With Black Friday and the beginning of the holiday shopping rush around the corner, there’s never been a more important time to market your retail business on social media. Many retailers have a social media presence, but keeping up with the best practices with ever-changing features and algorithms can be challenging. Despite what some may refer to as a headache, making your product or business shoppable via social media is well worth the effort. According to a study conducted by Forbes, nearly two-thirds of shoppers use social media as part of their shopping strategy. This includes researching the product, seeing what the reviews are reporting, and eventually making a purchase. To help simplify your holiday marketing plan, we’re sharing some of our top tips for making the most out of the best ways to market your retail business on social media:

Make Use of the Features 

Ultimately, Facebook and Instagram want you to use them for your business, so they try to make their shopping features as user-friendly as possible. Instagram offers many shopping settings, ranging from product tags to highlight products in your pictures and videos so that users can easily tap and shop the product they’re interested in, to shops where you can share your story, sell, and curate collections.

Facebook has recently changed its original Facebook Page Shop to a new overarching “Facebook Shops” concept. These shops are created using commerce manager, where you can customize, arrange and curate your collection. Once your Facebook Shop is set up, your collections may be visible on Instagram and Facebook (as long as your business accounts are linked). This allows you to market your retail business on social media through one streamlined avenue, in addition to making your business visible and shoppable to potential customers. Throughout an ongoing pandemic, shoppers are more likely to shop through social media than ever before, so make sure you’re making the most of these shopping features.

Make the Most Out of Your Giveaway

The holiday season is commonly referred to as “the season of giving,” and for many local businesses, this includes giveaways as a thank you to their followers. Giveaways don’t have to be reserved for influencers or national companies with large followings. This marketing strategy can serve as a launching pad for small businesses getting their start or boosting their visibility. Partner with other local businesses to create a mutually beneficial giveaway featuring multiple products and reaching multiple audiences. Using giveaways as a tactic to market your retail business on social media can help increase sales around the holidays. 

Get Your Audience Engaged

Stay top of mind by actively engaging your audience on social media. While it’s easy to continuously scroll on social media, using the question, quiz, or poll feature on your Instagram stories encourages followers to pause for a minute and linger on your content. You can also promote engagement with your followers by asking them to comment their favorite product, color, or style on your Instagram posts. Social media is a tool to communicate and engage with your audience, so make the effort to reach out!

Extend the Reach of Your Customer Service

Everyone knows the value of quality customer service. In the same way that you would expect your customers to be attended to in your brick-and-mortar store, followers engaging with your social media should also be attended to. Potential customers will often check out social media profiles before making a purchase. Seeing attentive and thoughtful customer service online can be enough to encourage a potential customer to make a purchase. 

Feature Your User-Generated Content

One of the easiest and most effective ways to market your retail business on social media is to use your user-generated content. Instead of models, larger retail businesses have shifted their focus to featuring normal people wearing their brands. Not only does featuring fans wearing your clothes make for easy content, but it also makes your audience feel included in what you’re producing. Pro tip: always ask for permission before re-posting, and don’t forget to tag the creator! 

Talk to a Pro About How to Market Your Retail Business on Social Media

While these tips are helpful if you have your hands full this holiday season, contact TargetMarket. Leave the digital work to a professional and let one of our team members help market your retail business on social media. Ready to get started? Contact us today at (888) 632-4499 or fill out our form for a free consultation.

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