With more than a billion Facebook users around the world, a billion Instagram accounts, and hundreds of millions of Tweeters and Snapchatters, social media has simply become too important for you to not be using it at the core of your branding strategy.

However, knowing that social media is important for your brand and leveraging it into quality marketing are two different things. To help you make the most of social media with your brand-building efforts, here are some strategies to adopt.

Be a Human

Social media and the internet make it super easy to connect with people, but there’s no denying that the lack of a human touch can make it difficult for people to feel true affinity with a brand, especially if that brand exists almost entirely online.

You can counteract this by implementing a “be a human” strategy. All this means is that you are going to use social media to show the human side of your company. This could mean posting photos of behind-the-scenes action at the company, or simply sharing your company’s personality with people through fun posts, comments, and by sharing content from around the web.

When you do this, make sure you’re giving authenticity and transparency top priority. In a world full of superficial social media content, users are clamoring for interactions that are real.

Some examples of doing this include posting photos or videos of people at work or that demonstrate how you do things, such as how you make your products. Fun things you could do would also be to live stream a party or an important company announcement.

In the end, it doesn’t really matter exactly what you post so long as it’s representative of who you are as a company and shows to people that there are real people behind the screen they’re looking at.

Consistency

One thing to keep in mind, though, is that while you’re posting your human side, you need to remain consistent. People expect to have a similar experience with a brand no matter where they interact with it, so if you’re posting dramatically different content on Facebook and Instagram, this is likely going to hurt you.

The best thing to do is to create a brand persona, which is essentially a description of who your brand would be if it were a person. Outline specifically the traits that make your brand unique, and detail out the tone, style, and voice of the content you want to produce.

Then, when you are posting on multiple platforms, the personality you project will be the same, which leads to a much better experience for users and can more easily translate into brand loyalty.

Interact with Your Audience

In a similar vein, another thing you can do to build your brand with social media is using it to directly interact with people.

This not only boosts the “human” aspect of your brand, but it will also improve the overall experience your audience has with you. No one likes sending an email to a company and never receiving a response, but if they can send you a message on Facebook or Instagram and get a quick reply, you will build a much stronger connection with your current and potential customers.

Another thing to do is to create content that encourages people to interact. Ask questions, pose problems, solicit ideas, and call out for user-generated content, such as a photo or video of how people use your product. This will help people feel as though being loyal to your brand helps include them in a community, which will make the connection that much stronger and more impactful for your business.

Demonstrate Purpose

In today’s world, many people are searching for purpose. Ideally, they find it first in their communities and their jobs, but they also want to feel it with their favorite brands.

As a result, you would be wise to use social media to help show people what you’re all about and how what you’re doing is helping contribute to a better world. People should feel good about spending their money with you ­— so good that they will tell others about what you’re doing and why they should spend their money too.

Highlighting how you give back to the community and what you do to help make the world a better place is a powerful branding strategy that you can effectively implement thanks to the many opportunities provided to us by social media.

Start Building Your Brand Today

If you haven’t started already, then know that the moment has officially arrived for you to launch your social media brand strategy.

Of course, don’t just dive in without thought. You need to have a clear idea of the specific messages you want to send and how you want to send them. Unleash the power of social media and transform your brand into an effective means of recruiting and retaining customers.