Small Businesses and Social Media, a Great Combination

More and more small businesses are gaining larger numbers of customers than large and medium-size businesses. Even though larger businesses have more money to spend on social media, their vision doesn’t always include social media and its magic.

When it comes to small businesses and social media, there are many success factors that contribute to bringing the businesses to the next level.

Building relationships

Of all of the success factors, relationship building is by far the most important one when it comes to social media. That is one of the reasons that smaller companies are more successful. In a smaller business situation, the principles of the business will take the time to get to know their clients personally. That personal touch makes a tremendous difference. The personal relationship between client and business owner gives extremely valuable feedback and insight to the business owner and establishes loyalty on the part of the client.

Start small

If you can establish short-term goals and interact with people on a personal and focused basis, you will see that the relationships that you are building will be of high quality. The number of connections with other people that you establish are not nearly as important as the quality of those connections. When faced with the question of quality versus quantity, you should always go for quality. Regarding connections through social media, there is usually much more interaction between the small-business owner and the client. In other words, there is a true relationship that goes both ways. The larger-business owner, on the other hand, will usually have a goal of getting as many followers or online connections as possible without being too concerned with the personal interaction.

Faster response

With small businesses, the customer will generally get what they need from the business owner more quickly. They won’t need to drill down through layer upon layer to eventually get to the person with whom they really want to speak. Another quality that is often present in small businesses is sincerity. They don’t have the corporate shell that often surrounds large businesses. It is that shell that prevents them from being themselves because they must follow the business’s policies.

Polar opposites

The business approach of small companies differs greatly from the business approach of large companies. When it comes to using social media, the smaller companies will be much more inclined to interact personally online (for example, using the LinkedIn Q&A feature). This strategy will be instrumental in gaining more clients eventually. It is really rare to see large companies approaching social media in the same manner.

Engaging other people

Social media is a tremendous success when it comes to businesses nowadays. One of the main reasons for that is the engagement factor. People love to be engaged and enticed. The really like that much better than having someone stand in front of them, trying to do a hard sell on them. It is a totally human quality to want to feel as though they are a part of something. Social media is a logical choice when it comes to small businesses and their marketing strategies.

Conclusion

Social media helps businesses to stand out in a marketplace that is constantly moving and is very noisy. Small businesses have a more difficult time doing that than larger businesses do. Social media can give the small businesses exposure online like nothing else can and it can boost their reputation to heights that they could not have imagined before.

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