Category: Uncategorized

Top 3 Tips to Battle Burnout as a Social Media Manager

Post author By Rallio
Post date December 22, 2020

As we trudge through the final days of 2020, many people are ready for this year to end and welcome in 2021. If you’re a social media manager (by name or by definition), the burnout can be real.

However, when the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve, that doesn’t mean the trials of 2020 will magically disappear.

Rather than think of leaving 2020 in the dust, try implementing the tips below for battling the burnout. These tips are not meant to downplay the substantial challenges we’ve experienced over the past year. Instead, they’re intended to prepare you to enter the new year strong as a social media manager, executive or business owner.

Tip #1: Take Time to Recharge

The always-on nature of our modern-day lives means that social media is perpetually only a tap away. If you’re a social media manager, that means your job never really ends.

You might publish a funny Instagram Story or Facebook post, but the work isn’t done upon publication. You have to interact with your followers, respond to their comments and questions, as well as reply to any negative feedback or reviews.

You also have to boost your content, monitor your analytics, pivot if you’re not getting the results you want, and continually think of creative ways to engage your audience.

That last bit — the creative part — can be one of the most challenging aspects of a social media manager’s job. Not only must you be a critical thinker, highly organized and collaborative across teams, but you also must find ways to keep the creative juices flowing.

To ensure you’re able to keep posting the best content, it’s important to step away from your social media pages and take time to recharge. Granted, the pandemic has made in-person contact more difficult or nonexistent for some. However, it’s imperative that you build time in your day for real-life experiences.

These moments of hitting your reset button don’t have to be elaborate. It might mean taking a walk, meeting up with a friend for a socially distanced coffee, or calling a friend or family member to check in. Maybe it means picking up a book or engaging in a hobby at the end of the day — instead of endlessly scrolling.

This type of mindful use of social media — choosing when and how you’ll engage — may contribute to positive health outcomes. In one study from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, researchers found that certain types of routine social media use are positively associated with social well-being, good mental health and self-rated health.

In contrast, social media use becomes problematic when it includes checking apps excessively due to fear of missing out or becoming disconnected from friends.

As Harvard puts it, “these findings suggest that as long as we are mindful users, routine use may not in itself be a problem. Indeed, it could be beneficial.”

We can also infer from these findings that for a social media manager, you have twofold responsibilities:

Stay on top of your social media
Carve out time in your day to disconnect

This brings us to our next tip: Get some help.

Tip #2: Build a Team

Whether you’re a social media manager working for someone else, or a small-business owner trying to manage social media on your own, one thing becomes crystal clear the longer you work on your social media: You need a team.

It doesn’t have to be a big team, but you need more than just yourself if you want to cover the two responsibilities mentioned above. You can’t do everything yourself and expect to be able to take time away.

As we discuss in The 5 Top Players You Need on Your Social Media Team:

“At the very least, assume you’ll need one or two people handling your social media posting, review responses, boosting and inbox replies.

Remember, too, that you can always outsource this function, and many business owners do so in an effort in order to dedicate their resources elsewhere.”

When you outsource, it doesn’t mean you’re stepping entirely away from your social media. Rather, you can partner with someone like Rallio to provide much-needed help, support and expertise. You’ll also be able to grow much faster on social media and gain new customers if you have more people working on your behalf.

Tip #3: Crowdsource Your Content

In line with tip #2 above, you as a social media manager can turn to employees and influencers. Our article 19 Jaw-Dropping Social Media Stats + Action Items for Marketers offers some insights on why the use of employees and influencers to promote brands continues to be on the rise:

“Weber Shandwick reports these jaw-dropping social media stats: 98% of employees use at least one social media network for personal use, and of those, half of them are already posting about their company.

These third-party endorsements, so to speak, impact buying behavior. Convince & Convert notes that 83% of Americans are more likely to purchase a product or service that’s recommended by a friend or family member.

Forbes further reports that brand messages shared by employees on social media reach 561 more people than those shared on a brand’s social media channels. They also earn eight times more engagement.

Need some dollar figures to wrap your head around? One November 2020 study in Public Relations Review found a correlation between employee advocacy and sales. “When people are talking about your organization, it helps elevate brand recognition, especially for companies that are in the sales realm and have growing goals,” states one study participant.

