What is Social Media Marketing? Social Media Marketing Explained for Beginners

The pace at which the increasing number of people are joining social media and using it multiple times every day, this has opened a huge opportunity for businesses to market their products and services through social media.

And, the trend for social media marketing has ever been increasing in the past decade. Therefore, if you don’t learn social media marketing right now, then you’ll be left behind in the competition.

And if you don’t want to be left behind in the competition, then keep listening to this episode. Because in today’s episode I’ll be discussing what is social media marketing, and I’ll explain social media marketing for beginners, so that you may learn social media marketing.

And I’ll also guide you step-by-step on how to get started with social media marketing. So keep listening!

Hey digital learner, welcome back to another episode of the Digital Marketing Made Easy podcast. If this is your first time here, my name is Rahul Dubey and I help digital creators like you turn your digital presence into profit using various digital marketing strategies.

If you are someone who loves tips and strategies to create profitable online business, then make sure you subscribe to this podcast for the weekly new episodes. Okay, so now without any further delay, let’s get started.

First of all, let me explain what is social media marketing.

Everyone has a different understanding of social media marketing, so everyone defines social media marketing differently.

In fact, Wikipedia defines social media marketing as the use of social media platforms and websites to promote a product or service.

And, even though this is correct to some extent, but I don’t agree with this definition completely.

Because, in my opinion,

“Social media marketing is the process of marketing your products and services using social media platforms.”

Please notice that I define it as a process of marketing product and services, and not just promotion, because promotion is limited to only one goal, i.e. promotion, while marketing is a complete process where you have different goals.

You may either have a goal like brand awareness, or getting more engagement from your existing audience, or reaching more people, or may be getting leads, or even getting sales.

But, with social media marketing you can have different goals and different objectives. That’s why I said it as a complete marketing process, and not just a way of promotion.

So that is the reason why I think Wikipedia’s definition about social media marketing is not so good.

Alright, now that you understand what is social media marketing, let me explain some common terms that you’ll usually encounter in social media marketing.

The first term is content.

1) Content: And whatever you create and post on social media, that would be a content. A content can be anything.

It may be in the form of text, or visuals like images, videos, etc. or in the audible form.

But, whatever content you’ll create and post on social media, every piece of content will fall in one of the three categories, i.e. either readable form of content (something that people may read), or a visual form of content (something that people may visualise like images or videos), and third one is: an audible form of content (something that is audible and people may listen to it).

So now that you understand what is content, let's move on to the next term which is likes.

2) Likes: And, likes are often considered as the signal that people are liking your content. If someone likes your content, they may simply tap the like button. And the like button may vary from one social media platform to another.

For some social media platforms, it may simply be in the form of a thumb sign, while for others, it may be in the form of a heart shape.

Most of the time people are always craving for more likes. And likes is often considered as a very crucial element.

Alright, now moving on to the third term about social media marketing, we have Shares.

3) Shares: And, shares are the currency of social media. If someone finds your content very useful, and considers that your content may inspire his/her followers, then that person may pass that information to his/her followers by sharing.

And even though likes and other interactions may be good for your social media marketing, but if you get a share, that’s even better. Because a share can bring a completely new set of audiences and provide you more visibility.

Okay, now that you understand what are shares, now let’s move on to the next social media marketing term which is comments.

4) Comments: And, a comment is basically a way for people to express their feelings about your post in the form of words.

For example, if someone likes your post then they may simply hit the like button. But if they decide to share what they feel about your post, then that feeling can only be expressed in the form of words. And those words are known as comments.

Okay, now that you understand what are the comments, now let’s move on to the next social media marketing term, which is engagement.

5) Engagement: And, engagement is nothing but a general term that denotes that people are interacting with your content. Whether they are liking, commenting, sharing, or simply clicking the links, or whatever action they are taking, all of these fall under engagement.

And now that you know about engagement, let’s move on to the next social media marketing term which is hashtags.

6) Hashtags: And, hashtags are basically a way to add metadata about your post on social media. Usually, people use hashtags to describe the topic of their content, or tag it as the part of the latest trend.

