How To Choose The Best Social Media Platform To Market Your Business In 2021

Introduction – How To Choose The Best Social Media Platform To Market Your Business In 2021

When it comes to social media marketing, there are so many different platforms out there. It can be hard to know which one is best for your business and objectives.

There are many social media platforms available to businesses – and all of them offer the opportunity to market your business online.

The problem is that not all social media are created equal. Different social media are best suited for different types of businesses, niches, and marketing objectives.

That’s why we put together this blog post!

We’ll talk about the different social media platforms and how they work as well as which ones may be a better fit for your type of business.

In this blog post, we’d like to teach our readers which social media platform is best for their business and marketing objectives.

By the end of this post, you should have a much clearer idea of what social media platform is right for you!

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Why You Should Market Your Business On Social Media

Social media is a term for any social interaction that takes place online and on various platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or LinkedIn.

Social media has become the norm to interact, socialize, and meet new people in today’s society – it’s how we communicate now!

But it doesn’t stop there!

Social media provides a powerful platform for you to build an online community and grow your business.

Today, in 2021, it is reported that 91.9% of businesses with more than 100 employees are expected to use social media to market their business.

Another 73% of marketers believe that their marketing efforts through social media have been effective in some way.

This means that if you have a business without social media marketing strategies in place, you’re missing out big time.

And not only are people communicating through social media – but they’re also spending tons of money there too!

Nearly $50 billion dollars was spent by consumers last year on products advertised via social networking sites like Facebook and Instagram alone. That number doesn’t even include other platforms like YouTube or WhatsApp.

One of the biggest reasons why businesses are turning to social media marketing is because it’s cheap.

It doesn’t require the same level of investment as traditional advertising, and you can use a number of free platforms to market your business!

How Can Social Media Marketing Impact Your Business Positively

There are many ways that social media marketing can be used to grow your business online.

One of the most popular ways is to establish a social media presence.

This will allow you to market your business on sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other places that people spend their time communicating online which helps with customer acquisition.

Another great way is to use platforms such as YouTube for video marketing.

It’s been reported that customers trust videos from businesses or brands over any other content type! That means being able to produce quality videos is an integral part of your social media strategy if you want success.

Another advantage of using social media marketing is that it can help to improve your brand awareness. Brand awareness is the degree to which people know, recall, and recognize your company. It’s a number that can be measured through surveys of customers or through social media analytics.

Social media is also an excellent place to connect with other businesses in the industry as well as potential partners who may want to work with you!

This creates opportunities for collaborations on projects, events, promotions – anything at all!

Social media marketing has some incredible benefits including higher conversion rates so it’s important not only for consumer awareness but because it generates leads and potential sales too!

Social media is also, as we’ve mentioned above, a cheap and easy way of getting inorganic traffic to your website.

The best part is there are dozens of platforms to choose from!

To help you learn more about how social media can be used to positively impact your business we have created this blog post to teach you 15 different ways to use social media to market your business online.

It will help you to learn the many different ways that social media and social media marketing can be used to grow your business. It goes far beyond lead generation and website traffic generation.

To learn more about this you can visit the article here: Use Social Media To Market Your Business These 15 Awesome Ways

How To Choose The Right Social Media For Your Business And Marketing Objectives

There are dozens of social media platforms available to choose from.

So how do you know which one is best for your needs?

There are a few things that you must consider before you decide which platform is best for you.

Let us discuss the three most important things to consider before you can decide which social media platform is best for your business.

Your Business

When you decide to market your business using social media one of the first things that you need to consider is the type of business that you have. 

The reason why you must do this is that there are different demographics that are dominant on different social media.

For example, 60% of Pinterest users are women, 80% of us moms are on Pinterest and 89% of Pinterest users are on the platform for shopping inspiration. This is further supported by the statistic that tells us that 50% of Pinterest users are there to make a purchase.

This tells us that if your business caters to women moms and is eCommerce-based then Pinterest is a good solution for your business.

This is in contrast to a popular social media network for professionals, LinkedIn. 56% of LinkedIn users are men and 57% of LinkedIn users are outside of the US. 