Gartner adds that a lead generated through employee advocacy or social selling is seven times more likely to close than those originating from other lead-gen tactics.

Bottom line: The evidence speaks volumes, and the stats above are just a fraction of the research showing the effectiveness of employee advocacy.”

To integrate employee advocacy, create a formal program that encourages employees to post brand-approved assets about your business. With Rallio’s technology, you can gamify the process with leaderboards and rewards for your top posters.

Not only does employee advocacy help you as a social media manager, but it also builds greater engagement and morale among employees.

The End Goal: Minimize Social Media Manager Burnout While Getting Results

Your social media manager role can be exciting, rewarding and fulfilling if you take the proper steps to minimize burnout. The three tips above can set you up for a prosperous year — and leave you with enough energy to enjoy a cute dog TikTok video or two.

Final takeaways for a social media manager:

Find a balance between work and play. Set boundaries for yourself so you’re not “always on” and you have the ability to recharge.
Maximize your most productive hours (it’s different for everyone). Fast Company recommends choosing high-protein foods that support brain function and incorporating aerobic exercise to boost creative potential.
Take a digital detox at specific times, too. Maybe you shut off your phone at night or completely unplug for lunch. Again, lean on your team to ensure you’re able to step away.
Make sure you’re engaging in activities that don’t include social media. Yes, you’re a social media manager, but perhaps you’re also a bicyclist, a painter, a baker, a gardener, a musician or a novelist.

At Rallio, our goal is to help brands — and you as a social media manager — avoid burnout while achieving incredible results. With our powerful combination of technology and a team by your side, you can’t help but be massively successful.

Social Uncategorized

5 Terrifying Social Media Mistakes That Can Scare Away Your Followers

Post author By Rallio
Post date October 28, 2020

Social media mistakes are not uncommon — and they could be costing you big if you continue to repeat them. The most terrifying social media mistakes are the ones that might just scare away your followers for good.

Is your social media page turning into the haunted house on the hill that nobody wants to visit? Are you losing sleep because you’re concerned about your social media results?

Time to call in the Ghostbusters of social media and let Rallio scare away the goblins and ghouls — so you can put an end to the nightmare these social mistakes might be causing:

1. Being an Unwanted Guest

There are a couple of different ways your page can turn into the unwanted guest in newsfeeds: posting infrequently and/or posting irrelevant content.

If you’re posting infrequently, your followers will forget about you and what you do. Any posts you do create either won’t be seen — especially if you’re not boosting them — or may be met with a “Huh? Who and what is this?”

If you’re posting irrelevant content, it will garner the same results. You’ll be forgotten, unfollowed or hidden from newsfeeds.

Ghostbuster tip: Post relevant, local content that shows the real, authentic you. Include a wide variety of posts about team members, product spotlights and how-tos, blog posts, and videos featuring your people and customers.

As far as frequency, the typical cadence is three to four times per week, according to HubSpot. If you’re posting local, non-promotional content, you can post more frequently, even daily. Just don’t go overboard, as that will also be unwelcome by your followers.

Pay attention to the content that gets the most engagement with your audience, too. Boost the most relevant posts to increase your chances of being seen — without the accompanying frightened look of surprise from your followers. Focus on quality over quantity for the best results.

2. Haunting Followers With Promotions

Along with posting irrelevant content, another social media mistake is posting too much promotional content. Just like they don’t want to see content they don’t care about, they don’t want to be flooded with promotions, either. It’s like getting junk mail, and it’s not going to win over your followers.

Ghostbuster tip: As you begin posting relevant content, you’ll build a relationship with your audience. At that point, the occasional promotional post won’t be off-putting to your audience. It will feel more like a friend telling them about a great deal or a cool new product. You can also boost these promotional posts to increase visibility and reach.

3. Scaring People Away

If you snarl at people who criticize you, or you’re rude when they ask a question, or you ignore people altogether, that’s a definite no-no. This social media mistake has to do with failing to realize that social platforms are also customer service channels.

People turn to your social media pages to ask questions, leave reviews and share about their experiences with your brand. If you’re rude to them or don’t get back to them, it’s going to scare them away — or send them on a spree of spreading negative information about your brand.