So, now that you understand what is hashtags, let’s move on to the next term which is reach.

7) Reach: And, reach is nothing but the number of people who can see your post on social media. Whenever you post something, this will be shown in the news feed of certain people. And, the number of those people is known as reach on social media.

Okay, now that you understand what is reach on social media, it’s time to know the next social media marketing term, that is followers.

8) Followers: And, almost everyone knows about followers. Because, every social media user is so obsessed about followers. So, followers are basically those people who choose to see your posts in their news feed.

That means, when someone likes what you are posting on social media, they may simply tap the follow button, and become one of your followers.

So, whenever you post next time, your post will automatically appear in their news feed, because they are one of your followers.

Similar to likes, followers can also be termed differently on different social platforms. For example, on Instagram you have followers, while on YouTube, you have the same followers termed as subscribers.

Alright! Now that you have the understanding of various social media marketing terms, it’s time to start social media marketing.

But before that, you need to understand the behavior of different social media platforms and what are the latest trends in social media marketing.

When you are thinking of starting social media marketing, the first thing you need to do is: you need to understand the behaviour of different social media. So, see the way different social media platforms work.

For example, Facebook allows you to post text updates, images, and videos, along with other forms of content like Facebook stories. However on LinkedIn, you can only post text updates, images, and upload documents in PDF format.

Apart from that, stories are not yet available on LinkedIn. Maybe, they might come later, but currently, LinkedIn doesn’t support stories.

Similarly, different social media platforms have different user base and demographics.

For example, Snapchat is a social media platform with the user base having the age group between 18 to 35, and they are mainly looking for fun on the platform. However on LinkedIn, it is a professional community where people are usually professionals looking to connect with other professionals and businesses.

And, you know what? Every social media platform has different demographics and user behaviour.

So, before you start social media marketing, you need to understand the different social media platforms and their behavior.

Apart from that, you need to be aware of different social media marketing trends. Now, let me tell you some of the social media marketing trends that you must know.

The first social media marketing trend that you need to know is: Organic reach on social platforms is going down.

And, you must be wondering, what the heck organic reach is. So, let me tell you.

When you post something on social media, it’ll be shown in the newsfeed of your followers. The number of followers who will see your content is known as your organic reach. And this organic reach is free.

That means, you are not paying anything to reach those followers, or your potential customers.

However, apart from that, you also get the opportunity to boost your post in the form of paid ads on social media. And that way, you can reach even those people who are not your followers.

But, keep in mind that just because you have ten thousand followers, your post will not reach in the news feed of all those ten thousand followers.

If you would have posted this 10 years back, then you could easily reach upto 80-90% of your followers. But now, whenever you post something, it’ll only reach in the news feed of a certain percentage of your followers, say, upto 50-60% without you having to pay anything. And that’s your organic reach, which is ever decreasing.

The next social media marketing trend that you need to know is: Every social media platform has got this policy - pay as you go.

That means, every social media platform wants you to spend your money on paid ads. And that’s totally understandable, because all these social media platforms are in the business to make money.

And the only way they can make more money is: you, as an advertiser, start spending more money on paid ads. And that is the reason why they are limiting the organic reach of your post on every social platform.

Because, if they don’t do it, they’ll find it very tough to make more money. So what you are left with is: Pay as you go.

That means, if you want to reach more people, gain more visibility, generate leads and sales, then you need to be willing to spend money on paid ads.

Alright! The third social media marketing trend that you need to know is: Features and Tools are merging.

That means, social media platforms these days, are getting features from other platforms or other places.

For example, the type story feature that you see on Instagram, has been copied from Snapchat. Similarly, the short video sharing functionality on Instagram which is also known as Instagram Reels, has been copied from TikTok.

So you can see that features and tools are merging from one platform to another.

And the fourth social media marketing trend you need to know is: You need to be able to jump on the trend very fast.

That means, whenever a new trend or feature comes on any social platform, the social platform tends to provide an advantage to that group of people who jump on the trend early.

