Social Media Marketing Trends for Local Business in 2020

Billions of people across the globe are already using social media platforms. This is why as an owner of a local business or as a social media manager, you should incorporate your marketing strategy with these changes. If you find it difficult to keep up with your competition, worry no more because, in this article, we will give you the “Top Social Media Marketing Trends that Local Businesses Should Not Ignore in 2020!”

Social Media for Local Business

People all over the world are already online. In fact, there are over 3.42 billion Internet users across the globe. This number was from 2017 and it’s not going down. How much more when 2020 is already here?!
If you haven’t noticed yet, people, no matter what age bracket they come from, are using the internet. 
You are even using the Internet by just reading this article. 
This only means that you are not just interested in the 3.42 billion Internet users, you are also interested in increasing your sales. 
So, why the above-mentioned statements are important for the social media marketing of your local business? Because part of the growing reach of the Internet is the rising era of social networking platforms. These include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Youtube and TikTok. Of course, there are a lot more social media platforms but these are the giants when it comes to social networking.
To give you a bit of an overview, internet users use these platforms to create, share and participate in different social circles.
However, due to innovations, these platforms are not only home for Internet users but for businesses also. 
Businesses utilize this opportunity to increase their brand awareness, connect with their prospects, and then convert them into customers. 
You see, a lot of businesses have already gained success by using these platforms for their marketing strategy. 
Even if you are a business owner of a local brand, you can still achieve this.
How? Just keep scrolling and you’ll see the top marketing trends for your local business!

Social Media Marketing Trends for Local Business

Businesses right now are already using social media. If you haven’t started utilizing these platforms, then you are surely missing the opportunity in increasing your sales. 
For the fact that you are reading this, then you are surely one of the hopeful business owners of your locality that are investing in different social media platforms.
But the question is, have you already gained success or are you still having a lot of trouble in paying your bills?
Well, if you are in the latter, cry no more because, in this article, you will read the top social media marketing trends that local businesses like yours should not ignore this 2020!

(1) Personalization is Key

You should not forget that when it comes to getting the attention of your prospects, personalization is key.
This is really important nowadays because audiences have become choosy on who they follow and what content they share on their profiles.

• Customize your accounts.

One thing that you should keep in mind is that your brand’s social media accounts are the digital storefront of your business. 
This means that you should treat it like your real store and make it attractive so that you can convert a lot of audiences into customers. 
How can you do this? Simply optimize your business accounts.
First, you need to make sure that you have the perfect photos that would represent your company. 
In every social media platform, it allows every user to upload a profile picture. This photo should represent what your business is and on of the perfect photos to share for your audiences to remember you is your logo.
Moreover, others like Twitter and Facebook even allow you to add a cover photo that would show more details about your business. You should utilize this chance to add more information about your local business.
If you are a business owner of a restaurant, you can add a picture of your main dishes in your cover photo, as well as, add a contact information, location and link of your website. Remember that you don’t need to really add all the details on this part of your account because your main goal is to attract audiences and not to bombard them with information.
Furthermore, you should add all the details about your business in the About page. Social media platforms allow businesses like yours to showcase everything that will give your prospects more information about your business.
You can add your contact number, email address, website link, availability and location. On Facebook, you can add more details about your business like its founding date, mission, price range and others. Don’t forget that you are a business owner of a local store, so strongly indicate the location of your company.
Lastly, add a call-to-action (CTA) that would let your customers buy your product, send your page a message, or visit your website. This way, you are clearly stating what you wanted your prospects to do in your business page. 
Do keep in mind that the purpose of optimizing your business profile is to get more customers and lead them to visit your stores or buy from your website. 
This is why you should make it as pleasing as possible. 
In this way, you are not only attracting customers, you are also telling them about the values and other aspects of your business that would detach you from the competition.

• Pay more attention to social listening.

