Social media is a word that is highly viral and trendy these days. From school children to old people, everyone is conscious of it and maintains an account online. So what is this social media and why and how is it unavoidable to people, and how do e-commerce shops make the best benefit of the same fact? Social media, in simple terms, is building a digital presence for yourself online, which acts as a contact between the brand and customers. -Ardath Albee, CEO of marketinginteractions.com, said Social Media can provide a conversational extension to a B2B company’s nurturing programs. Social Media allows us to humanize our communications and make our companies more approachable.” Surveys prove 30% of online shoppers purchase from a Social Network like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat. 56 % of users follow brand pages to keep up to date with new products. Browsing on your social media, you must have often encountered ads that made you buy the product, which you never came across anywhere; hence the entire selling things online is made easy with social media. Another solid motive for using social media is that social media is a free marketing tool that allows companies to engage customers worldwide. If one shares information on social media, many people could see it, leading to the massive spread of information.

When you step foot in e-commerce, you should always try to be the best and mold according to the technology and world. As everything changes with time, we have to act accordingly. Social media is a big boon to eCommerce stores, and one should know how to effectively use them. Let us see a detailed analysis of the impact of social media.

Out of many social media handles available, each type of e-commerce business should focus on the social media suitable for its customers. Let us see which type of e-commerce store should prefer which social media handle.

If your eCommerce business targets:

1.People of age more than 30 or if you prefer to focus on only one social media platform:

For example, If your eCommerce store has health care equipment and deals with similar products, Facebook is the correct option for your business; seniors are the fastest-growing demographic, and nearly 40% of those born before 1945 are on Facebook. Facebook is actually the best shot if you want to focus on only one site too.

How Facebook can help eCommerce stores:

1. Increases the reach of your e-store: Random scrolling through Facebook in their free time is an everyday routine to many people, and in this lockdown, the amount of time spent by people on Facebook has intensified a lot. Facebook reaches almost 59% of the world’s social networking population. Be where your customers are, and profits are all yours. Creating a brand consistency on Facebook increases the popularity of your stores and drives more people towards the site.
2. Selling products directly on Facebook: You can make your revenue now from Facebook by adding a shop tab on your Facebook page and elevating your brand. A single click on the shop tab makes your customers land on your website to make payments. This shop tool is a total package; linking your business accounts to managing to ship returns takes care of everything.
3. Run Facebook ads to promote your products and offers: Ads are a well-organized way of promoting your business Every time a message seems to grab us, and we think, ‘I just might try it,’ we are at the nexus of choice and persuasion, and that is because of advertising, and now imagine if you start ads on the most used app by people? Sales would increase plenty. To get started, first, you have to create a Facebook ads account and it is a paid service but worth every penny you spend on it and can share targeted ads to people who are your prospects and as ads get displayed in feeds of potential customers, conversion of lookers to buyers happens instantaneously.

2. If you target to reach the young brains of the world, be proactive in happening discussions around the world.

If your small business deals with books or online stationery, or any school work-related items, you should step on to Twitter and participate in their discussions, tweet, retweet, and build yourself an image to target your prospects.

We often come across news saying trending on Twitter; ever wondered what these trends and tweets are? Twitter is a microblogging platform that allows you to post using 280 words maximum. Your posts are referred to as tweets. It is most used by people because the content is available crisply and instantly. There are 330m monthly active users and 145 million daily users.

How Twitter helps your e-commerce store?

1. Engage with customers, especially mobile users: Twitter helps you tweet, retweet, post, and solve all the customer queries, the fact that any person around the globe can reach you with a single tweet and a hashtag is what makes twitter rest from others. Apart from solving customer’s problems, Twitter is a way of promotion. Suppose customer tweets saying he loves your product and other people retweet it, and you become the #1 trending and boom! In no time, everyone would like to know about your business and start visiting you.
2. Research about your other competitors: You can’t do business without knowing your competition. It is essential to know everything going on in the market. Twitter is a great place to know about your competitors by following them. You can also keep learning from your business idols. The best thing about Twitter is the hashtags, and you can easily chat and engage yourself and stay updated on the happenings in your sector and carry these learnings to your business.
3. Twitter Ads: Twitter ads are paid type and can help you obtain followers, tweet engagement, app installs, website clicks, and using a feature called Ad-creatives, you can target an audience based on demographics, age range, etc.