Ghostbuster tip: Respond to your engagements, messages and reviews. Whether it’s positive, negative or neutral, you always want to look alive and make sure your followers hear from you.

4. Being overly controversial

In 2020, it’s expected that there will be a degree of controversy on social media. Whether it’s about the pandemic, politics or social issues, there are many different topics about which you might want to take a stand.

While it’s important to stand by your convictions and core values as a company, it’s also important to do it as tastefully and respectfully as possible. Insulting people who don’t agree with you doesn’t make you look very inviting.

Ghostbuster tip: If you’re going to comment on touchy subjects, stick to the facts. Think of it like Thanksgiving dinner with a bunch of relatives. Unless you want people flinging mashed potatoes and turkey at each other, you’ve got to remain pleasant and approachable.

Want to encourage people to vote, for example? Great! Be encouraging. Tell your followers where to find their local ballot dropoff box. Post a photo of yourself wearing your “I voted” sticker. Don’t say, “You’re a real dummy if you don’t vote” (even if secretly that’s what you think).

5. Letting your analytics collect cobwebs

If you’re posting content, boosting your posts and running promotions, you need to know what’s working and what’s not. Checking your analytics helps you gain an understanding of the types of content that work best on your page. It also helps you tailor promotions for your audience.

So if you’re not checking your analytics and getting to know your audience, you won’t be able to make any of those important tweaks.

Ghostbuster tip: Regularly take a fine-toothed comb to your analytics. All of the major platforms offer insights into your audience, your promotions and your growth. Then use that information to create the most compelling content and campaigns going forward.

RIP to Your Social Media Mistakes

You work hard to gain followers on social media. Don’t scare them away by succumbing to the social media mistakes above.

Rallio has perfected the process of creating engaging content, responding to online reviews and making sure our clients’ pages are performing optimally. If you’re ready to lay your social media mistakes to rest, get in touch with us today.

Tags social media marketing

Uncategorized

3 Major Forces Shaping Social Media Marketing for Franchises — and What to Do About It

Post author By Rallio
Post date September 21, 2020

The changes brought about by the pandemic have been felt universally — and franchise organizations everywhere have had to pivot, adjust and change with the times. Social media marketing for franchises has become more important than ever.

Those businesses that haven’t embraced social media marketing are either lagging behind those that have — or, worse, closing their doors altogether.

On the up side, the pandemic has opened up doors of opportunity for franchises and small businesses. As we discuss in a recent webinar produced for the International Franchise Professionals Group (IFPG), a membership organization for franchise professionals, three major forces have come into play. Our Vice President of Business Development, Ryan Hicks, delved into a discussion of these three forces as they relate social media marketing for franchises.

Below, we’ve recapped the key points that Hicks addresses, plus our best practices for tackling social media marketing for franchises. We recommend putting these tips into play in order to set yourself up for success moving forward.

Force #1: Economics

As we know, 2020 has been a volatile year, full of uncertainty. While some sectors have experienced gains, others have struggled to keep their heads above water.

Unquestionably, economics are influencing social media marketing for franchises, either for better or worse. The initial knee-jerk reaction for some businesses was to slash their marketing and advertising budgets.

“But what brands are realizing is they need true connection with their communities to survive, and I mean that in every sense of the word,” explains Hicks, who is also a Certified Franchise Professional (CFE) with over a decade experience in the franchise sector, as well as host of the MODRN Business podcast.

Key takeaway: Rather than cut marketing and advertising, franchises should consider ramping up those budgets.

Force #2: Social Influences

We’ve seen everything from virtual baby showers and weddings to drive-by birthdays and graduations in 2020. In the absence of in-person experiences, people have had to turn to online events.

If you’ve been invited to a Zoom event or a socially distanced celebration in 2020, then you know what we’re talking about. The trend has taken hold in business, too. Curbside pickup, online ordering, delivery, and contactless ordering and pickup are now an essential part of doing business today.

Key takeaway: Connecting with your customers online and shifting the way you do business gives you an opportunity to survive and thrive.

Force #3: Technology

As a natural extension of these shifts in online behavior, we’ve seen engagement explode on social media. Not only are we using online platforms to take the place of in-person events, but we’re also using them to communicate with one another and stay up-to-date.

