Social media is one of the most powerful marketing platforms today for any brand. As a retailer, you need to leverage social media channels to generate buzz, and increase brand awareness. So how do you go about doing that?

Get active on every social media channel that your target market is active on.

The first step is to know who your target market is. Once you know that you can easily figure out what channels you need to be active on. Are you a small restaurant? Go where the foodies are. Instagram, Facebook, Yelp, Twitter etc. This goes the same for any business. Being active where your target consumers are means you will quickly gain brand exposure. Also, STAY active. Post daily on channels like Twitter or bi-weekly on Facebook. You need to keep your brand top of mind among consumers.

Create a unique online brand persona.

As a retailer, you have a unique advantage over B2B companies by appealing directly to consumers. You can employ much more creative social media strategies since you don’t have to be as strictly professional as B2B marketers. Creating a unique brand persona is critical. What do your customers like? Are they snarky? Then by all means create a snarky persona. Some of the top performing brands have great personalities like Old Spice and Taco Bell. Again, knowing your target customers’ profile is critical to finding which brand persona will work for you.

Encourage brand engagement with a word of mouth strategy.

One of the best ways to market your retail brand online is to use a word of mouth strategy. Social media is all about posting things that go viral. Strategies like offering special deals if you Like/Re-tweet/Share/ brand posts are great at generating buzz. Also, be sure to not just promote selling your products. You can also post other types of engaging content like humorous musings, or pictures/videos of your offerings. As long as your content relates to your customers they will share it. Mix it up, don’t spam your followers, and you will be in great shape.