Social Media Marketing Tutorial | Detailed Guide 2024

Social Media Marketing Tutorial for Beginners

Want to get an overview of social media marketing quickly?

Want to learn the basics of Social Media Marketing in a nutshell? If yes, this concise yet informative Social Media Marketing tutorial for beginners will fulfill your requirements.

What is Social Media Marketing Tutorial?

Social Media Marketing Tutorial for beginners helps you learn how to pick a social media platform that works for you, set objectives and success criteria, and identify your target market.

Additionally, it offers training to help you become a social media influencer.

Social media penetration is at almost 2.8 billion active users worldwide (and growing). This is a considerable number.

When such a large number of the world’s population is on social media networks, Marketers cannot afford to miss reaching out to them via this medium.

In this Social Media Marketing Tutorial article, you will get to know the definition of social media marketing, social media channels overview, and how to create a social media strategy, followed by social media marketing video tutorials.

So, let’s learn about social media marketing.

What is Social Media Marketing?

Social Media Marketing promotes products or services using different features of social networks.

Some popular social media networks are Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram, and Snapchat.

People use these social networks primarily to connect with their friends. But they also use it to follow the brands they like for the latest offers or updates.

As per Statista, Facebook has roughly 2.93 billion users worldwide. If a brand is not promoting itself on social media, it misses a big piece of business!

Social Media Marketing is a crowded place. You need the correct training to advance your career. To get all of this, go to Digital Vidya.

How to get CSMMM (Certified Social Media Marketing Master) Certification at Digital vidya?

On registration, you will receive participation details for 1 month of live instructor-led online Social Media course sessions. You can attend these sessions from anywhere.

Days: Saturday or Sunday (Weekend Batch) / Tues & Thur (Weekday Batch)

Time: 10:00 AM to 1:30 PM (IST) / 8:00 PM to 9:30 PM (IST)

Venue: Online [You could be living anywhere in India (e.g., Delhi, Gurgaon, Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Noida, Pune) or outside India (e.g., Singapore, Malaysia, UAE/Dubai)]

Why Social Media Marketing?

As we have learned earlier, social marketing is, now, the more pressing matter is to examine the need for social media marketing. Social media, as the name suggests, allows you to socialize with people.

With its massive user base, social media is an effective way for a business to spread awareness, increase engagement, and boost revenue. The following reasons only reiterate the importance and need for social media marketing :

• Increase Brand Awareness: The massive social media reach is one of its most attractive features. Social media can boost your business’s visibility and expose you to potential clients. Brands create share-worthy and eye-catching content that enhances its visibility and recall.
• Grow your business Affordably: Creating a social media profile is free, making it appealing to even small businesses. Social marketing involves lower costs and is not as reliant on data which further reduces costs.
• Boosts Engagement: A simple social media post can reach millions of people via likes, comments, shares, and the right hashtags. Engagement on social media helps you keep in touch with the people you serve. Q&A sessions or short informative videos can start an interesting conversation with clients interested in your business.
• Builds Reputation: Social marketing helps you effectively manage your reputation and be seen as a caring and supportive brand in the public’s eyes. Creating authentic content resonates with people, which further attests to your authenticity. Asking questions, listening to others’ queries, using email marketing, and responding quickly can do so.

Social Media Channels Overview

Facebook has already crossed a 2 billion user base, and India is the largest country with more than 241 million monthly active users! Mark Zuckerberg announced the milestone of crossing 2 billion users on 27th June with the following post:

If you see the image below taken from the latest joint report “Global Statshot” by We Are Social and Hootsuite, you can observe that the top social media channels right now in the world are:

• Whatsapp
• Instagram
• Facebook
• WeChat
• Douyin
• Tiktok
• Twitter
• FB Messenger
• Telegram
• Line
• Pinterest
• QQ
• Snapchat
• Kuaishou
• Imessage
• Discord
• Starbucks

Let me give you an overview of the Top 11 Social Media Channels:

B2B and B2CCustomer service, community building, and public relations

1. WhatsApp

WhatsApp is the most used and favorite mobile app messenger worldwide, with more than 2 Billion active monthly.  In India alone, there are more than 487 million active users.

Ecommerce Companies are using this platform for updating orders and remarketing their target audience for other products.

2. Instagram

Instagram is owned by Facebook and enjoys a current user base of more than 1.386 Billion worldwide. Being a mobile-first platform, it is increasingly popular among teenagers and young adults.

So, if you are a brand that targets young customers, you must have a presence on Instagram. Moreover, the Ad Platforms of Instagram and Facebook are deeply integrated.

So you can extend the reach of your existing Facebook ads to Instagram or launch Instagram ads in solitude too. Here’s a detailed post on setting up and utilizing Instagram for business.

3. Facebook

Using Facebook, you can market to almost all sets of customers using Pages, Groups, and  Ads. B2C as well as B2B. I mentioned B2B because almost every social media user is present on Facebook. So, with the right targeting, you can also reach out to the business customer.

Facebook allows deep targeting through its Ads Manager and Power Editor. You can promote your content or create an ad campaign to target customers based on age, location, gender, interests, devices, and networks.

