are you a Business-to-Consumer brand (where you sell directly to the public) or are you a Business-to-Business brand that sells to other businesses?

Effectiveness Rankings

Recently, Social Media Examiner published an in-depth article about the Content Marketing Institute‘s survey about both types of marketers and their experiences on the effectiveness of advertising on various social networking platforms. While many marketers agreed that some platforms are than others, there was a distinct difference in the rankings based on whether the marketer was B2B or B2C.

Here are the “effectiveness” rankings of social sites and percentages from B2C marketers:

1. Facebook: 66 percent
2. YouTube: 53 percent
3. Twitter: 50 percent

(5. LinkedIn)

No surprise here.  Facebook dominates the B2C brand preferences for marketing effectiveness.

In contrast, look at the rankings and percentages from B2B marketers:

1. LinkedIn: 66 percent
2. Twitter: 55 percent
3. YouTube: 51 percent

(5. Facebook)

It might not surprise you that LinkedIn tops the list with B2B marketers and does less well with B2C brands. But it is more interesting to see that Facebook, the largest social networking site on the planet, actually only comes in fifth on the B2B list.

In fact, what’s interesting here is that LinkedIn ranked in Facebook’s fifth position on the B2C list.  Marketers are telling us that LinkedIn actually helped them engage with both consumers and businesses, not just other businesses. Of course, if you think about it, business owners and professionals who visit LinkedIn are also consumers.

The Takeaway

The main takeaway is that it’s important to start with a little market research to find where brands similar to yours are spending their budget.

Before becoming overwhelmed with too many choices, start with a marketing strategy using just one platform likely to produce good results for your type of business. Once you’ve optimized your campaigns on the initial site, you can branch out and experiment with others.

Let Us Help You Make Better Choices About Spending Your Social Media Budget

Over the last decade, we’ve helped many different kinds of companies profit from their social media spend. We’ll use our varied experiences with other companies and your own unique business to suggest a marketing strategy that’s crafted with your own objectives and growth goals in mind.

Get in touch with us today for a free consultation with one of our marketing experts to get more value out of your social media expenditures.