You know about the importance of social media marketing to connect with your target market segments, but are you using it to its full potential to increase your online sales? Diversification is an important part of any online sales strategy, and social media offers an alternative to your website and other channels like Amazon for reaching the right shoppers and converting them into buyers. 

Whether your sales have hit a slump as a result of the pandemic or you’re simply looking for new channels to expand your digital marketing reach, here are five ways to use social media to change up your selling strategy and increase online sales revenue.

1. Facebook Shops

Launched earlier this year, Facebook Shops allows you to create a mobile-first online store that lives directly on your business’ Facebook account. The feature allows users to shop products that catch their eye in a few simple taps, without ever leaving the app. This keeps friction to a minimum, which, as you probably know, is always a goal if you’re looking to maximize conversions. 

Your Facebook Shop is linked directly to your existing ecommerce store, which makes for seamless order receipt and fulfillment on your end. Or, you can opt to have Facebook fully handle the checkout process through Commerce Manager. When you do this, the user’s checkout information is saved in the app, so the next time they return to shop, the checkout process is even speedier.  

Facebook Shops gives you the advantage of reaching customers with a high purchase intent as well as enabling shopping-related messaging through Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.

2. Facebook Ads

facebook ads icon

Courtesy of Facebook

Whether you’re new to Facebook ads or a seasoned pro with the platform, one thing is for sure: using the same old ads that have worked for you in the past isn’t likely to work so well in the current climate. If you want to see results on Facebook ads, it’s crucial that you update your messaging to be relevant right now.

Include value propositions that illustrate why your product is useful in the context of the unusual times we’re living in. Does it make life in quarantine easier? Help customers balance work and home life? Empower people to stay healthy? Enable users to keep in touch with family and friends? Whatever the case may be, be sure to emphasize this in your ad copy and imagery. 

Additionally, use Facebook ads to disseminate the need-to-know information your customers are after right now, like your adjusted store hours, updated return/exchange policies, availability of curbside pickup or local delivery and shipping timelines. Finally, be sure to clean up old campaigns for information most users will currently find irrelevant, like messaging pertaining to live events or air travel.

3. Instagram Shopping

Instagram’s heavy focus on visuals and its scroll-and-tap-friendly layout couldn’t be more suited to eCommerce, and now you can turn your Instagram account into a shoppable feed. Like Facebook Shops, Instagram Shopping allows users to purchase your products from directly within the Instagram app. 

When you share a photo of one of your products and tag it via Instagram Shopping, it’ll be labeled with a title and price. With a single tap, users can pull up the expanded description, see all variations and complete checkout. 

Instagram Shopping is an excellent channel to get your products in front of additional customers who aren’t yet familiar with your brand via the ‘Discover’ tab and by sharing and tagging products in your Stories. Instagram shopping is currently in the process of rolling out to users with an Instagram for Business account. Click here to learn whether your brand is eligible for Instagram Shopping.

4. Shopping On Pinterest

Pinterest is another visual-first social media platform that consistently draws a highly engaged audience. At the end of 2019, Pinterest reported 322 million monthly active users. Use the platform’s shopping features to make it easy for customers to act on products that catch their eye while scrolling through their Pinterest feed. 

Pinterest’s Shopping tools can be enabled from your Pinterest Business account. First, you’ll need to connect a product data source, like your eCommerce store, then upload your product catalog. Pinterest will automatically create what is known as product pins for every item in your catalog. With product pins, users will automatically see the product name, price and brand prominently at the bottom of the pin. You can also tag products in other pins you’ve created, like lifestyle shots or pins promoting your blog posts. 

Once your product pins are up and running, you can create collections that help users discover additional items in your catalog. If you’re a homeware retailer, for example, you might create a collection for an entire room, which would then be easily shoppable on Pinterest when you pin a photo of that room. This helps boost your average order value while providing an enjoyable user experience.

5. Instagram and Pinterest Ads 

instagram social ads

Courtesy of Instagram

Both Instagram and Pinterest also allow ad creation from the shoppable products in your feed. Instagram and Pinterest ads can boost your reach dramatically among the market segments you’re most interested in. 

Detailed targeting capabilities on both Instagram and Pinterest allow you to zero in on the right audience based on demographics, interests, and even a predefined list of existing customers. One of the most powerful targeting capabilities is similar audiences, which show ads to users who are similar to a list of known customers or email subscribers you upload. We talk more about similar audiences in the context of Google Ads in this post–a different platform, but the concept is the same. 

Plan, Manage and Analyze Your Social Media Marketing Campaigns With Ease

As with any new marketing strategy, careful planning and optimization are required to make your social media marketing campaigns a success. Launch and measure campaigns on all platforms from a single dashboard with Springbot. Springbot streamlines your marketing efforts and puts the data you need to make decisions at your fingertips. Use social media to increase sales and stay in step with your audience. 

Integrate with your eCommerce platform, gather leads, track advertising campaigns, build custom reports, and much more. Schedule your free demo now to discover how Springbot’s many marketing features will help you grow your online sales and run your business more efficiently.

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