Social media has become one of the most effective, instant and value-for-money ways of advertising and reaching customer bases for the window and door industry in recent years. It’s real-time, and it’s free, which is best of all!

For an effective overall marketing strategy it must be included. Some companies are making the most of it, some are, in my opinion, making a right pigs ear of it! So, here are my ten tips of using social media in the glazing sector.

1. Identify your market and platform

Social media is only effective when it is aimed at the right people. This means knowing your customer base, and attributing the right platform to that base.

For example, Facebook is a very good platform for window and door installers who deal with home owners and the general public. They are much more engaged with it and has a more relaxed feel. However installers would find very little reward in using a platform like LinkedIn when trying to reach new home owners as customer. This is they way I see things:

B2B – LinkedIn, Twitter

B2C – Facebook, Pinterest

If you’re broadcasting your message on the wrong platform, your potential customer base isn’t going to see or hear what you have to say.

2. Keep social media content relevant

Following on from choosing the right platform, it is also vitally important to get your message right. If you’re a B2C company using Twitter, which is a predominantly business orientated community, there is no point in tweeting things related to consumers where very few home owners will see it.

Be sure to keep your social media content relevant according to the social media platform you’re using.

3. Be regular

Social media is something that demands your time. It is only effective if it is used on a regular basis. The more regular and engaged you are, the more likely it is that your followers will read what you have to say, therefore making it more effective.

If you use your account only rarely, posting something every other week or month, it’s likely your content will go unnoticed.

4. Keep it diverse

It’s always a good idea to keep your content diverse. I know myself that I get very bored reading the same old tweets and FB posts, repeated day after day. It becomes dull, ineffective and plain old boring.

If you don’t diversify your content, you risk losing followers and losing influence and reach. So mix things up a bit!

5. Keep it clean

As a business using social media, you do have to take some responsibility for what you’re posting online. It is perfectly fine to have a joke with your followers and readers. But I have seen in the past some very polarising and fiesty tweets that perhaps would have been best served being posted on a personal account, or even not at all.

Beware, if you’re going to use your business social media account to post personal views, be prepared to defend them.

6. Use imagery

Imagery is a very powerful thing on social media. Pictures, GIFs and videos make for effective social media marketing no matter who you’re aiming it at.

One very good example is Solidor and their installers as customers. They have a very loyal following of installers who on a daily basis proudly tweet their pictures of their finished composite door installations to Solidor and wider social media. This makes for very powerful and effective social media marketing – and it’s all free!

7. Get involved in the conversation

Don’t stand on the sidelines watching the conversation and engagement happen without you. If your business creates social media accounts but all that happens is that conversation is watched from the sidelines, it would be a complete waste of time.

Get involved in the conversation, even if you haven’t been mentioned. The more that people and companies get involved, the more effective social media can be.

8. Fill in your bios!

There is nothing more irritating than looking at social media profiles to see an egg or little to no information on a public profile. What is the point of setting up a social media account then failing to populate it with information.

Make sure that across all social media accounts, that as much information and imagery about your business is on display. No information equals no followers which equals ineffective social media and a waste of time.

9. Know your stuff

It is very easy to spot a social media account posting information about subjects that they’re no knowledgeable about. I have seen it plenty on Twitter. Lots of accounts tweeting various facts and figures which simply do not add up. It’s easy to be caught out by your audience if you post something that can easily be disproved. You risk losing credibility.

10. Keep it friendly

It never helps to have public disputes in the eye of the watching public. If a customer complains to a company, that company should aim to respond and help, either privately or in public. Private I find works better as the conversation can be a bit more honest.

But it never helps to start swinging handbags as generally the only party to come out on the losing side of the argument is the business being complained to, not the complainant.

These are my ten, and of course there are plenty more that could be stated, but follow these ten and you should be doing OK!

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