Holiday Social Tips for Your Business

The Holidays are right around the corner, and now is the time for your business to drive engagement with the excitement and buzz of the season. Holiday related hashtags and posts will be growing on social media platforms, making this a great time to use social media as a tool to drive your engagement. Here are some tips on how to own this season and curate an engaging feed!

Community

This season is about coming together and spreading joy. Here are some ideas that encompass holiday cheer: 

  • Collaborating with local artists and businesses on events or products is a great way to double the exposure of both businesses. 
  • Post flyers and social media graphics of upcoming events that your business is hosting or attending.
  • Showcase photos and social media graphics of small businesses to encourage shopping locally!

Promotional Items

‘Tis the season of giving! Advertise your holiday sales, local charity events, or giveaways with intriguing graphics, photos and captions.

  • Now is the time shoppers are looking for discounts- use this to interest potential customers with your holiday deals!
  • Use local charity events and fundraisers as an opportunity to get involved with the community and get your name out there.
  • Organize a calendar countdown giveaway to engage with your followers. Host a giveaway for a week or two, and give away a gift to one of your followers for every consecutive day of the countdown!

Holiday Inspiration

Use your page as inspiration for the upcoming Holidays with gift and decoration ideas, recipes, and DIYS that relate to your product or service.

  • Show off your product or service as a great gift idea.
  • Create DIY videos or picture walk-throughs that relate to your product or service to inspire creativity.
  • Post videos and pictures for an end-of-year recap.
  • Make sure to use popular Holiday hashtags to increase your engagement.

This Holiday season is the time to take initiative and step up your social media marketing technique! If you’re interested in taking your marketing to the next level, contact us at Smart Marketing Advertising Agency! We are a full service marketing agency located in Anderson, SC helping businesses with website design, logo design, digital and social media marketing, graphic design, SEO, branding, and so much more!

The Lasting Impact of Quarantine on Marketing Today

When COVID -19 shut down the world as we knew it, many businesses didn’t know what this would mean for their future. They had to change the way they ran in order to meet guidelines and keep their employees safe. Many switched to curbside pickup and contactless delivery, which are still very popular today even with most of America now back up and running. 

But what did Quarantine mean for marketing? 

As people were cooped up at home to stay safe, they spent more time online leading marketing to evolve to meet them there. 

According to research, the time spent online during lockdown saw an increase from the year 2019 to 2021, from 56 minutes to 65 minutes, respectively. The amount of social media users worldwide also increased by 11% between the years 2019 and 2021, from roughly 3.4 billion to 3.78 billion, according to the same study.

What were people doing online during this extra time?

The amount of time people spent watching videos in 2020 increased by 85%, making video the most popular type of content for the past two years. Quarantine saw the rise of the popular app TikTok, where a variety of videos, ranging from educational to funny, can be found on just about any topic.

According to Forbes, YouTube was also a staple for many bored-at-home internet users, seeing an increase from 73% of Americans frequenting their site to 81%

 

When are people getting online?

The pandemic also changed peoples’ habits when it came to what time they chose to get on social media. Research shows that now the best times to post on Facebook are Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 10-11 AM, and the best times to post on Instagram are now Tuesday at 11 AM or 2 PM, and Friday at 11 AM. 

All of these changes resulting from the pandemic have led social media to become the number one channel for marketing. Users like to see lighthearted or inspirational content from brands relevant to their interests, and social media likes to make it easy to find these people for any brand! If you need help pivoting your business towards this new marketing strategy, we’re here to help. 

 

Smart Marketing has been successfully helping businesses market their products and services for over 10 years. We can help you with anything marketing related from logo design, social media management, website design to large media buys for professionally shot videos.

 

Smart Marketing Advertising Agency

Anderson, South Carolina

Logo Design • Website Design • Digital Marketing

 

 

 

What are SMART goals?

When starting a new project it is always important to visualize what you want the end goal to be. We’ve all had those dreams that seem unattainable but that was only because we didn’t have a plan of attack! The same concept applies to marketing as well – if you don’t have an idea of your end goal and how to achieve it, then how will you know when you’re making progress? 

One way to track progress, set goals, and help yourself stick to them is by using SMART goals. 

What are SMART goals? 

SMART is an acronym that stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-based. Using SMART goals to help you visualize your steps to your goal will help you avoid creating plans that are too vague, aggressive, or poorly thought out. Plans that are not well fleshed out can seem daunting and lead to discouragement.. 