In order to really personalize your social media marketing strategy, you should know that social listening is important to your business.
If you haven’t known yet, social listening is the process of monitoring information or feedback that came from customers and experts about your brand, competition and anything that deals with your industry.
When you listen to the people that point out anything about your business, you will be able to learn the needed changes.
Of course, in knowing people’s opinions, you should also carefully analyze if it is really necessary. Use the data that you have gathered and by analyzing the inputs one by one, you will then be able to revise your social media marketing strategy. 
This is really important to local businesses like yours because it is key in knowing more about your industry, your customers, and processes that will provide a better service for your possible customers. 

• Tailor your content to your audience.

Different industries cater to different target audiences. This is why your content should only be tailored to who your audiences are. 
This is especially important when you are still building your name in social networking platforms because your audience will act as an ambassador of your business.
Keep in mind that your content is as important as your audience. If your prospects don’t feel attached to your content, then it is surely useless content. 
Before posting any content, you should ask yourself these questions: “Will my audiences be happy to see this? Is it the content that they want in a business like mine? Does it have any value to them?”
If the answers are “yes,” then it is the perfect content. If it is not, then you should reassess and rethink your content.
Remember that your content should always have a purpose and this should always be directed into your audiences.

(2) Growing Need for Engagement

One of the things that have changed in social media is that reach doesn’t matter anymore. The new metric should be ENGAGEMENT. 
Your business page may have thousands of followers but your engagement is not that high, then you have to reassess your marketing strategy. 
You don’t need a lot of followers, you need audiences that are willing to pay for your products and services. 
Do keep in mind that engagement doesn’t just end in posting content.  You need to nurture your audiences. You can answer their queries, comment on their shared post, check-ins and other engagement styles that will open a conversation. Immerse them in your industry and make them come back to your business pages again and again. 
You can do these by building a relationship with your prospects and appreciating your audiences.

• Build Audience Relationship

If you are still starting with your social media marketing or if you have already started, you should know that by building a relationship with your audience, you need to show the human side of your brand.
As what Holly Chessman from GlowTouch Technologies said, “A company that simply uses social media as a medium for advertising is losing out on the most important piece: the “social” aspect, where you have the opportunity to build those all-important connections.”
Social media platforms are made up of users whose main purpose is to build a social network and if you only post advertisement about your business, then you might want to reconsider and post educational content, shared articles and blogs about your industry and such to avoid losing audiences.
Communicate with your audience. Tailor your content for them and when a prospect engages on your posts, make sure you reply to them. 
The key here is to make sure that they’ve come to an active brand that cares for their digital audiences in all of the stages of the buyer’s journey. 

• Appreciate Audiences

When it comes to keeping your prospects to you business profiles, you also need to appreciate their presence. 
You can do this by hosting a contest or giveaway, share customer testimonials, post user-generated content or offer discount codes and coupons to your loyal audiences.
This way, it doesn’t just benefit your prospects, you are also gaining from this because you aren’t just attracting people who are willing to buy your product or services, you are also letting other audiences who might not have heard about your business be interested in what you can provide to them.

(3) Continuing Rise of Stories

From Snapchat to Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn, Stories are really conquering the world of social networking. 
It was reported that there are over 500 million daily active Stories users of Instagram alone and 64% of marketers have already implanted this trend into their marketing strategy.
Thus, it is really undeniable that this trend will continue to prosper.
Now, you may be asking on why Stories are successful to all ages. The answer is that it is an intriguing content. You see, people are hungry for stories and tend to be always on the lookout on live content as it is more authentic. Moreover, because Stories only last for 24 hours, people tend to be intrigued by this. Thus, they will really click the ephemeral content that you have posted. 
So, how can your local business benefit from this trend? Well, utilize the features that come with Stories. 

1. Beautify your content with text, drawing tools and filters.

2. Make your content identifiable with hashtags.

3. Communicate with your audience by tagging or mentioning other users, asking questions and using polls.

4. Add links to your other social media accounts or to your website.

5. Add location tags so that your audience will know your location.

6. Use a CTA to let your audience know what you want them to do.

Do keep in mind that Stories are also content. So, use this social media tool to engage with your audience and build your brand. 