Additionally, LinkedIn is the most trusted social media network available today. 40 million people use LinkedIn to search for jobs each week at three people are hired every minute. 55 million companies are on LinkedIn and 80% of people on LinkedIn Drive business decisions.

This means that if you’re searching for a job or you want to make a connection with a company you wish to do business with then LinkedIn is a better option than Pinterest.

This just goes to highlight that different social media platforms are best suited for different types of businesses.

 Another thing that we must explore before deciding which social media platform is best for our marketing objectives is the customer that we intend to serve.

Your Customers

The customers we plan to serve to Drive the decision of Which social media platform we will use.

For example, if we consider the social media demographics of Pinterest again then we know that based on the statistics of how many women and moms are on Pinterest that it would not be favorable or a good decision for us to start a company around men’s Sportswear that would be marketed on Pinterest even though Pinterest pins are e-commerce driven. 

The reason why this happens is that even though there are men on Pinterest that the statistics show that men sign up for a Pinterest account and then leave whereas women will create an account that will continue to use the platform for engagement, shopping, and product education among other uses.

If we, on the other hand, consider using Instagram for this type of business, a men’s sportswear company then we will see much better interaction and profits in our business.

The reason why this happens is that Instagram is more picture-based and video-based. a lot of Instagram users would also be in our target demographic for a men’s sportswear company which is the ages of 18 to 35. 

We can also use special features on Instagram by Instagram shopping to display our products and Link back to work eCommerce website.

For reasons like this we might not choose Pinterest as our primary marketing platform for such a business even though Pinterest would definitely be a good solution if we were targeting women.

Your Marketing Objective

The final thing that we must consider when we choose a marketing platform for our business is the marketing objective of our business.

This is very easy to understand. If we take Instagram, for example, then most of the interaction that happens on Instagram is actually profitable for building a brand and building brand awareness.

However, if we look at the statistics of Facebook then we realize that a lot of the activity on Facebook can also Drive business decisions. 

According to a study and report done by HubSpot, Facebook has the highest return on interest or ROI among all paid advertising platforms.

Additionally, even though the average price for an ad increased by 5% in the last quarter of 2020 the engagement and impressions of these have increased by 25% over the same period.

Listening means that even though Facebook ads cost a little bit more they are bringing in a lot more returns on your investment.

So if your marketing objective is to build a brand, interact with your audience and build a relationship with your prospects then Instagram is your best solution. But if you would like to also drive business decisions like sales and leads then Facebook is a better option for you. 

Finally, if your objective is to build business relationships with other professionals, get employed, employ others, or do B2B marketing then LinkedIn might be the best option for these marketing objectives.

These are just simple examples of how different social media platforms will be suited for different marketing objectives that you might have.

However, we recommend that you have a following on as many relevant platforms as possible because at any moment you might need to do something a little bit different in your business to find the best marketing solution for your long-term success.

When To Use Facebook To Market Your Business

Facebook is the biggest and most popular social media network available today with over 2.85 billion monthly active users and 1.5 billion daily active users. It also has a very balanced user base ranging from both men and women between the ages of 18 to over 65.

That is to say that if you have a business then there is a good chance that you can use Facebook to find your ideal customer.

Some Key Facebook Statistics You Should Know

1. Over 2.74 Billion Monthly Active users
2. 59% reach of the world’s social networking population
3. The third most visited website in the world
4. 57% of users are men and 43% of users are women
5. 32.4% of its audience is aged 25 to 34
6. Users spend an average of 34 minutes per day using the platform

Facebook Statistics Source

Facebook Marketing Advantages

Some of Facebook’s strengths in marketing:

1. Facebook groups make it easier to build an online community
2. Their wide user base makes it possible to find almost any customer on their platform
3. It is especially effective in building connections since recent algorithm changes focus heavily on this
4. Facebook Ads give the most Returns On Investment according to a Hubspot report
5. Detailed reporting options for ad campaigns
6. The closest thing to the most complete and perfect social media platform for users and marketers alike
7. Facebook messenger and business page can be an alternate option for offering support and news about your business to customers