You can also save these audiences (called custom audiences). And to expand your reach further, you can also create a Lookalike audience based on your custom audience, which means an audience similar to your custom audience.

With each Facebook ad account, you get a unique Facebook Pixel (which you must add to the header tag on your website’s code).

4. WeChat

WeChat is a multi-purpose social media, messaging and payment app developed in China.

It’s the largest social media platform in the country and one of the top 10 social networks in the world. Users can send messages, hail a ride, pay for their groceries, keep fit, book a Covid-19 test, and even access government services like visa applications without leaving the app.

WeChat had over 889 million monthly active users by 2016, and as of 2019, WeChat’s monthly active users had risen to an estimated one billion. As of January 2022, it was reported that WeChat has more than 1.2 billion users.

5. Douyin

Douyin is the Chinese version of TikTok and the only platform available to people living in China.

ByteDance also owns it, and it’s been around since 2016. Like the international version of TikTok, Douyin also provides users with a feed of video content tailored to their interests and preferences. Light on text and images, Chinese Tiktok Douyin, is all about entertaining, easy-to-consume video content.

6. TikTok

TikTok is currently among the most popular social media platform with extremely high engagement rates. It is a short video platform that is highly addictive and is a leading trendsetter in today’s market. TikTok advertisement has become a popular platform for launching new products and services.

7. Twitter

Twitter has struggled to grow in the past few years and has lagged behind platforms like Facebook and Instagram. But still, it is quite a useful platform for marketers.

Twitter started with a limit of 140 characters (which is still there) per update. Still, it has included many features and rich media (Photos and Videos) to make its platform visually interactive and more valuable.

In India, Twitter may not be that popular, but in the USA, it is still a trendy medium used by B2-B and B2C marketers.

Since you now have an overview of social media marketing and channels, the next step in this marketing tutorial is learning how to create a social media strategy.

8. YouTube

The second-largest platform and third-most-visited website are both YouTube.

It is the quickest and most straightforward way to learn about new technology.

It helps in the global marketing and sales of our goods.

9. LinkedIn

The largest professional network on the internet is called LinkedIn. LinkedIn can help you find the ideal job or internship, develop and strengthen professional connections, and get the knowledge you need to advance your career.

10. Telegram

Telegram has over 500 million monthly active users and is one of the 10 most downloaded apps in the world.

Telegram is a popular cross-platform messaging app because it offers enhanced privacy, encryption, and support for prominent group chat features.

It also has no ties to other social media platforms (both Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp are owned by Facebook, for example), which makes the service more appealing to some.

The app is multiplatform, with versions available for iOS, Android, Windows, Mac, and Linux. You can also access Telegram from a web browser.

11. Snapchat

Snapchat is fast emerging as the most popular channel among teenagers. So more brands targeting teenagers is a potential goldmine.

How To Create Social Media Strategy

From a brand’s perspective and as a social media professional, you need to take care of the following aspects to create a well-defined social media strategy:

Set Social Media Goals

The very first step of a social marketing campaign is to determine the goals you seek to achieve with the campaign. Goals can look like increasing brand awareness or generating new leads.

Why do you want to be on social media in the first place? What do you want to achieve? Some of the potential social media goals which you can set are:

• Increase Brand Awareness
• Drive Traffic to the Website
• Generate Sales/Leads
• Build Social Media Communities
• Implement Social Customer Service

Know Your Target Audience

The next step is to research your target audience. This strategy will be helpful later to know how to cater the campaign for your ideal customers.

Keep Tabs on The Competition

Researching your competition and learning from their campaigns and mistakes is essential.

Social Media Listening

This is very important to keep track of your brand mentions.

How can you resolve customer complaints or reply to negative comments from angry customers if you are not even aware that they are talking about you? Even in the case of positive comments, you need to amplify such messages and thank those users for the same.

You can use any free social media listening tools like Hootsuite, Social Mention, Measured, and Cyfe. Google Alerts is also a highly useful tool to keep track of your brand mentions across the web.

Choose the Right Social Media Channels

If you listen well to social media, choosing the right channels for your business will be a cakewalk.

Just create profiles where your customers are active. For example, for B2B, LinkedIn is the best platform, while to target teenagers, Snapchat is a great platform.

Define Your Guidelines

A business needs to set guidelines to dictate its social media campaign. The following important aspect of your campaign is to create a profile that authentically depicts your personality.

Plan and Schedule Your Posts

The content you post on social media should be preplanned. This improves the engagement your content gains. One way to do so is to create a calendar to schedule your posts.

Run advertisements on various social media platforms

All social media platforms have the option to run advertisements- paid or unpaid.

Create a Brand Personality

It would help if you were human while interacting with people on social media. People like to have one-on-one interactions. A semi-formal and honest approach works well on social media.

Measure and Analyze Results

Measuring and analyzing social media metrics is an excellent way to see whether you are on track. All the major social media networks, like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, etc., have native analytics platforms.

You also need to integrate Google Analytics with your company website to track the traffic coming in from different sources, including social media. Amplify what works, and tweak or weed out what doesn’t.

