Why Community-Driven Social Media Marketing is Crucial for Your Small Business or Nonprofit

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If you understand the importance of a healthy, vibrant community, then you’ll have the mindset to harness the power of social media marketing. Social media marketing is not only about getting your content online in a branded and consistent manner, it is also about connecting your messaging with the potential partners and affiliates around you who have their own audiences who need to know about YOU. Instead of thinking first about what content to create, we turn the paradigm on its head and think about our community, our audience and who needs to know about each post. Once we think about our audience, we develop a tagging strategy; only then do we begin to create great content.

Community is important for small business owners and nonprofits because it’s the backbone that supports us. Community helps these entities to amplify their messages. Innately, communities want their downtowns to thrive and they want the people who build businesses in these places to succeed. Being an entrepreneur or running a nonprofit can be like working in a vacuum. You wear all the hats and there’s never enough time in the day to think about your marketing and social media and get feedback and perspective on what your messaging needs to be. This is when you know it’s time to harness your community and connections and let them amplify your messaging and help you get in front of your prime audiences.

When you use social media as a vehicle to connect with other businesses, community groups and influencers, your social media marketing becomes very powerful. This is what hyperlocal really means. It means learning how to connect with people in your community, real life relationships being created and nourished and ultimately magnifying your message through reciprocal local support.

Instagram Stories

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If you aren't using the Stories and Highlights on Instagram yet, you need to start! It is a great way to get on prospective clients' feeds and show a bit of your brand's personality, a peak behind the scenes! Stories last for 24 hours but can be saved in the Highlights section under your bio. Here are some good reasons to use Instagram Stories for your business:

  1. Your Stories are "discoverable" which means that even people not following you can find your Stories!

  2. You can tag accounts and send them the Story directly. This is a fun way to support other businesses in your community!

  3. You can showcase services and products to help them stand out.

  4. Stories are a fun way to goose engagement with the Polls and Questions features

  5. It is a great way to show your personality, your passion for what you do and this will add to your following.

Write to us with any questions you have about Instagram Stories. We can't wait to see what you create! Make sure to follow us on Instagram @redrootmarketing where we share lots of social media marketing tips and we will be sure to follow you back!