By embracing technology and social media platforms, businesses are able to communicate about new, safe ordering options and stay in front of customers.

“Brands that did not used to consider social media as a worthy marketing channel before this pandemic have realized that may have been a mistake in the past,” says Hicks. Using technology to communicate with customers ensures you stay top-of-mind in a time when you could easily drown in a sea of competitors.

Key takeaway: It’s more important than ever to stay in front of customers. Technology is a huge driver of social media marketing for franchises.

Best Practices in Social Media Marketing for Franchises

Respond to all your online reviews

One of the biggest mistakes we see franchisors and franchisees make is not responding to every online review, says Hicks. While they might reply to the one- and two-star reviews, they’re not always getting back to customers who leave glowing reviews. Those are missed opportunities.

Consider the following stats:

86% of consumers read online reviews for local businesses
89% of consumers read businesses’ responses to online reviews
85% of consumers think reviews older than three months are no longer relevant

Not only will responding to all reviews improve your online reputation, but it can also potentially improve your local SEO. To streamline the process, consider using a solution like the Rallio Dashboard to pull in all your reviews in one place. With Rallio, you can respond to Facebook and Google reviews without having to leave the platform and log in somewhere else.

Respond to all your social media comments and messages every day

Just as you should be responding to all your online reviews, the same is true of any comments, direct messages and other engagements on your social media pages. If you’re not paying attention and getting back to customers, it’ll look like you’re ignoring them.

You also risk missing customer service inquiries, potential leads and sales opportunities. If you don’t get back to them, they’re going to move along and never come back. And if they raise a customer service issue and you don’t respond, they’re going to be angry — maybe even take to an online review to air their concerns.

Moreover, Hicks adds, the algorithms on social media platforms are paying attention to your response times and engagements. How quickly are you getting back to your followers? Are you even getting back to them at all? The social media wizards behind the curtain are paying attention, even if you’re not.

“If you have people trying to engage with you and you’re not even responding, that’s a problem,” warns Hicks.

If you don’t have time to dedicate to social media marketing for franchises, you’re not alone. When you’re busy running your business, social media may fall to the bottom of your to-do list. You can either assign the task to someone on your team, or outsource to a third party like Rallio. In addition to social media marketing services for franchises, we have an all-in-one Dashboard to help you view and respond to all your comments and messages.

Craft your own custom local content three times a week

Most franchise brands have at least a cadence of corporate content getting syndicated across the brand, notes Hicks. This is the “bread and butter,” if you will — the professional, branded content produced at the corporate level.

You need this kind of content as a franchisee to help identify you as a part of the brand. If someone comes across one of these posts on your local page, they’ll be able to trust that you’re a legitimate business.

At the same time, this isn’t the only thing you should be publishing. Successful social media marketing for franchises includes content that isn’t “overproduced.” It’s authentic and local, with real pictures and videos of team members, customers and the local community.

“So wait,” you’re thinking. “I can’t just rely on corporate to handle my social media marketing?” For franchises, this is a common question.

And we get it. It’s a lot to handle. Again, Rallio has a team of Social Strategists who can help create, post and caption your content. Many of our clients also receive weekly emails with content ideas if they’ve opted in for that service.

If you want to give posting a try yourself, here are a few ideas of what to post:

“Before and after” photos, if it makes sense for your business.
Team or customer testimonials. Try Canva.com for free graphic design tools.
Pictures or videos of your product or service in action.
Partner shoutouts: What partners work with you and why?
Your work with the local community. Document any photos showing how you support local businesses, nonprofits, schools or other groups.
How-to videos. What knowledge do you have that your clients do not?
How does your product or service make your clients feel? How can you show that?
Networking events, even if virtual.

Boost your posts at least once per week

As you’re posting local content, boost this content at least once a week to see even greater results. Even on a modest budget of $5 a week or more, you can begin to target your local audience and people who aren’t already connected with you.

If you’re taking the steps above, you should start to see massive growth on social media. According to our research, people who followed these tips tended to:

Rank an average of 2.68 spots higher in Google search
Receive 53% more online reviews
Produce 25% more website traffic from social
Generate 4 times more leads from social each month

Bonus tip: Solve the content problem through crowdsourcing

Rallio has still other tools and services to help business owners organize and manage social media marketing for franchises. We can also help you activate and incentivize employees and customers to post images from your business. In this way, you can “crowdsource” your social media and create a much richer user experience for anyone visiting your page.