In marketing, SMART goals are used to achieve both an improvement in a company’s revenue and also an increase in their brand awareness with consumers. These goals for companies are usually based on what are known as Key Performance Indicators, KPIs

Companies who provide services may set goals around a specific increase in lead form entries. A product based company may set goals around an increase in a specific product sold following a campaign for it. For example, an X amount of increase in chicken wing sales after a new wing campaign is launched.

For brand awareness, a company may set a goal for engagement around their new campaign. They could also set goals around creating a higher quality email list, or a higher rank on Google following a new SEO approach. One tip for using KPIs for your company is to try and align your Revenue KPIs and Brand KPIs so that the effect your efforts are having on the company are more clear and easier to communicate. 

What does SMART mean? 

Specific – 

Be as specific as possible when setting a goal. The more narrow your focus the easier it will be to identify steps necessary for achieving it.

Measurable – 

What evidence will let you know that you are making progress towards your goal? If your focus is narrow enough then it should not be difficult to determine what you will measure success by. 

This is where those KPIs come into play. Determining KPIs for revenue goals are usually straightforward but choosing ones for brand goals can be more subjective. For example, if your goal is to create a higher quality email list then you could measure it by how many people are opening the email and clicking on the attached links. Set an increasing goal for each new email sent out and keep a record of your progress! 

Attainable – 

Is the goal you have set for your company attainable at this moment? Are there other steps to take first before you can reach this goal? Use past data to determine the possibility of reaching the goals you have set and if they seem like too big of a stretch, reevaluate. The objective is to have challenging goals but not to the point of discouragement. 

Relevant – 

Does this goal contribute to your long term goals for your company? Will achieving this goal be valuable for your broader objectives? 

Time-base – 

How much time will it take to achieve this goal even with a determined approach? Will this goal require a long research period before the actual implementation? If your goals seem to be more long-term, like 6 months to a year, then it may be beneficial to add in some shorter term goals to keep yourself and your team motivated. Setting up a realistic time frame for your goals will help you minimize time wasted and build confidence as you begin to see success. 

 

For full service marketing solutions turn to the pros of SMART Marketing! 

Serving Upstate South Carolina, Georgia and the greater United States since 2010

 

TikTok for Business – Yes or No?

 

TikTok has been around since 2018 but it was formally known as Musical.ly, an app where people would lip sync to songs. Since its rebranding to TikTok the app has experienced exponential grow in popularity.

 

TikTok now boasts 689 million users worldwide, putting it ahead of platforms such as Snapchat, Pinterest and Twitter in terms of monthly active users. Although the 689 million does not include China where the app operates under a different name, Douyin, and has 600 million DAILY users.

 

Together TikTok and Douyin have 1.29 billion active users. Users of the app spend an average of 52 minutes on the app each day, which is the same amount of time as Instagram and a little behind Facebook at 58.5 minutes.

 

These numbers are amazing considering the fact that Instagram and Facebook have been popular for much longer than TikTok, in fact it took Instagram six years to reach the amount of users TikTok gained in three. It even took Facebook, the king of social media, four!

 

Although the growing audience is always a good sign for marketers or business owners looking to explore new avenues, the demographic of the audience is very important as well.

 

The average user of TikTok is between the ages of 29 and 10 years old, skewing the audience for this app very young. While this audience may be perfect for some businesses, for others it is not ideal.

 

This younger audience takes to the app to watch engaging short videos of people making recommendations, cooking, dancing or even just talking. There are many large trends on the app people take advantage of to grow their following.

 

These trends can include dances, use of a specific sound over a personal video and/or use of a filter. The trends change rapidly but there is a tab on the app dedicated specifically to trending sounds and hashtags to keep you up to date.

 

Audiences on TikTok only respond well to authenticity. They do not want to see fakeness in videos, so advertising on TikTok would require more personable videos from business owners and their employees. Videos showcasing the process of making or packaging your product, videos of you performing a service or videos of employees being themselves.

 

For example, businesses such as dog groomers, power washers and jewelers have all found success on TikTok because people are interested in their work. Everyone loves a cute puppy, and many people find the process of grooming one relaxing. People also love to watch videos of power washers, or any other type of cleaning as well, because they find them relaxing and sometimes motivating to clean their own home. Whether they are a smaller business or quite large, jewelers find success on TikTok by showcasing breathtaking rings and their various styles, or by showing the process to make or clean their jewelry.

