Digital Marketing Fundamentals: Social Media Strategy

Social media differs from traditional media through interactive content that anyone can publish and an algorithmically personalized feed that highlights content, interactions, and people.

Identify the four social networks—Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok—and understand their audiences and content formats. Evaluate which network fits your audience and content capabilities to focus your marketing efforts.

Understand how users use social networks for research, education, and entertainment, and craft a strategy that fosters authentic interactions, reviews, and inquiries.

Learn how social listening helps you understand your target audience, monitor conversations, and translate insights into actions that refine campaigns and build lasting relationships.

Analyze competitors on social media to learn from their successes and failures and inform your content planning, uncovering opportunities across first, second, and third level competition.

Create detailed buyer personas to clarify your target audience, tailor content and tone of voice, and guide data-driven social media strategy from demographics to scheduling.

Discover the seven main social media goals, including increasing brand awareness, building an active community, and acquiring new customers, using tactics like responding to comments and live Q&A.

Define specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound smart goals for social media, break them into weekly, monthly, and yearly milestones, and track progress with regular adjustments.

Identify actionable social media metrics that align with your business goals, focusing on interactions, attention, return on investment, and customer service to measure and optimize conversions and reach.

Explore owned, paid, and earned media and how a balanced mix expands reach, builds trust, and engages audiences across social media and websites.

Explore how social proof builds trust by leveraging trusted recommendations, expert or celebrity endorsements, authentic testimonials, and data-driven milestones to credibly influence online purchasing decisions.

Learn to build authentic social proof by staying responsive, sharing transparent behind-the-scenes content, and leveraging testimonials, user-generated content, and easy reviews to boost trust and credibility.

Build a community on social media by engaging with followers, answering questions, sharing user-generated content, and staying authentic to boost organic reach.

Choose platform-aware content for Facebook and Instagram by posting native videos and articles on Facebook, and authentic, visually appealing photos and stories on Instagram to boost engagement.

Twitter favors concise posts with visuals and hashtags, linking to blog content when needed, while LinkedIn emphasizes high-quality professional content, including job postings and company news.

Plan YouTube content that educates or entertains, showcasing products via tutorials or informative videos. For TikTok, create engaging portrait videos up to 3 minutes, repurposing content or collaborating with creators.

Create a long-term social media strategy by using evergreen content and a balanced 80/20 mix of informative and entertaining posts with 20% promotional content, while planning for maintenance and engagement.

Branding on social media builds recognizability and a consistent, reputable online presence across platforms. Maintain coherent visuals and quality content with consistent descriptions and profile pictures to stand out.

Define your brand on social media with a concise three-question description—what we do, for whom, and how we do it—focused on a specific target group and clear stand-out factors.

Define the right social media tone by treating online interactions like in-person customer conversations, ensuring a coherent brand identity across networks. Use social listening to tailor empathetic language in context.