As an Entrepreneur Top Franchise Supplier for three years running and an Inc.com 5000 fastest-growing company, Rallio is prepared to handle social media marketing for franchises — from corporate down to the location level. Feel free to reach out to Hicks directly via ryanh@rallio.com, or head over to rallio.com to explore our full suite of services.

To tune in to the full IFPG, webinar, click here, or visit ifpg.org to learn more about membership.

Tags franchise social media, social media marketing for franchises

Uncategorized

Should You Outsource Your Small-Business Social Media? 4 Compelling Reasons It Makes Sense

Post author By Rallio
Post date September 11, 2020

With the recent launch of Rallio Local for Small Business here at Rallio, we’ve had a few questions come up about outsourcing small-business social media.

It’s not an unusual question by any means. Most small businesses’ social media needs are greater than their resources. After researching their options, many entrepreneurs decide that outsourcing their small-business social media makes sense.

How so, you wonder? We’re glad you asked.

#1: You Can Lean on Experts

Here at Rallio, we’re on social media all day, every day. We live, breathe, eat and sleep social media. That’s because it’s our business to do so — just as it’s your business to live, breathe, eat and sleep your own business.

So if you’re busy running your own business, it’s likely that you don’t have the time to manage your social media. You also might not particularly want to manage this task, much less become an expert in it.

That’s all OK, because when you outsource, you can hire people who are experts in social media like Rallio. You don’t have to waste time or resources on something that draws you away from your core functions as a business owner.

Rallio, an Entrepreneur Top Franchise Supplier and an Inc.com fastest-growing company, has earned nationwide recognition for its service of the franchise sector, from corporate down to the franchisee level. With its new Rallio Local for Small Business division, Rallio will also be able to lend its expertise to small businesses that are independently owned and operated.

“Rallio has become the trusted provider of choice for thousands of franchise operators by offering best-in-class social media solutions and top-notch customer service for our clients,” says Chuck Goetschel, CEO of Rallio. “With our new Rallio Local for Small Business division, we are now able to further translate this experience and expertise into serving the local bakery, barber shop, restaurant, dentist, tire shop and other types of small businesses in all different verticals.”

https://www.facebook.com/rallio/posts/1723817577771407

#2: You Can Access Top Technology

Rallio’s solutions include a social media management platform where users can access and manage all their social media accounts, in one central dashboard with a single login. Along with a mobile app, the platform enables clients to upload and schedule content, implement employee advocacy programs, reply to comments, messages and reviews, and much more.

Basically, Rallio makes small-business social media management a much smoother, easier process. Rather than having to log in to multiple platforms with different logins, you can simply log in to your Rallio Dashboard.

You’ll also avoid letting anything slip through the cracks like a negative customer review or an important sales lead. Everything will be in your inbox to review and respond to.

#3: You Get the Service and Support You Need

In addition to Rallio technology, the Rallio Local for Small Business program includes social media services for busy entrepreneurs. Clients are paired with their very own Social Media Strategist who manages the entire small-business social media process — from posting and boosting local content to interacting with the page’s community and even responding to online reviews.

Our team will do the heavy lifting for your small-business social media needs. Don’t know what to post? We do. Don’t have time to respond to your reviews? We do. Can’t figure out boosting? We have the formula for your success.

All of these factors make Rallio Local for Small Business an essential component to your overall marketing program, especially during the pandemic.

“This program is a must for small-business owners as they continue to address the ongoing pandemic,” adds Goetschel. “With social media usage at an all-time high and businesses having to pivot to meet COVID-related demands, having Rallio in their corner is going to be invaluable. Businesses simply can’t afford to ignore social media as part of their overall marketing strategy. Outsourcing the work saves them time and is much more cost-effective than trying to take the work in-house or do it themselves.”

#4: You Could Get Free Services

As part of the Rallio Local for Small Business program’s rollout, Rallio will be offering referral incentives to small businesses. New clients have the opportunity to get one month of free small-business social media services when they refer another small business to Rallio. To qualify, both businesses must commit to three months of service. Email localsales@rallio.com to inquire about the referral program.