In other words, if you are an early adopter of the latest feature or latest trend on any social platform, then the algorithm of that social platform will provide you an advantage and reward you with more organic reach.

For example, Instagram Reels are the latest feature and trends on Instagram. And, Instagram algorithms are already providing more advantage and organic reach to those people who are creating more of Instagram Reels content.

So, you need to be willing to jump on the latest trend very fast.

Alright! Now that you know the various social media marketing trends, it’s time to learn how to start social media marketing step-by-step.

So the first step to start social media marketing is: Understand your goals as a social media marketer.

There can be different goals for social media marketing.

Your goal may either be increasing brand awareness, driving traffic to your website, generating new leads, boosting brand engagement, building a community around your business, providing social customer service, or increasing mentions in the press, or growing revenue - or whatever else may be your goal.

But, you need to understand what are your goals for social media marketing. Because if you don’t know your goals well, it’ll be very tough to take steps to complete those goals.

So ask yourself, why do you want to be on social media? And you’ll get your answers.

Okay, the second step to start social media marketing is: Know your target audience.

And even though you understand your goals, if you don’t know who is your target audience, it’ll be tough to take actions to complete those goals. Because when you know your target audience precisely, it becomes very easy to market your products or services on social media.

For example, Pinterest is a social media platform, or more precisely say, social bookmarking site where people pin images on pinboard. About 81% of users on Pinterest are female.

Now, if you have a men's grooming product and you are marketing that on Pinterest, then that would be a bad idea. Instead, you need to be on any other platform where your target audience that is men looking for men’s grooming products are.

So you got the idea, right?

So knowing your target audience very precisely is very crucial for your social media marketing success.

The third step for starting social media marketing is: Know your strengths and limitations.

Usually on different social media platforms, different types of content will perform better. On some platforms text-based content will perform better while on other platforms, video-based content will perform better.

Now, look inside yourself and know your strength. Because if your strength is creating text-based content and you start marketing on a platform that favours video-based content then that would be tough for you. Similarly, you need to be aware of your limitations.

And once you know your strengths and limitations, it;s time to create a social media marketing strategy that suits your strengths and limitations.

So the fourth step to start social media marketing is: Create a social media strategy, and get started!

And, in order to decide your social media strategy, you may ask yourself some questions. Questions like: Why do you want to be on social media?

Who is your target audience?

What are you going to post on social media?

On which platform you are going to post?

How often are you going to post?

And when is the time you are going to post?

Depending upon whether you have a team or you are a one-man business, you can decide and create your social media strategy.

And once you have got that strategy, you need to simply get started.

Finally, the last step is: Stay Consistent.

Because, once you have got started, the only other thing that requires you to get results in social media marketing is: remaining consistent.

And, I personally have made the mistake of not remaining consistent on social media. And this has cost me a lot. I don’t want you to go through the same misery.

But, I know, coming up with consistent content for social media is tough. That’s why I have created Bite-Size Content Vault for Digital Creators like you. In the Bite-Size Content Vault, you’ll get hundreds of pre-written content prompts and ideas to quickly start creating social media content.

And, the good thing is: all the content prompts and ideas are categorized into several types depending upon the type of content you are going to create.

Simply visit LearnDigitalwithRahul.com/bite, you’ll also find the link in the show notes below. So, this was all about how to start social media marketing as a beginner. I hope you found it helpful.

So, let’s wrap up this episode, and if you still have any questions, you may leave a voice message or ask me in the LearnDigitalwithRahul official Facebook group. You’ll find the link to both of these, and all other resources in the show notes below.

And hey, if you enjoyed listening to this episode, or you found any value out of this, be sure to leave a review with 5-star ratings on iTunes. It would mean a world for me.

And by the way, when you do that, please take a screenshot and post it on Instagram tagging me @LearnDigitalwithRahul - I would love to reshare it and feature you on my profile.

With that being said, I’m Rahul signing off, and I’ll talk to you in the next one. Until then, stay motivated, stay creative, and feel proud to be #DigitalCreator.