Lack of strategy is a common problem for small business owners and solopreneurs who are trying to grow and make sales on social media.
Without a clear marketing plan, business owners may find themselves posting aimlessly (because you feel you ‘should’ post) and then, find it difficult, time-consuming and draining to achieve their desired results.
Having an understanding of what strategy is, what’s right for you and how you’ll then use it to move forward with suitable tactics and methods… *that* is when the magic happens!
This blog discusses…
- what is strategy anyway (and what it isn’t)
- the benefits of having a strategy that’s right for you
- examples of some different strategies
- my easy-to-follow way to create a strategy that’s right for you & your business – the 4 M’s is my system 🙂
- tips on how to apply different tactics to reflect your chosen strategy.
What is social media strategy? (And what it's not.)
In the context of small business owners, local businesses and solopreneurs or companies-of-one, a strategy is a plan. It is the roadmap or approach you will take to ensure your social media page/s, posts and interactions are best suited to the goals you want to achieve.
Think of it as what you will do to weight the dice in your favour. To get a 6 (or at least a 4 or 5!) every time.
Not just rolling an unweighed dice. Or a wrongly weighted dice.
What social media strategy ISN’T…
The main misconception usually among small business owners who lack marketing experience, is that they confuse strategy with methods.
Methods and tactics aren’t the same as strategy… they’re how you apply the strategy that you already have.
Strategy is WHAT you plan to be doing. The tactics are HOW you will do it.
In the analogy of rolling the dice: Strategy is what you plan and intend to do to weight the dice, before rolling it.
Tactics are how you will roll it. Ideally, that works in harmony with – and not against – your plan… Your plan is to score 6… The how? To roll hard or soft, what direction, how often to add spin, will you shake first, how frequently to roll… these tell you how to do it, not what to do.
| Feature | STRATEGY (The "What" to do) | TACTICS (The "How" you'll do it) |
| Your Focus | Long-term goals & overall direction | Short-term actions & tools to use |
| Small business example | To become the go-to bookkeeper for small businesses in the Sheffield area | Posting an educational Instagram Reel on Tuesdays |
| My analogy | Weighting the dice to roll a 6 | How hard you throw the dice |
Say, strategy might include working out what platform/s to focus on – this is a broad WHAT to do – whereas factors such as the frequency of posting, the time of day to post, whether to use videos or Stories… those are ‘HOW TO’ methods.
Methods might relate to any strategy at all, not a weighted one that’s right for you and the outcomes you want!
Another misconception is that strategy isn’t always important. For example, it’s possible to post and as long as it’s about your business it’s ok, because you’re not being random.
Or that as long as your follower count grows (whether or not they fit an ideal customer profile), then it’s OK, because it’s still growth.
Lack of strategy is hoping for the best, and will take a LOT more rolls of the dice to score well. Delivering on the desired outcome is harder and slower.
Instead, strategy means back to the foundations. Building them solidly, in ways that are right for your desired growth.
Key components of a focused strategy mean consideration of:
✅ The goals YOU have
✅ The target audience/s YOU want to appeal to
✅ The visual and written messaging YOU will deliver
✅ The experience YOU have and what’ll be manageable for YOU going forward
✅ The metrics YOU will use to determine success.
What are the benefits of creating a social media strategy?
The benefits of coming up with a focused strategy mean that your marketing efforts (on social media and beyond!) will:
Reach more of your desired audience, connect more deeply with them, drive more successful outcomes those efforts are more purposeful and more impactful.
In addition, you’ll also be more productive with your energies and waste less time. Efficiency!
I see many small business owners who either,
- Have no strategy at all
- Have a strategy but they’ve mis-interpreted what that means
- Have a strategy but they’re are not applying the most suitable tactics to deliver on it. Their tactics may even be in strict opposition 🙁
So in the first case, progress on their social media page(s) will always be slower than if they had created a strategy.
And in the 2nd and 3rd cases, in my opinion it can often be slower still, since they often require some, or a lot, of corrective action.
The benefits become clear, don't they?
3 Examples of common social media strategies
Social media strategies can be best differentiated by the overall aim that you want to achieve from Facebook, Instagram and/or other platforms. I recommend most small business owners focus the majority of efforts on their main aim and less-so for a secondary aim, and again less for a third aim. (For the vast majority of small businesses, there are three overall aims for social media: awareness, community/ service and sales.)
Say, 60% working strategically towards aim one, 30% towards aim two and 10% for aim three. (The exact split is up to you, however I suggest a strong split like this, for best consistency and clarity of messaging.)
Let's look at each:
Brand awareness strategy
This is best if the principle aim is to build recognition, grow visibility in front of new audiences and attract new followers.
The quantifiable goals (measurables) in this strategy would likely be to increase page followers and up both the reach of posts and views/ plays of videos. The relevant methods and messaging can then be applied to suit this strategy.
Engagement strategy
This example strategy is one with a focused aim of nurturing and engaging with the community of potential customers. You hope to use social media platform/s for the main purpose of providing support, building loyalty and answering questions - all actively developing interest and interaction with your brand, ahead of the purchase stage.
If the vast majority of tactics and energy back up this strategy, you’ll definitely achieve specific goals of building strong relationships, growing their understanding of your product(s)/ service(s) and being 'top of mind'. The messaging and significantly, the practical tactics you’d use would very likely be different than for other strategies.