(4) More Videos and Live

Although long-form posts can still attract audiences but when you want a direct way to engage with them, then you need videos. 
According to this year’s Cisco Visual Networking Index Complete Forecast, nearly 1.9 billion Web video users will be watching 3 trillion minutes of videos per month in 2021. Thus, video will be dominating the Internet traffic by 80%.
Of course, Youtube is on top when it comes to videos. However, other social media giants have given its way to videos too. Instagram even made IG TV to let its users post long-form of videos. 
You may be asking why this form of content continues to appeal to more audiences? It’s mainly because of the fact that it is visual and it gives its purpose directly. 
You see people don’t want to scroll up and down just to read very long content. Besides, it is more convenient if they can just sit and just listen to someone narrating something or just watch as a video comes to an end.
Moreover, videos are also more engaging rather than posts or photos. Your audience can choose to just watch the video or start a conversation with you while your video is ongoing.
So, how can you use this trend for your social media marketing strategy?
Just remember these four things whenever you create a video:

1. Catch your audience’s attention.

2. Make a video that is valuable and engaging.

3. Give a relevant offer or include a CTA.

4. Convert them into customers.

Remember that a video is also another form of content. So, use it to engage and convert your prospects into customers.

(5) The Rebirth of Groups

Groups had long been part of social media communities. However, as brands continue to dominate social networking platforms, it is clear that communities of a specific business will surely be born.
You see, ever since before, there are already a lot of groups and even Facebook has consolidated a part of its platform where people can communicate with people who have the same interests as theirs. 
And because social media have already been home for businesses, Facebook has also let brands to build their own groups. 
Of course,  even on different social networking platforms, you can still create a group for your business. Instagram has a “Close Friends” feature where brands can showcase their stories to selected people. 
You can also do this without using any of Facebook or Instagram feature, simply make your own branded hashtag where you either use the name of your business or what your business believes in. 
If you’re thinking about why you need a group for your brand when you already have a page of your own, then here are some reasons for you:

1. More loyal audiences and customers.

2. Direct feedback and ideas.

3. User-generated contents.

4. In-depth connection with community.

Creating your brand’s community is important in your local business.
As JD Prater from Quora said, “Groups will be a place where brands can share inside jokes and stories and connect with smaller, dedicated groups of loyal people rather than trying to reach everyone.”

(6) The Need for Employee Advocacy

The best people who knew about your business are your employees. This is why you need to use employee advocacy for your social media marketing strategy. 
If you didn’t know yet, employee advocacy is the promotion of an organization by its workforce. 
This is really an important thing to do because these people know your brand better than anyone else. They can help you boost your social reputation online and share your company’s culture and values to people who might be interested in your business. 
Moreover, doing this will also help your employees feel appreciated. Thus, you will strengthen your relationship with them.
In order to really increase your brand’s reach through your employees, you need to do these 5 things:

1. Provide tips and training.

2. Give reasons to share.

3. Make shareable content.

4. Recognize employees as advocates.

5. Measure the impact.

Remember that you should motivate your employees and give them value so that they will be able to be your employee advocates.

(7) The Rise of Influencers and Micro-Influencers

In every social media platform, there are surely thousands of influencers and micro-influencers that have followers who really value their content.
Brands use these people to increase the reach of their business. 
You see, influencers have people following them. These can either start from a thousand up to million followers. 
Because of this, businesses tend to use this as an opportunity to increase their brand awareness.
Although, influencers have better following, businesses nowadays prefer micro-influencers. 
This is for the reasons that the latter have more loyal followers with only a few changes. 
As a local business owner, you don’t need an influencer who has a big influence on social media platforms. You only need someone who have more targeted followers and is more knowledgeable in their niche. 
Of course, there are some things that you need to keep in mind before choosing your brand’s influencers, as suggested by Hubspot  and Unamo :

• Create an Influencer Strategy

1. Determine your goals.
2. Define your audience.
3. Choose an influencer type and budget.
4. Make sure the influencer is a good fit.
5. Review work of influencer.
6. Reward influencer.
7. Measure your results.

