Social Media vs. Social Media Marketing

Blog

What comes to mind when you think of social media? If we had to guess, we’d say fun, lighthearted sharing with those in your circle. The idea behind social platforms is primarily to keep up with the life events of people you care about.

What about social media marketing? This is when we suspect the alarm bells start going off—most people don’t know the difference, even if they think they do. Social media marketing is our team’s bread and butter, so let’s break down the disconnect.

What’s the Big Deal?

Ultimately, the difference between social media and social media marketing is simple—ROI. We’ll often run into people who don’t believe social media works. We disagree, but only when whoever’s running the accounts knows the difference.

Excuse our bluntness, but many brands don’t see ROI because they don’t consult with experts. Either they pass off social media to the inexperienced intern because “they’re young and grew up on social media,” or someone on the team thinks they can handle it because they have a few hundred followers on their personal account.

Neither option will generate success.

Put in the Effort

Good (emphasis on the good) social media marketing doesn’t come easy. It requires:

Ideation
Auditing
Research
Strategy
Intention
Collaboration
Execution

Versatility
Analysis
Evolution
Agility
Time
Money
Resources

The list truly goes on and on. This is why experience and understanding are paramount to effectiveness. Is it better to invest completely into making a social media marketing effort effective or to have an under-qualified employee waste time every day posting silly things that won’t impact revenue? Are we biased? Sure—but to us, that’s an easy question to answer.

Be Realistic

Social media marketing is what we do every day. And we do it well. We do our research, keep up with trends, analyze each bit of content we post for our clients, review everything, and then review it again. We look at the numbers; we evolve our strategies.

With that effort comes consistent rewards. We often garner engagement and click-through rates well above industry averages; we get our clients qualified leads, volunteers, event attendees, donors, etc. Honestly, we don’t say this to self-promote. We say it to demonstrate what can happen when brands put social media marketing before social media.

We also want to remind you that digital marketing agencies and experts, though we’re not magicians (unfortunately), always ALWAYS have a method behind our magic.

Success and ROI don’t happen overnight. Virality isn’t something we can will into existence; it’s not even what we aim for. We strive for sustainable growth, longevity, results, and actual effectiveness. Temporary virality doesn’t get you that.

Trust the Pros

Collaboration is everything. You know your audience and brand better than we do, but we know social media. Our magic works best when we learn from our clients about their audience, mission, and what makes their universe go around. In turn, they trust us to get results.

Can we support your social media marketing efforts? Get in touch with us today!