In addition, Rallio will be hosting an ongoing social media contest to give away one month of free service to three lucky small-business owners. Here are the rules and entry requirements:

Visit Rallio’s Instagram and Facebook pages (@rallio).
Look for the post with the hashtag #RallioLocalSmallBusiness.
Tag another business on the post.
Each time you tag a business, you earn one entry in the contest.

Three lucky winners will be announced on Sept. 30. (Future contests will be announced at a later date.) Note: To enter, you must be an independent business owner. Tagged businesses may also enter by tagging other businesses.

https://www.facebook.com/rallio/posts/1721821871304311

Let Us Handle Your Small-Business Social Media

Our Rallio Local for Small Business division is an extension of our existing social media management and marketing solutions. As a top-ranked provider of social media technology, employee advocacy and local social media services, we’re thrilled to be offering our all-in-one social media solutions to small, independently owned businesses.

If you’re ready to outsource your small-business social media and focus on other parts of your business, contact localsales@rallio.com, and visit www.rallio.com/getlocal or www.rallio.com.

Learn more: Should I Outsource My Social Media? 6 Questions to Ask Yourself

About Rallio

Rallio is a powerful SaaS combining social media technology, creative services and employee advocacy. As the supplier of choice for franchise organizations and small businesses, Rallio enables brands to manage their entire social media presence, online reputation and online directory listings in one dashboard for all locations. Business owners can either take charge on their own, with easy-to-use desktop and mobile technology, or recruit the help of Rallio’s in-house agency. Rallio’s motley crew of social media strategists, brand managers, designers, producers, writers, engineers, geeks, freaks, change-makers and born leaders helps businesses ditch boring content forever and light up their social media pages.

Uncategorized

How to Do a Social Media SWOT Analysis and Amplify Your Results

Post author By Rallio
Post date September 9, 2020

As a small-business owner, you might know it’s important to have a social media presence. At some point when you’re wearing multiple hats, however, you also might forget to pay attention to your social media — much less think about doing a social media SWOT analysis.

It’s easy enough to set up your social media pages and put a checkmark next to that box on your to-do list. What’s not so easy for busy entrepreneurs is keeping up with posting, engaging with their audience, boosting their content, and responding to followers’ questions and reviews.

To avoid falling into a “set it and forget it” mindset, we recommend performing a social media SWOT analysis — identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Walking yourself through this process will help you stay sharp on social media and amplify your results.

What Is a Social Media SWOT Analysis?

By fine-tuning your social media, you’ll ensure you’re investing your money optimally on social media — not pouring money into the medium “just because.” With a social media SWOT analysis, you’re able to analyze your social media marketing strategy based on four quadrants:

Strengths: What are you doing right on social media? What are your competitive advantages, and how well are you conveying them?
Weaknesses: What factors might be holding you back on social media? Do you lack internal resources, budget or time?
Opportunities: What do you stand to gain on social media? Is it new followers, greater engagement, new leads, brand awareness?
Threats: What are some of the external forces that could hinder your progress on social media, such as competitors or economic factors?

You can perform an overall social media SWOT analysis periodically, perhaps on a quarterly basis. This will help dictate your general social media marketing strategy. However, it’s also wise to perform a social media SWOT analysis anytime you want to analyze a campaign or project.

Keep in mind, too, that your SWOT analysis requires that you measure not only hard numbers, but also customer sentiment about your brand. This means you’ll be looking at both your analytics as well as “softer” factors such as reactions to your posts and follower growth. Together, all of your metrics add up to social media success when all your gears are working properly.

“In 2020, an estimated 3.6 billion people were using social media worldwide, a number projected to increase to almost 4.41 billion in 2025.” — Statista

What Are Your Strengths?

What are you doing well on social media? Your analytics will show you how well you’re engaging with your community and which types of posts perform well. Other factors that might be considered strengths include:

Brand-consistent messaging, imagery and use of assets such as company logos
Authentic content featuring real people and places associated with your business
Well-written captions that encourage engagement
Ongoing boosting campaigns to make sure your content is more visible and has a better reach
Audience engagement such as likes, comments and shares
Replies to your followers’ comments, direct messages and reviews

Together, the strengths above help to differentiate you on social media. Instead of being just another company, you can set yourself apart. Over time, your strengths help you grow your social media presence and increase the chances of meeting other goals, such as new leads and sales.

