Make your business stand out! A quick guide to mastering social media for your business.

These days when social media plays such a big part of our lives, business owners can no longer ignore its influence over web traffic and ultimately, sales. If done right, it gives your brand a unique voice and helps you gain new customers. Countless brands have gained popularity from their posts going viral with the help of regular updates full of fun facts and valuable information. If anything, you should treat social media as a free advertising and marketing tool.

In this article I’ll walk you through some tools that will up your game on ‘socials’ without the need for a graphic designer degree.

Make a plan

Plan first and think about your future product launches, upcoming holidays and any campaign ideas you can calendar to roll out during the year, so you don’t miss anything important. You can then fill the gaps with more organic content. 

One simple idea is to create a short series of videos (YoutTube Shorts or Instagram Reels are some great tools!) or easy graphics where you talk about how to use your products.   Sharing your expertise will make the potential clients more likely to follow or subscribe. 

Introducing the ‘behind the scenes’ or showing ‘product sneak peaks’ are light and entertaining ways to showcase products and services. Users love an introduction to the team or to the office dog! (Dmac have an office dog!). This all helps in making your brand more approachable, friendly and fun. So now you have a plan in place and a couple of ideas for the first posts, let’s move on to how to go about creating an engaging post.

Pick the right tool 

There’s a variety of tools out there for every level of skill. Whether you need to edit your photos, create an engaging graphic or trim your video…there are tools online or a variety of phone apps to help you. See our blog where we go over some Handy online design tools that will up your website game and make updating it a breeze.

When it comes to social media, Canva is absolutely brilliant. It allows you to browse a large library of pre-designed templates and update them to suit your brand and a subject of the post.

The free account gets you started and offers access to some resources. Paying a small fee every month unlocks many more options, templates, stock images, videos etc. 

The editing options are simple to use and update for everyone. They even have a Beginner’s Guide that walks you through the platform, the tools, team setup and the actual design. 

If for any reason you don’t think Canva is for you, there’s a range of alternatives – both free and paid.

Staying on Brand

When creating your content you should try to keep things consistent. This will help to create an association with your brand. If your logo is displayed, it should follow the brand guidelines (don’t use the version from 5 years ago, change the colours or distort it in any way).

Start by updating your social channels with a profile picture/ cover image (where relevant). The images will need to be specific size in order to display properly. They tend to change now and then, but you can usually find an up to date guide on the Hootsuite’s website. This will ensure your logo shows up correctly across all devices, websites, apps…and posts aren’t weirdly stretched and distorted.

Your designer will provide the variations of your standard logo as an alternative colour version to use on top of the busy backgrounds. Make sure there’s enough contrast and your logo and any text are easy to read at all times.

Canva allows you to set up your brand – this means you can upload your logos (multiple versions), sample the colours used, choose the right fonts (you can upload your own) as well as keep any photos and icons/graphics organised and accessible. This makes updating their templates to suit your brand a breeze.

Keeping your branding consistent ensures your social media page looks professional, intentional and put-together. 

Creating a new design

1. Pick your format
   Select the correct size based on where and what you’d like to post. Canva has loads of pre-sets to fit all of the popular social media platforms.
2. Decide the essential information
   Think of all the essential information you need to add to your post. It should feature your logo, a message and a call to action. You can add some additional info, but try to keep it simple. Busy posts full of text are usually not eye-catching and might be hard to ready on a small mobile screen.
3. Have fun with your design
   If using Canva or any alternative platform, you can make things easier for yourself and find a template that’s close to what you’re trying to achieve. Find your design inspiration.
   Once you’re happy with your find, update it with your message, add a logo, slogan and any other crucial info. Remember that you can add more info into the actual post.
4. Update for your brand
   Go over each element and make sure the fonts and colours are consistent with your brand. You don’t want a green that’s similar to the one in your logo. You want the exact same shape. Use a colour picker if needed. 
5. Tidy up
   – Are all of the elements aligned nicely and not too close to the edges of your design?
   – Are the text and logo easy to read? Is there enough contrast?
   – Is the graphic not too busy? You might want to take something away and make the graphic easier to read on a mobile.
6. Resize and make a copy
   Resize your post to work as a reel! Creating two sets of graphics – 1080x1080px and 1080x1920px usually covers most of the social media post formats and is a good place to start.
7. Ask for feedback
   Show your work to a friend or a family member and see what they think. Getting someone to proof-read your work will help to spot the typos and mistakes and avoid embarrassment.
8. Schedule your post.
   Most of the social channels give you some sort of insight into the best times to post. This will ensure your work doesn’t go unnoticed and that you make the most of your audience.
9. Keep Canva organised
   Name your files. This will help you find the older posts so you can update and reuse them again as the time goes on. 

Keeping your social channels fresh is a great benefit to your business and can be fun too. It’s a fantastic way to improve and expand your business and to attract new followers and customers.

You can engage with your users and get immediate feedback or even ask for the suggestions on new products or services that your audience might be  looking for. 

While there is a bit of a learning curve to navigate, once you find your voice and become familiar in making  the most of the design tools, it only becomes easier. 

If after all this, you decide that messing with the design and graphics isn’t for you, feel free to reach out to us. Whether it’s a once off help or you decide to purchase an ongoing support/ maintenance/ digital marketing contract – we’re here to help with your website and social media needs.

While it takes some learning curve, once you find your voice and learn to make the most of the design tools, it only becomes easier.