Facebook Marketing Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages of using Facebook to market your business:

1. It might take a bit of time and investment for a beginner marketer to learn how to properly use the platform
2. A large user base might make it hard to connect with your ideal customer or audience
3. Organic reach is almost dead. That means you will have to pay to get your message across

Best Types Of Businesses To Market On Facebook

These are some of the businesses we recommend you use Facebook to market:

1. B2B businesses
2. B2C businesses
3. Service businesses
4. Small businesses and startups
5. E-Commerce businesses
6. Local product or service businesses

In general, Facebook can be used to market any business of any size or marketing objective. This one size fits all approach is particularly effective for Facebook because its marketing algorithm is very effective in getting you results if you use it right!

When To Use Instagram To Market Your Business

Even though Instagram seems to be a mobile app-only platform it is actually the sixth most visited website in the world. It has a user base of over 1 billion monthly active users making it the second-ranked traditional social network in the world behind Facebook.

In terms of demographics, Instagram is quite evenly split between both genders with 51% of its users being men and 49% being women.

Users spend an average of 30 minutes per day using Instagram in 2020

Some Key Instagram Statistics You Should Know

1. Over 1 Billion Monthly Active users
2. Reaches over 140 million U.S users
3. 88% of its users are outside the U.S
4. The sixth most visited website in the world
5. 51% of users are men and 49% of users are women
6. 81% of Instagram users have used Instagram to research products and services while 66% say the network helps with interacting with brands
7. Users spend an average of 30 minutes per day using the platform

Instagram Marketing Advantages

Some of Instagram’s strengths in marketing:

1. Instagram is perfect for businesses to establish a brand and increase brand awareness
2. Instagram is perfect for building a relationship with customers and clients
3. Instagram is one of the best platforms for e-commerce businesses due to its focus on pictures and videos
4. Features like Instagram shop and Branded Content makes it an effective platform for e-commerce businesses to market and sell products
5. Even distribution between men and women makes it easy to connect with both genders
6. Instagram Live and Instagram TV makes creating an authentic brand and relationship with customers and clients easy
7. An effective platform for brands looking to grow by using Influencer Marketing

Instagram Statistics Sourcehttps://blog.hootsuite.com/instagram-statistics/

Instagram Marketing Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages of using Instagram to market your business:

1. Instagram’s organic reach is pretty much dead. This means you will have to pay to effectively connect with your clients and audience
2. Low organic reach can make creating an online community and growing your business costly

Best Types Of Businesses To Market On Instagram

These are some of the businesses we recommend you use Instagram to market:

1. Local businesses
2. B2B businesses
3. B2C businesses
4. Service businesses
5. Small businesses and startups
6. E-Commerce businesses
7. Businesses that cater to a younger audience like Millenials and users up to age 35

When To Use LinkedIn To Market Your Business

LinkedIn is the most trusted social media in the world with 73% of its users agreeing with the idea that they protect their user’s data well.

LinkedIn, like Instagram, is also an effective platform for reaching both males and females with 57% of its users being men and 43% of its users being women.

It has 722 million members with 76% of its user base existing outside of the U.S with 59.95 of its users between the ages of 25 and 34.

That is to say, LinkedIn is popular among young professionals and business owners since 40 million people use LinkedIn to search for jobs each week and every minute 3 people are hired through LinkedIn.