3.If your products or services are perceptible, visual, and fall under the planning category.

For example, your store deals with complete wedding planning, house renovations, interior design products, or outfits for women; Pinterest would be your go-to option.

Pinterest is like an online pinboard where users can save, upload, sort, manage pictures. As we know that an image that speaks 1000 words using Pinterest would be very beneficial for your e-commerce stores too. There are 480 million active Pinterest users per month, and 77 percent of the Pinterest audience are women, so if your products target women, you should not miss your shot on Pinterest.

How Pinterest helps your e-commerce store?

1. Simplified Shopping Experience: Everything on Pinterest is through pictures, and as a customer searches for a product, he gets a diverse list of all of them, and it is easy to find what they are looking for and find the store hence by.
2. Free Ads: Social media giants like Facebook and Instagram offer the most minor organic reach, but with pins and saving pins on Pinterest and using innovative content and targeted strategies, organic ads can do wonders on Pinterest and shoot up your sales. It also has paid ads with more features than organic ads.

4.To answer customer questions related to your eCommerce domain:

Let us say your eCommerce store deals with shoes, and a person on quora asks how do I select the best shoe for myself; you should grab this opportunity to answer and cast a spell on these people who might become your future buyers.

Wondering how quora, a platform meant for questions and answers, can help e-commerce in any way? Ok, let us answer a question who would be your favorite teacher, the one who enables you to get answers to all the questions regarding a concept or question, or the one who leaves you mid-way without assisting you? Of course, the one who holds your hand through all stages, and that is precisely what you can do on Quora to your customers, answer their concerns, and make them drive to your site.

How does Quora help your e-commerce store?

1. Build a reputation by answering questions: Be a listening ear and a helping hand to your customers by sharing content, answering their questions, and leaving the link of your website or your blog link to increase the traffic on your e-commerce store.
2. Doing market research and connecting with people: Connect with people who matter to you and not just answer their questions, but you can ask questions too and learn from big companies and build a strong profile for yourself in the market.

5.If your store deals with any kind of fashion-related products, target Gen Z’s

Almost every teenager is on Instagram and uses it to search for products, follow small businesses, buy there, repost them on stories. So if your store deals with clothing, glasses, shoes, jewelry, anything, buckle up and create your Instagram accounts. Instagram influencers are some of the most famous people globally, and being on Instagram can also help you take their help in promoting the store.

Instagram is very popular nowadays, and it is mainly used by teenagers. There are 1 billion users on Instagram, and on average, almost every person spends around half an hour on Instagram. Instagram is also owned by Facebook and is similar to it with many other peculiar and exciting features like reels, igtv videos, and many more.

How Instagram helps your e-commerce store?

1. Offers checkout directly from the feed: As customers see a product they like on Instagram while discovering new products, an instant urge of buying them pops into their heads, and we need to cast their feeling of them using Instagram’s checkout feature, which provides a seamless shopping experience.
2. Attract your customers: Use Instagram to keep your customers engaged by trying all the cool features like conducting polls, question and answer sessions, live talks. You can also run competitions and gain prospects by offering giveaways and promoting yourself on Instagram.

People around the globe are on social media platforms, and it is a big ticket for e-commerce stores to reach any customer from any corner of the world using them. There are tons of social media platforms available apart from the ones stated above. It is always advised not to keep all your eggs in one basket, and hence you need to make a good mix and match of all the social media platforms you should be using according to the type of customers and focus on one platform more than all, where you get the most engagement and let the marketing game be on!

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