In today's digital era, more and more business relationships take place online. A presence in social media is therefore becoming increasingly important. Through your social media activities, you have the opportunity to convey an authentic and likeable presence. But how do you achieve this?

The key is an effective social media concept. In this blog post, we show you what content your concept should have and how it is created.

1. Goal setting

Goals provide a clear direction and help you focus on what is important. It also allows you to measure and evaluate the progress and effectiveness of your social media activities. Therefore, set both short-term and long-term goals for your success.

To make the goals as realistic as possible, they should be defined SMART. SMART stands for specific, measurable, attractive, realistic and time-bound. You can set goals for your social media activities on the following topics:

• Brand awareness (increase reach, reach potential customers and gain followers).
• Engagement (increase interaction of the target group with the content)
• Lead generation (encourage newsletter sign-ups, downloads, enquiries for your products or services)
• Website traffic (drive more visitors to the website from social media, increase influence on conversion, sales or other website goals)
• Customer engagement and customer service (engage with customers and respond to questions / concerns / feedback)
• Influencer marketing (introduce brand and products to a larger audience to increase brand trust and credibility).

Once the objectives are defined, the target group needs to be identified.

2. Target group

It is worthwhile to engage with the target group in order to get to know customers better and at the same time to address new prospects. Finally, a detailed knowledge of the target group enables the creation of customised and targeted content.

A target group is defined as people with the same demographic, socio-economic and psychographic data. Based on this information, all persons in a group can be addressed with the same marketing measures. A persona is then created from each target group, which has the characteristics of the target group analysis. It is considered as a recipient:in the advertising messages and helps you to better understand the emotions, needs and values of the target group. Furthermore, it enables you to take the perspective of the customer.

3. Channel selection

There are a variety of social media platforms, and not every one is equally suitable for every company.

The most important factor when choosing platforms is your own target group. After all, your marketing measures will only be successful if they take place where your target group is. You may only reach part of your target group via one social media platform. In this case, it is advisable to combine different platforms - provided you have the necessary resources.

You should ask yourself further questions in order to be able to make your choice afterwards.

• Does the platform fit our goals?
• What kind of content do we want to create?
• What resources do we have available?
• Where are our competitors?

4. Design concept

Now it is clear who you want to address and through which channels this should be done. The next step is to develop the design concept. This involves defining various components that lead to a uniform appearance.

Profile design

The profile picture appears next to each post and helps to increase the recognisability of your company. The company logo is often used for this purpose. The header image can also be seen as a small billboard. It is a visual eye-catcher and offers the opportunity to convey important messages or content.

In addition to the images, information is of great importance, especially when it comes to searching for a company. It is advisable to include relevant information about your business. Further links can be created in the descriptions of the individual platforms. These details make it easier for potential customers to contact you and should be updated regularly.

Text

With the right words you create attention, establish an emotional connection to other users and convince with your advantages. You should always have the following guiding questions in mind: What do I want to achieve? Who do I want to reach? And on which channel am I writing?

Next, you should determine your writing style. For example, your style can be persuasive, serious and brief. Also consider the tone of voice. We recommend using the "you" form on social media.

Furthermore, you can decide whether you want to use emojis and hashtags. Emojis have a loosening effect on social media posts and support statements. However, the rule here is: less is more. The use of hashtags is a controversial topic. We are in favour of hashtags because they group topics and make posts easier to find. We recommend using a maximum of seven hashtags.

Visual language

The visual language defines the character of an image in the context of a uniform appearance. It is also an important tool for marketing communication. After all, a picture says more than a thousand words.

An image should convey meaningful content that prompts the user to make further decisions. For example, whether he clicks from a social media post to your website, subscribes to a newsletter or directly makes a purchase decision. Define the conditions for the design of the environment, colours, light, perspective and atmosphere.
 

Colours and fonts

Every brand has its own CI colours. What would Milka be without purple? Nivea without blue? Our brain automatically associates companies with colours. To increase the recognition value of your company, we recommend that you work with the existing CI colours.

The same applies to fonts. Use the already predefined fonts. However, test whether the fonts are suitable for social media and replace your texts with a neutral, easily readable font if necessary.

Video

The type of video that is successful for your company depends on your target group and the social media platform. To ensure that your video marketing is integrated into the communication strategy of the company, branding must of course not be missing here either. Therefore, define in your social media concept how the logo will be placed and how the colours and fonts will be used. Furthermore, you can record goals, framework conditions and topics that facilitate the creation. These components will give the video the necessary recognition value.

5. Content concept

The choice of topic is a decisive factor for the success of social media posts. It influences how well the target group reacts to the posts and how the profile grows as a result. The topics should therefore be based on the interests of the target group and always offer added value. Furthermore, current topics and trends increase the probability that non-followers will be interested in your posts and follow your profile. For the social media concept, we recommend that you collect, note down and tackle a few ideas.

6. Editorial plan

An editorial plan offers numerous advantages for organising content as well as communication effectively. It facilitates the timely creation of content, ensures a balanced distribution of topics and enables you not to miss important events and occasions.

For example, the editorial plan can be created in an Excel spreadsheet or in another organisational tool. Find out which application is best for you.

7. Measurement and analysis

Monitoring involves the targeted observation of social media activities. By regularly measuring key figures, successes can be measured and content adjustments can be made. To do this, use monitoring tools that help you collect the desired information. Examples are Instagram Insights, Google Analytics or Hootsuite. Also determine the frequency of the analysis and which key figures should be recorded. After a few weeks, you can evaluate the key figures and compare them with the goals.

Closing

As soon as all the content has been worked out, you can compile the individual components in a document and finalise the concept. Take a few hours for the elaboration and create a well thought-out social media concept - it's worth it!