Some Key LinkedIn Statistics You Should Know

1. Approximate 700 million users
2. A LinkedIn Ad can reach 13% of the world
3. Ad exposure on LinkedIn can increase purchase intent by 33%
4. 80% of LinkedIn users are decision-makers in their companies
5. 55 million companies are on LinkedIn
6. 96% of B2B content marketers use LinkedIn for organic social marketing
7. 76% of LinkedIn users are outside the U.S.
8. Remote jobs on LinkedIn increased by 250% from March to October 2020

LinkedIn Statistics Source

LinkedIn Marketing Advantages

Some of LinkedIn’s strengths in marketing:

1. It is the best social media platform to use to reach professionals
2. The perfect platform for getting hired
3. The best social media platform to use to grow B2B businesses
4. An effective platform to use to increase connection with and among employees
5. A powerful platform to use to grow your brand using video marketing
6. The best platform that you can use to get organic reach for your business

LinkedIn Marketing Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages of using LinkedIn to market your business:

1. It is not the best platform to use to meet new people as most users tend to only interact with people they know
2. There tends to be a lot of spam and users trying to sell you their products or services at every turn
3. Users aren’t very active, social, or open to meeting new people and forming new connections most times

Best Types Of Businesses To Market On LinkedIn

These are some of the businesses we recommend you use LinkedIn to market:

1. B2B businesses
2. SaaS companies tend to do well
3. Service businesses
4. Small businesses and startups

When To Use YouTube To Market Your Business

Youtube is one of the most popular social media platforms available today. In fact, Youtube is the second most visited website in the world behind Google with 21.9 billion monthly visits in 2020. Youtube also has more than 2 billion logged-in monthly users.

Youtube is especially effective and popular with long-form, high-quality video content that can be used for a variety of reasons. Businesses can use Youtube to grow organically by posting videos consistently or inorganically by using Youtube Ads.

People watch over a billion hours of video on YouTube every day with users over the age of 17 spend 41.9 minutes on YouTube daily.

Some Key YouTube Statistics You Should Know

1. The second-most visited website in the world
2. The second-most used social network in the world
3. 56% of its users are male and 44% are female
4. 100 billion hours of gaming videos watched in 2020
5. 72% of people used YouTube to exercise or keep fit in 2020
6. 70% of viewers bought from a brand after seeing an ad on YouTube
7. YouTube Ads targeted by intent increase purchase intent by 100%
8. 50.9% of B2B decision-makers use YouTube for research purposes

YouTube Statistics Source

YouTube Marketing Advantages

Some of YouTube’s strengths in marketing:

1. It is an effective platform to connect with users up to age 35
2. It can be a powerful purchase-decision driver
3. Effective in showing product and service quality
4. Effective for building a solid brand and online community
5. Can be used to educate prospects and customers about your products and services
6. Especially effective platform to use to teach your community ‘how-to’ do things
7. Effective for use in live streaming for cooking, exercising, gaming, tutorials, etc
8. Best social media platform for posting video content

YouTube Marketing Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages of using YouTube to market your business:

1. It is hard to use to meet new people in a one-on-one, personal relationship level
2. Not very effective for posting short, frequent updates like other traditional social media
3. Can be expensive and time-consuming to create long-form video content
4. Not very effective for local businesses who serve only local customers or clients

Best Types Of Businesses To Market On YouTube

These are some of the businesses we recommend you use YouTube to market:

1. B2B businesses
2. B2C businesses
3. Service businesses
4. Small businesses and startups
5. Businesses that cater to a younger audience like Millenials and users up to age 35

When To Use Twitter To Market Your Business

Twitter is the most effective social media for sharing news and important information about your business. 59% of its users regularly get news from the platform.

70% of its users are male and 30% are female. It is the 6th-ranked mobile app with 353 million monetizable Daily Active Users. Monetizable Daily Active Users is the term Twitter uses to report its audience.

Even though 90% of Americans know about Twitter, even if they don’t use it, it’s not a very popular app in America with only 68.7 million or 19.4% of its user base coming from America.

Public perception on Privacy and Data Security of Twitter is also not the best it could be with the platform ranking 7 out of 9 digital platforms on the scale of trust. Only Facebook (notorious for data breaches) and Tik Tok rank worst.

However, Twitter is the number one social media platform in Japan and 82% of B2B content marketers use Twitter for organic content marketing in the last 12 months.