 

TikTok has created an editing software designed to help business owners create paid ads on their platform. These ads will appear as the first thing users see when they first open the app or as they scroll through videos and if they click on it, they will be brought to a screen with a little bio of your company and the rest of your videos.

 

Although these ads do work and help you get in front of TikTok users, posting an organic video and using popular hashtags to help it go viral will help your company find more loyal and enthusiastic customers.

 

Again, TikTok users are all about authenticity, so connecting with them on a personal level and promoting your business will make them more willing to like, comment and share your video, which in turn will help you get in front of more potential customers.

 

Overall, if you are interested in getting on to TikTok, I believe if you do some research, find out what other companies like yours are doing on the app and how successful they are, and if you are willing to put a lot of time into creating high quality content, and your target audience is between the ages of 18 to 24 or *younger….. then TikTok is a great place for you! Getting thousands of views is very easy on this quick pace app and many small businesses have found overwhelming support on the platform!

 

Smart Marketing Advertising Agency is located in Anderson, SC. We help clients with social media marketing, website design, branding, and implementing a strategic marketing plan.  Yes – we can help you with your TikTok campaign too!

 

 

 

Tips for Marketing and Advertising During the 2020 Holiday Season

Tips for Marketing and Advertising During the 2020 Holiday Season

 

The holiday season is the most important time of the year for many small businesses. Research shows that seven in ten small businesses identify the winter season are their top sales opportunity according to The Visa Back to Business Study – Holiday Edition.  The study also showed that SIXTY percent of Americans will do the majority of their shopping with local retailers this year!

In order to best take advantage of this trend here are some of Smart Marketing’s tips and tricks:

  1. Start EARLY

 

Since the holiday season is everyone’s busiest time of year, people are sure to begin looking for their holiday presents early, so the most important thing for a small business is to make sure that they are ready for the holiday customers. Given the current state of the world with the ongoing COVID- 19 Pandemic, people are also going to be looking to find their Christmas gifts early so they can be sure to have them under the tree in time for Christmas and not stuck in mailing limbo! Implementing your holiday marketing strategy at the end of November is a sure-fire way to snag all the Holiday shoppers you can.

 

  1. Holiday Themed Giveaway

 

During the season of giving be sure to participate! Doing a giveaway on social media is one of the best ways to promote your company as many people are willing to comment, like, and share a post to have a chance to win a promotional item. Making this giveaway holiday themed only adds to the fun!

 

  1. Seasonal Email

 

Another way to get everyone in the holiday spirit is to create an email campaign centered around the holidays! Showcase all your special holiday themed products, or how you and your team are getting in the spirit on the job. You could also use this as an opportunity to tell your loyal customers how much you appreciate them standing by you during the unprecedented time of 2020. Remember – ask your loyal customers for referrals!  Your customers may be willing to share email addresses of friends that can benefit from your service and/or product.

 

 

  1. Video Ads

 

Since there are still a lot of restrictions on businesses in order to control the spread of the Coronavirus, one way to connect better with your customers is through video! Customers are spending more time than ever before watching online videos and it is estimated that the average person will spend 100 minutes every day watching online videos in 2021. Research shows that companies who use videos grow their revenue 49% faster than those who do not. Putting all the statistics aside, videos allow customers to relate to you are a person, which is instrumental when you run a small business. You want people to relate to you so that they want to support you!

 

Reminding your customer and potential customers that you are a small business is also a great idea! Trends indicate that people are wanting to support local businesses more during this pandemic. Likewise, being sure to thank those customers is also an important part of prospering during these unprecedent times. Showing gratitude and telling people how much their support means to you and your family goes a long way.

 

If you are interested in some more in depth help with your marketing efforts please reach out to us here at Smart Marketing Advertising Agency!

 

 

Smart Marketing Advertising Agency

Anderson, SC

Coming Soon – Charleston, SC

 

 

 

Blessed…Grateful….Appreciative

 

We are very blessed to have such a wonderful group of clients who support our community and agency!

We are very grateful for each  business we are privileged to represent!

We are very appreciative for each of our clients who share the same goals as we do!


We would like to wish you and your family a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Our offices will be closed Thanksgiving day and Friday, November 28th.  We will reopen Monday, November 30th.

We are very excited to launch all of our Christmas marketing plans beginning November, 30th!  Please give us a call if you need assistance with your holiday marketing or have questions we can answer for you!

God Bless,

Tonya Childs

Smart Marketing Advertising Agency

Anderson, SC 29625

 

 

 

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