This is an excellent basic plan you can create to stay on top. More information related to this can be found in the detailed Infographic below:

You can watch some informative social media marketing videos in the next section of this Social Media Marketing Tutorial.

Social Media Marketing Tools

Social media marketers use various social media management tools to simplify time-consuming like:

1. SocialOomph

SocialOomph helps you to automate various business tasks across numerous social media platforms.

2. PostPlanner

You can easily schedule Facebook updates and increase customer engagement on social media platforms.

3. Agorapulse

It is deemed the best-rated social marketing tool that focuses on audience engagement.

4. Chattypeople

This is one of the top social media marketing tools and is an on-demand tool. There is no need to have any prior coding knowledge to use Chattypeople.

5. Canva

Canva has free and paid features that help people create content using multiple templates, fonts, and colors. Using Canva can improve the quality of content you create and post on your website or social media profile.

6. Buffer

This is a publishing tool that increases customer engagement.

7. Brand24

This simple yet effective social media marketing tool analyses keywords and improves the content you create.

Difference between Social Media Optimization & Social Media Marketing

SMM is a long-term process that might entail SMO. However, it is popularly said SMM starts where SMO ends.

SMO

• Your website needs to be polished and updated to be visible on social media. Making your sites more aesthetically pleasing for social media users is one of the duties involved in social media optimization.It IncludesPutting social media plugins on webpages
•  Allowing users to sign up using Google or Facebook
•  Adding buttons for social media sharing on websites
• Increasing social media audience engagement
• The created content needs to be designed so that it can be shared.
• Share your content widely across several networks and post frequently.
• Ideally, provide contact information on the company’s social media pages.

SMM

Increasing social media engagement is the sole goal of social media marketing or SMM.

It Includes-

• Analyzing how the business competes online
• Developing an SMM strategy to achieve the goal
• Use analytics to plan your audience.
• Establish a schedule for publishing the content online.
• Increase audience engagement.
• After learning the stats, modify your strategy.
• Another strategy its uses to advertise its products is paid advertising.

Social Media Marketing Video Tutorials

Some of you might like to learn by watching videos on YouTube. If you would like to learn by watching a video, here is 67 minute long social media marketing video tutorial:

I hope you like it.

In case you want to learn Social Media Marketing Tutorial in Hindi, then the following video can be of help to you:

I hope you learn the desired lessons in these videos.

Conclusion

I am hopeful that the information and the resources I have shared in this article will help you to get a decent overview of social media marketing.

The free social media tutorials in this article in concepts and videos will help you draw an actionable social media marketing plan for your company.

You can also take the help of social media marketing services to make a well-proof social media marketing plan.

We’d recommend you enroll in our Social Media Marketing training course led by industry experts who would help you enrich the knowledge base in this fraternity.

Image Credits: We Are Social, Hootsuite, Jay Baer, ConvinceAndConvert.com, Adam Zubin, The Noun Project.

FAQs

1. Why should I use social media?

The contemporary world has gone social, and as per stats, around 30% of all time spent online is associated with social media platforms.

Brands should use it to widen their reach, generate leads and optimize conversions and sales. Whether you want to boost brand awareness, sponsored content, or a combination of both, Social Media is beneficial.

2. What social platforms should I use?

The use of social platforms depends upon the specific needs of a business or brand. Facebook is considered quite effective as a practical starting point, while LinkedIn is quite useful for b2b businesses.

However, every brand is unique, and therefore, their use of social platforms should be associated with where their audiences are, what products or services they offer, what goals they want to accomplish, etc.

3. How often should I post?

Generally, posting at least twice a week is good, but it also varies. You can post on Twitter and Pinterest more frequently if you have the time and the right content to post.

A Hubspot study suggests that pages under 10,000 fans experienced a 50% drop in engagement per post when they posted more than once daily. It also indicates that, at a minimum, brands should post to their Facebook Pages 3 times per week.

4. How can I schedule social posts?

On Facebook, you may use Facebook Business Manager to schedule all posts.

On Twitter, you can opt for TweetDeck, while Instagram posts can be scheduled by using HootSuite, which also enables you to schedule posts on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. You may also find other tools for your specific scheduling purpose.

5. How Do I Get More Followers?

Posting too frequently or buying followers won’t let you get followers who are helpful and profitable for your brand, as Paid followers do not necessarily engage with your content.

Therefore, you can drive engagement by offering high-quality content to people at the right time and adding value to their lives. Using creative and unique content will also help you in the process.

6. How to handle negative comments on social media?

Social media is where customers express all types of emotions and opinions.

Therefore, for handling negative comments, you may either choose to address your customers’ concerns to regain their trust or you might use content moderation solutions. Facebook and Instagram offer comment-filtering options.

7. Is Paid Social Media Advertising a Good Idea?

If your organic social media marketing campaigns are not raising awareness for your products or services, you can opt for paid social media advertising to widen the reach of your content in front of your target customers.

8. Is social media a good career in India?

One of the most exciting and promising occupations is one involving social networking. Starting a social media profession and enrolling in an online digital marketing course are the best options if you love social media and want to support businesses in expanding their online presence.