Social media sales strategy
This example is relevant if your main aim of social media is to achieve sales and conversions – you’d choose this one if the majority of time/efforts would be going towards converting the audience you already have. (It works best if you already have a large audience of hot leads!)
Specific measurables might be running quantifiably more promotions and special offers, working with influencers and of course, an increase in sale volumes. Or sometimes conversions can have a slightly different twist, say to increase signups to your email marketing list; so subscriber numbers would be a key measurable in this case.
How to create a social media strategy for Facebook or Instagram - using the 4M’s
To make developing a strategy easier for small business owners, I have created a two-stage process that I call the 4 M’s:
Follow this, answering the questions as you work through each practical step…
- Your Messaging Matches Your Measurables
- THINK:
First, what are your aims? Put the aims IN ORDER. What is the most important reason you want to use social media? This is where you'll push 60% of your efforts. Then the second aim will be less important (30%) and finally, what will be the third aim (the 10%).
Eg, for you main goals of increased post interactions (likes, comments, shares, saves, Stories interaction, re-pins etc) and increased DMs, you'll be creating an engagement strategy to cover that 60% of your efforts. So 60% of your messaging will focus on that accordingly – the "what" to do.
Next, what relevant Measurables will you use to determine your progress towards each of those goals (60-30-10)?
And over what timeline will you check on success?
It’s really important that you add quantifiable numbers when forming a strategy, and as such it’s helpful to use the SMART objective model (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound)
Eg, for a lead-generation approach, to increase email sign ups by 100 and enquiries by 15% over 3 months.
Now, who will be the ideal person to ‘get’ this message? They might be an ideal customer (Dream Customer) or maybe an ideal collaborator. Define them.
For more help with this part of the process, start by reading this blog.
Clear profiling of your ideal person informs you around their needs, experiences, habits and desires, and the language they respond to – vital to inform your messaging delivery and content plan. (Market research will also help!)
And, how do you intend to weight the dice, in your social media business page and/or with each piece of content? What will you be doing so that what you ‘say’ and what they ‘hear’ will Match up to deliver on the goal? This is the part about getting the Message across… it’s about being clear in what you say.The answer here isn’t about specific content planning; more about broad ideas and umbrella-thinking to Match you with them, via say…
…the right platform/s
…the right choice/s around different content format
…the right kinds of language and visuals (eg sales-led or community-led? ),
and such.
TIP: It’s OK not to be 100% confident in your small business messaging at the start; it gets a lot better the more you relax into it naturally, and the more you practice.
No one starting out to play a new instrument starts at concert pianist, grade 8 level, do they?! - Create Methodically, in line with the first 3M's
Being Methodical guarantees that your content (and page setup) delivers on value for both you AND your ideal person.
Not just you, not just them. Both of you.
Value to both of you translates as one of the following:
- It furthers their awareness of you/ your brand. It can be informational, or by being relatable through commonalities, or motivational/ supportive.
- It progresses their evaluation of how you/ your brand/ your product or service is better than others, or better than not having anything like it.
- It increases their understanding, such that they’re closer to becoming a customer. It can confirm their belief so far, help get them off the fence, or grow trust in you/ your process/ your solution(s).
Tips for applying your methods to fit your strategy
- Brainstorm post ideas based on different nuggets of value you’ll offer. Make sure the value and message fits, whether you’ve chosen a brand awareness strategy, engagement strategy, sales strategy or another type.
From there, plan out your content including diarising action time, all of which will support your strategy consistently going forward. - A chosen strategy can be relevant for use across all social media platforms, but the success of that strategy is likely to vary on different platforms - the tactics vary. A typical reason is each platform differs in how it pushes content out to its users. This will strongly inform how you adapt your tactics (formats, frequency of posting, etc) to optimise your results on each platform.
- Build in time to study performance indicators on Facebook/ Instagram insights, or other chosen platform/s. Analysis is so beneficial for finding patterns around what’s working, what’s not and what you might tweak.
- Experiment with tactics and methods such as different formats, styles and frequency to get quicker results on what delivers successfully for your chosen strategy. Quantity is better than quality, to inform you around this as you get to learn faster with more rolls of the dice.
- Different tactics will definitely be more relevant for different strategies, so try a course or workshop to learn the best practices for each platform. You’ll be better placed to apply the relevant methods and achieve more from your efforts.
SUMMARY: Turning strategy into results
The importance of a well-defined strategy can’t be under-estimated, beginning with your aims and moving on to the messaging that is relevant. But it is nothing without making sure your tactics then correspond in order to deliver on that particular strategy.
Try building your own strategy using the 4M's process, with the help of the examples in this post.
You can find more tips on clearer messaging and best practice marketing methods in my regular Instagram posts, so make sure you’re following me there.
Or, contact me for more personalised advice and problem-solving – my 121 coaching is designed EXACTLY to help small business owners in Bristol and beyond to develop the strategy and tactics that are right for them. Send a no-obligation message to find out more.
Ruth
For transparency… this post was created by me - a human! My hands wrote the words, with quite a lot of help from my brain. Not written by a LLM.
The image used to accompany this post was created by AI. And I asked an AI tool to look at the finished piece for SEO suggestions. (I'm a marketing pro, not an SEO one.)
The full AI policy for Swallowtail Social can be found here.