Some Key Twitter Statistics You Should Know

1. The most popular social media platform in Japan
2. Twitter ads can reach up to 5.8% of the world population over age 13
3. 70% of its users are men and 30% are women
4. 28% of its users are between the ages of 25 and 34 years old
5. 21% of adults in the U.S use Twitter and are more likely to be Democrats than Republicans
6. 99% of its users also use at least one other social platform
7. Twitter Ad engagement is up 27%
8. There was a 15% increase in Click Through Rate (CTR) over single-asset ads

Twitter Statistics Source

Twitter Marketing Advantages

Some of Twitter’s strengths in marketing:

1. It is effective for sharing important news with customers and clients
2. It is effective in sharing short updates and posts
3. It is effective as an alternate support channel for your business
4. It is helpful for building personal, more one-on-one relationships with customers

Twitter Marketing Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages of using Twitter to market your business:

1. It is not an effective conversion driver
2. it is not an effective platform for building brand awareness
3. It is not effective for influencing purchasing decisions
4. It doesn’t have a high potential in reaching a wide range of audiences in the U.S or globally
5. Shouldn’t be your first choice for doing any form of paid advertisement

Best Types Of Businesses To Market On Twitter

These are some of the businesses we recommend you use Twiter to market:

1. Support and Call Centers
2. News Agencies
3. Political Representatives
4. Public Figures and Celebrities

When To Use Pinterest To Market Your Business

Pinterest can be considered the Holy Grail of B2C marketing for businesses in the space of Home Decor, mom and female related products and services, e-Commerce, Food and Diet, Exercise, Health, Wellness, and women-oriented niches.

Pinterest is the 14th largest social network in the world with 459 million monthly active users. 60% of Pinterest users are women but this statistic does not tell the full story.

That is because 77.1% of its audience that its self-service advertising tool identified were women, 14.5% were men, and the remaining were unspecified. This tells us that Pinterest is still a female-dominated social media platform.

Women aged 25 to 34 make up a whopping 30.4% of Pinterest’s ad audience with 92% of Pinterest advertisers ranking the platform first for reputation.

Some Key Pinterest Statistics You Should Know

1. The 14th largest social media platform in the world
2. Has 459 million monthly active users
3. 77.1% of its marketable audience were women and 14.5 % were men
4. In 2020 the number of male Pinners increased by nearly 50%
5. The number of Gen Z users grew by 40% between 2019 and 2020
6. 82% of its users are mobile users
7. 85% of Pinners use Pinterest to plan new projects
8. Advertisers can reach more than 200 million people on Pinterest
9. There was a 300% increase in conversions from Pinterest. People were using the platform to make purchases

Pinterest Statistics Source

Pinterest Marketing Advantages

Some of Pinterest’s strengths in marketing:

1. The best platform for feminine related products and services
2. An effective platform for driving traffic to your website
3. An effective platform for building brand awareness
4. Can be used to drive sales for your eCommerce business
5. Can be used to interact with your customers about your products
6. Can be used to display your product catalog

Pinterest Marketing Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages of using Pinterest to market your business:

1. All your content must be original since re-pinning the content of other users can lead to copyright issues
2. It can take time to properly create high-quality and engaging pins
3. Requires a lot of pins daily to see any results from organic reach
4. Not effective if your niche isn’t popular among women or on the platform already

Best Types Of Businesses To Market On Pinterest

These are some of the businesses we recommend you use Pinterest to market:

1. Local businesses
2. B2B businesses
3. Service businesses
4. Small businesses and startups
5. Feminine products and services
6. Health, fitness, and wellness

Conclusion – How To Choose The Best Social Media Platform To Market Your Business In 2021

In this blog post, we have taken a look at some of the popular social media platforms and some key statistics that tell us which type of business would have success marketing with them.

We have taken a look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of using each platform to help you better decide which platform is right for you and your business.

We also wanted to help you learn some of the ways that each of these platforms can be used in your business to build better customer relationships, generate growth, and drive conversions like sales and new customers and clients.

If you are looking for help with your social media marketing strategy or growing your business then our team is here for you.

Set up a free consultation with our team and allow us to handle all the heavy lifting involved in growing your business online.

If you have any questions about the article you can leave them in the comment section below and we will do our best to answer them.