• Locate your Influencer through:

1. Google Search
2. Social Media
3. Referrals
4. Blogs
5. Influencer Software
6. Talent Agencies and Agents

• Choose the best one with these characteristics:

1. Same Audiences
2. Similar Values
3. Same Social Media Platforms
4. Showcases Transparency
5. Authentic

(8) The Need for Consumer Reviews

As more and more people prefer to buy on social media, there is also an increasing necessity of customer reviews. 
Nowadays, people search for reviews first before buying a product.
This trend started in e-commerce platforms and now that more businesses use social media, this has also shifted in these platforms. 
In Facebook, your customers can easily post their reviews about your product or services. These reviews can easily be seen by your prospects. 
Although other social networking platforms don’t have this feature, you can still have a customer review. Simply, ask your customers to give a statement about their experience or let them post it into their accounts. You can then tag yourself in it or repost it in your business profiles.

• Review Management Strategy

Moreover, we cannot deny the fact their there will always be negative reviews. This is why you need to have a review management strategy wherein you watch reviews about your products or services and respond to it. 
You see, reviews can help also help your business. Whether it is a positive or negative review, you should respond to it because the people that have left it is concerned about the improvement of your business. Through these opinions, you can easily identify the flaws in your services. Thus, in turn, you can analyze and remove the flaws in your business.

(9) More Inbound Requests

Of over billions of people using social media, 28% of consumers use social media platforms to communicate with businesses.
Because of these, a trend wherein these platforms become the sources of inbound requests is growing. 
As have already said, a lot of businesses are already utilizing social networking platforms to expand the reach of their business. Part of this marketing strategy is answering queries of past and possible customers. 
Whether it is a question or complement in the comment section or through private conversation, you should really respond to all of it. 
This way, you are providing your audiences with better customer service and there’s a high chance that these people can easily be converted into customers, leads or influencers.

• Chatbots

However, if you find it difficult to respond because of time constraints, you can use chatbots to help you.
These are the latest tools that businesses use to improve their customer service. Through this, even if you are not online, a response will be given to an audience.

(10) More Targeted Advertisements

One thing that is really obvious in social media platforms is how it uses advertisements to keep their platform moving. 
If you haven’t noticed yet, social networking platforms are free because of advertisements and these ads are mainly come from businesses like yours. 
Moreover, because social networking platforms are giving way for more brands in their platforms, they have also increased the targeting capability of advertisements. So that businesses like yours can either target customers within your locality or to a bigger audience.

• Advertising tips

However, your ad will not attract audiences without planning. You need to know these advertising tips:

1. Know your objectives and target audience.
2. Create content for your ad with a perfect CTA.
3. Optimize your ad to any devices.
4. Target and retarget audiences.
5. Monitor and measure results.

Conclusion

As a local business owner, you should utilize everything in order to increase the reach of your business. 
Because there are billions of social media users across the world, you should also grab this chance to let your local business be known globally. 
For this reason, we have given you the social media marketing trends that local businesses like yours should not ignore this 2020. These are as follows:

1. Personalization is Key
2. Growing Need for Engagement
3. Continuing Rise of Stories
4. More Videos and Live
5. The Rebirth of Groups
6. The Need for Employee Advocacy
7. The Rise of Influencers and Micro-Influencers
8. The Need for Consumer Reviews
9. More Inbound Requests
10. More Targeted Advertisement

By using these trends in your marketing strategy, you are ensuring that your business will really conquer the competition!

Hiring a Social Media Marketing for your business?

if you find it hard to plan, execute, monitor and analyse your social media marketing strategy, ESTRAT Social Media Marketing for Local Business can help you solve this problem!
ESTRAT is one of the leading digital and social media marketing agency. The company helps businesses grow through relevant, up-to-date and effective Internet marketing strategies. This will ensure you that the company will provide a professional service that is perfect for your business!
Book your Social Media Marketing Free Consultation now.