Best Practices to Promote Your Business on Social Media by Christopher Litster

Social media amplifies your efforts so you can be found and engage a wider audience to grow your business.

To put it all together, here are four best practices for successfully engaging customers and promoting your small business through social media.

1. Follow the one-in-seven rule. This rule is where only one of every seven posts overtly promotes your business. The remaining six should be focused on sharing valuable content, including posts from the community. This doesn’t mean you can’t promote your business in those other posts; just be sure you pair it with great content.

2. Ask conversation-starter questions. Most people enjoy sharing their opinions, so ask Facebook fans to weigh in on topics that are relevant to your business and interesting to them. The questions should engage followers and inspire them to refer business while giving you great insight.

3. Share your expertise. Post little-known, fun facts in the form of questions with a special offer presented to the first person to answer correctly.

4. Provide value. While including fun posts that reflect your personality is a must, it’s important to create content that benefits your followers. That can mean posting tips on best practices, providing access to white papers, or offering special deals on products or services.