For years, we have been encouraging small businesses to build a social media presence through our training sessions, client meetings and even networking events.
This is now that time where having that online presence can be really useful for your business. We’re being encouraged to socially distance, which all of our team are doing by working from home, but if you’re a retail or hospitality business who relies on face to face customer interactions these coming weeks are going to be hard to manage.
Here are a couple of simple tips that might help you:
Don’t Hide!
Up until now you might be afraid of saying the wrong thing, so you’ve been keeping your head down – now is the perfect time to make the most of your social media presence. Your audience want to hear from you so they can understand what’s happening with your business at this time.
Engage
Engage with your customer base by communicating your messages but also listening to their queries and empathising where possible. Let your customers know what your business and your team are going through and even share the positive things that you are witnessing in your community – we need hope!
What you can say?
Spend a bit of time to figure out what the messages are that you want to share online, whether it’s that you can offer an online service, deliveries or a call & collect service. Your audience at this time are looking for authenticity so don’t be afraid to share a message that might be personal, it will help humanise you and your business.
Tip: We always advise before jumping in that it is best to do an exercise with your team to decide what the key messages of the business are – your content should deliver on these key messages, which is a great way of keeping you on track.
Empathise
Before posting always try to put yourself in the mindset of the reader – people are in unusual circumstances, many of them are worried and try to take this into account when you post.
Is there a way you can help?
Your business may not feel like it’s relevant at the moment but is there anything else you can offer your followers or your community?
A fantastic example of this is many of the distilleries across Ireland and the UK who are now making much needed hand sanitiser to provide to the HSE and the NHS.
Is there any way we can help?
If you need a hand to get up and running let us know and we can get you trained up with a training session online.
For more social media advice keep an eye on our channels over the coming weeks, as I’m sure to have much more to say now that I’m trapped indoors!
Be safe..
Alma