What Are Your Weaknesses?

In many ways, you can look at your strengths in reverse in order to identify any weaknesses. Just as your analytics will show you what you’re doing well, they will show you low-performing posts and lack of engagement. Potential weaknesses could be:

Off-brand imagery, poorly constructed captions, and inconsistent messaging and use of company assets such as logos
Poorly written captions that don’t inspire your audience to engage
Worn-out content featuring stock images or lacking variety (maybe you’re posting links all the time but no images or videos)
Lack of ad budget, meaning your content isn’t getting seen because you’re not boosting it
No audience engagement such as likes, comments and shares
Few or no replies to your followers’ comments, direct messages and reviews

These weaknesses will prevent your page from working as hard as it could for you. Bottom line: Iron out your weaknesses to make them your strengths.

What Are Your Opportunities?

Analyzing your opportunities helps you weigh the risks against the possible rewards. It also allows you to see any potential areas for growth. This analysis might look something like this:

Is the money I spend on boosting likely to help me gain new followers (risk versus reward)?
Are there opportunities to engage with my existing follower base? (Keeping a current follower is just as important as gaining new ones, if not more so!)
Are my customers asking the same questions or making the same requests over and over again? That is, is there an opportunity to improve my product or service, create certain offers and promotions, and better appeal to my customer base?
Am I reading all my comments and messages to inform point #3 above?

Answering these questions will help you continue to grow on social media. Even when you have strengths or weaknesses, you need to keep re-assessing what’s working and what’s not.

What Are Your Threats?

Last up in your social media SWOT analysis: threats. Much like you’re making educated guesses about your opportunities, you’re doing the same with possible threats. Those threats might include:

Economic factors that could impact buying behavior and social media usage, as we’ve seen during the pandemic.
Competitors who come out with new offerings before you do. They could eat into your target market and gain market share.
Other factors out of your control, such as new laws or regulations.

You can’t prepare for every threat, especially if you get blindsided like many businesses did with the pandemic. Not many people could have predicted how business would unfold in 2020, but COVID-19 has taught us not to get too comfortable doing things a certain way. For example, businesses had to shift to virtual offerings, online shopping, social distancing, safety protocols and other pandemic-related changes.

As much as possible, prepare for the unexpected. Think about worst-case scenarios and have a plan to address them.

And once you’ve laid out a complete social media SWOT analysis, you can identify your next move on social media. You’ll also be equipped to analyze any particular campaign before launching it.

The more you can play on your strengths and opportunities, and address your weaknesses and threats, the greater your results will be on social media. In many cases, your social media SWOT analysis can help you make the best decisions while avoiding any pitfalls.

Social Uncategorized

The Best Social Media Tips, Straight From Social Media Strategists

Post author By Rallio
Post date July 31, 2020

Sometimes, the simplest social media tips are the very best social media tips. There’s no need to complicate matters when you’re trying to figure out how to be impactful on social media for your brand.

In keeping with that idea, today’s blog article features social media tips from our very own Rallio Local Social Media Strategists. They are the people who work directly with individual businesses to post social media content, reply to reviews and social media engagements, and manage and monitor their social media presence.

When our Strategists speak with business owners, they tend to offer the same simple social media tips over and over again. Those tips are outlined below, followed by a brief video from our Strategists with further details.

Showcase the People Behind Your Brand

This is one of the best social media tips because it’s so easy to accomplish. You probably have content ideas right in the palm of your hand if you’ve taken any photos at your business lately.

People like to see who’s behind the awesome products or services you have to offer. From the owners to employees and even customers, it’s the people who really bring a business to life on social media. You’re passionate about your business, and that passion should shine through on your social media posts.

As noted in 6 Powerful Content Ideas for Your Small Business:

“Working on your storytelling skills is one of the best ways to improve your social media. Whenever you have something to post, think about the story of how it came to be. Share those stories with your followers. You’ll be amazed at how much they love them and how much engagement you get, especially with boosted content!”

