Just think! Spend at least six hours a week increasing your business awareness, traffic, and sales at little to no cost. There are almost 90% of marketers who have claimed that with the help of social media they have gained huge exposure for their business.

• Increase in new customer acquisitions – The main benefit of social media marketing is that you will have the opportunity to connect with networks of prospects that you might not otherwise be able to find using other common marketing techniques and even SEO.

• Improved brand loyalty Texas Tech University published a report according to which brands that participate in social media channels enjoy privileged loyalty from their customers. The report concludes that “businesses should take advantage of the social media tools they provide when it comes to engaging with their viewers. A very well planned and programmed strategy could prove prominent in convincing consumers to be brand loyal.” Another study published by Convince Convert found that 53% of Americans who follow brands on social media are more loyal to those brands.

• Greater brand recognition Every opportunity you have to distribute your content and increase your visibility is important. The social networks you own are just new channels for your brand’s voice and content. This is important because at the same time it makes it easier and more accessible to new customers, and it makes it more known and familiar to existing customers. For example, a frequent Twitter user might hear about your business for the first time only after stumbling across it in a news feed. Or, an otherwise listless customer might become more aware of your brand after seeing your presence on numerous networks.

• Client retention – Web platforms are the perfect places to chat with your customers about new products, extraordinary promotions, or simply to educate them about your business. Through constant FREE communication, you can keep your business in the eyes of your customers, which, in turn, will lead to repeat business and referrals. Keep in mind that the key to this type of communication is to be rich in content; do not use these avenues to present your product or service.

• Quick results – Successful and undefeated implementation of an SMM plan will create almost instant results for your business. This boost can be quantified by increased site traffic, increased lead acquisition, and ultimately increased sales. Unlike radio or television advertisements, where your customers disappear once the advertisements go off the air, these benefits of the web platform will continue in the long term as long as you keep communicating and updating your existence on social media.

• More conversion possibilities Every post you make on a social media platform is an opportunity for customers to convert. When you gain followers, you will simultaneously have access to new customers, recent customers, and old customers, and you can interact with all of them. With every blog post, image, video, or comment you share on your social pages there is an opportunity for someone to react, and each reaction could lead to a site visit and ultimately a conversion. Not every deal with your brand results in a conversion, but every positive interaction increases the likelihood of a final conversion. Even if your click-through rates are low, the sheer number of opportunities you have on social media matters. “The four elements of any action and how to use them in your online marketing initiative”, the “opportunity” is the first element of any action.

• Higher conversion rates SMM results in higher conversion rates in several different ways. Perhaps the most important is its element of humanization; the fact that brands are more humanized when interacting on social media channels. Social media is a place where brands can act like people do, and this is important because people like to do business with other people; not with companies.