PROMOTING BUSINESSES ONLINE THROUGH CONTENT CREATION, ADVERTISING AND INFLUENCING ON SOCIAL MEDIA

It's either your picture attracts attention or your caption is action-triggering. To grow a brand on Instagram is not easy but with consistent action-triggering caption, you are sure to becoming a top-brand. Caption writing include the following 5 factors: 1. What is the relationship between the caption and the picture? You can't post a picture about comedy and you caption is about how to start importation business. This will piss off anyone that sees your post because people don't like stress. You can't leave them to start figuring out the relationship between your comedy video and importation business, they will just scroll and pass your post without even liking. Funny enough, people do these so often. The relationship between your picture/video and your caption should be obvious. If the caption started like "I was watching this comedy and forgot to go and pick up the goods I just imported," it would have made sense. You can tell a brief story o...

*Stage 2, topic 1 & 2* *How to create contents and using location.* Instagram contents can be categorised into 3 major types. 1. Informative/Educative content. 2. Entertaining content. 3. Controversial content. 1. *Informative/Educative Content:* Every business owner has a personality. What makes up one's personality includes passion, beliefs, values, interest, orientation, likes/dislikes, hobbies, psychology, and attitude. To a great extent, one's personality can affect business performance. So on Instagram, your personality will reflect your business brand. Are you a type of person who likes educating/informing people? Then inculcate it into your brand. That means you should create content that educate or inform your audience about your products or services. If your business is about buying and selling of phones and phone accessories, educate/inform your audience about the latest phone technology, specifications, types of earphones, how to identify a good earph...

*STAGE 1, Topic 4 & 5*  *Choosing who to follow and how to follow hashtags.* 1. Follow your competitors doing far better than you on Instagram so that you can learn from them and also interact with those commenting on their page to build rapport. Some of them will end up following you too. 2. Follow your potential customers. People already engaging with your competitors page. Study what their engagements are like. Reply those asking questions with the correct answer and for those who show interest in buying from your competitors, follow them and like and comment on their post too. Then follow them up with DMs to offer them discount or something better than what your competitors are offering. Provide them with extra value.  *How to find who to follow:* 1. *From explore page.* The explore page contains suggestions from Instagram as a result of your activities on Instagram. The explore page is the search icon at the bottom of your screen when you open your Instagr...

*STAGE 1, 3rd topic*  *Creating your first post* There's a misconception about posting regularly on Instagram. Many people believe is the best way to attract followers but is not true. In fact, if you check handles of people who became public figures from Instagram, they seldom post on Instagram. Example @maraji, her post comes like once in 3 days but when it comes, it's usually worth the wait. Planning a post is key for growing your brand on Instagram. Planning your first post is even more important as that will give your potential followers what to expect from your page. Consider these 3 points when planning your post: 1. Who are my target audience and what would they want? Your page is not just about your business, it's about providing value for your target audience. Define who your target audience are and brainstorm what should interest them then satisfy their interest. Example a business page about selling of phones and computers can provide the following va...

Creating an Instagram Account To download Instagram; 1. Open your Playstore. 2. On the search space, type 'Instagram.' 3. click the install button. 4. Click open and allow all dialogue box that pops up till you get to the page where you will type your name. Creating your page name and username Page name for a business account should contain at least a word to what that business is about. A makeup artist whose business name is Glow makeovers is good for a page name. But if the Business name doesn't depict what the business is about, then include a word that gives true meaning to what your page is about. Example, if a makeup artist business name is 'Tickles' then your page should be Tickles Makeup. This will make it easy for your potential audience to identify your page because your page name will show once someone searches for your handle or a similar handle. After you have typed your page name; 1. Click next. Instagram will automatically create c...

Can you use a Facebook page, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and WhatsApp for the same purpose? One of my clients once told me that he got a very good contract just advertising his business on his Facebook profile so that is why he needs to increase his visibility online and I smiled because I knew that is one very good decision he just made. He is into printing and customisation of items like awards, souvenirs, mugs, shirts, etc. The truth is, in this age and time, almost every one has a smartphone and uses social media. One of Google's survey on how people shop with their smartphones shows that, about 68% of Smart phones users shop online and in the next coming year, this percentage will surely increase. If you are a business owner whether you sell products or offer any kind of service, your business needs strong online visibility. Let me quickly summarise what the major social media platforms offers to businesses and to people who will like to monetize their online p...