Think about the people and customers who frequent your business, the history behind your location, the employees who have worked with you from the beginning, new employees, or new products and what makes them great. Snap a candid photo or video and put your stories out there!

Be Authentic

Why be someone else when you can be yourself? Your audience can tell when you’re being authentic versus when you’re trying to sell them something. Authenticity wins over salesy every time. It’s also the best way to differentiate yourself in a crowded online world.

“Brands with inauthentic messaging distance themselves from their audiences and open the door for more down-to-earth competitors to steal their customers,” writes Convince & Convert. “People ally with brands because they see their own personalities and values reflected, but most people don’t want to describe themselves as insincere, foolish, or untrustworthy. When brands step outside their identities and try to latch on to unrelated trends, customers notice—and the results are rarely positive.”

Engage With Your Customers

As people comment, share, like and interact with your posts, be sure to engage back with them. Let them know you’re listening and that you appreciate them as customers and followers. Being engaged means more opportunities to solidify relationships and expand your reach.

As we write in Top 5 Social Media Growth Hacks for 2020, “When you post something, don’t think of it as a “mic drop” moment where you walk away and never have to return to that post again. Monitoring comments and interacting with your audience as they post is one of the simplest growth hacks — and you might actually enjoy it!”

Be Relatable

What topics tend to resonate the most with your customers and target audience? That’s what you should be posting about on social media. Doing so makes you more relatable and memorable, and people will be more likely to stick around to see what you have to say.

Pair those topics with a defined tone of voice, and you become much more interesting to your target audience and followers.

Convince & Convert writes, “Whether you want to be quirky, shocking, unconventional, or just plain friendly, the choice is yours. Just don’t be boring. That’s the quickest way to be forgotten, or not even being noticed in the first place.”

Something is wrong if this sound isn’t familiar to you 🙃 pic.twitter.com/hD3PjTf34z

— OREO Cookie (@Oreo) July 15, 2020

The Best Social Media Tips, in Our Strategists’ Words

You’ve read the tips, and now it’s our Strategists’ turn to explain their best social media tips in their own words. In less than three minutes, you’ll have a few brand-new tools in your social media toolbox.

As always, reach out to us if you could use a helping hand or two establishing a strong social media presence.

Tags social media marketing

Uncategorized

5 Ways to Integrate Email Marketing With Social Media Marketing

Post author By Rallio
Post date July 20, 2020

Is email marketing alive and well? Or is social media marketing the only option nowadays? It’s a question on many a marketer’s mind, but it’s not one you necessarily have to answer definitively.

Integrating your email marketing and social media marketing will give you yet another tool in your marketing toolbox. Instead of choosing one or the other, choose both, and you’ll increase your chances of reaching your target audience using different touchpoints.

Both email marketing and social media marketing have advantages for businesses of all sizes. The combined efforts give you double the channels than what you would have if you used only one.

With email, you have the advantage of growing an email list of customers who have opted in to receive your messages. You can send messages to them directly, strategically, and drive purchasing behavior. You have their names, purchase history and other data. You can retarget these customers and manage the entire lifetime of the customer relationship.

You can do the same with social media, just in a slightly different way. Social media has the advantage of reaching customers who are already online throughout the day. Targeted social media ads help you build brand awareness, capture their attention, turn them into followers, drive them to your website and likewise drive purchasing behavior.

Now imagine putting these two powerhouse marketing tools together. Instead of having them be separate entities, allow them to pair up and work harder for your overall marketing goals.

Tip #1: Add a Signup Form

If you’re a page Admin, you have access to various Publishing Tools to help you with lead capture — provided you have an existing CRM tool you’re using. Navigate to your Publishing Tools, and from there go to the Lead Ads Forms section. Click on Leads Setup, and you can search for your CRM tool, such as Constant Contact, MailChimp or HubSpot. The setup process for this integration will vary based on your CRM.

If you’re not a page admin, you can request that your admin walk through the steps above to add a signup form. You can also simply create a post with a link over to your website’s email signup form, and pin it to the top of your page.

Tip #2: Add Call-to-Action Buttons

With multiple options for collecting customer information, your social media platform gives you a lead generation tool for followers who come to your page.

Aside from email signup forms, