In 2018, an estimated 2.65 billion people used social media and that number is slated to grow. 60% of Canadians spend time using social media, and over 80% have purchased something online. When you crunch these numbers, it becomes obvious that you need to have a social media presence in order to grow your business. Not everyone has an enormous budget, though. We’re going to show you a few low to no-cost tools and methods for improving your social media presence, but first:

Your Time Or Your Money

Upping your company’s social media game is going to take time or money – you’ll have to decide which. You can use your smartphone camera, stage photos yourself, write your own content, find the best times to cross-post on each platform, and engage with your users. That’s going to take hours out of your day. Now, that might be fine by you, and if it is, good for you but if it’s not, there are a number of advertising firms who would be more than willing to take the work on for you, at a price. Obviously, if you’re doing this on a budget, hiring a firm might be a bit of a stretch, but it’s something to keep in mind – how much is your time worth?

Free Analytics

Social media is all about producing content, then finding which types of content are resonating with users and producing more of that kind of content. Facebook Audience Insight can help you glean information about what kind of content your target demographic likes, what kind of devices they use to access Facebook, and more. You can get insights on Instagram interaction as well. Followerwonk, a tool developed by Moz, can help you find out who your Twitter followers are, where they live, and when they Tweet. All of this data can help you discover what kind of content you should post on which platforms, and when you should post.

Use Best Practices

A well-staged photo is incredibly important for a social media posting on most platforms. But LinkedIn, for example, often favours text-only, linkless posts. Facebook prioritizes videos hosted on its platform, rather than on YouTube’s – after all, Google is one of their biggest competitors. You might think hashtags are corny but you should absolutely use them – they’re one of the best ways for users to tell each other about your business.

These are just a few quick tips to help you maximize your shoestring social media budget. One of the best tips we can give you for social media spending (and any other kind of spending) is to constantly evaluate how much bang you’re getting for your buck. That’s something a Compass Accounting can help you with – analyzing your spending to make sure you’re getting good value out of your advertising budget.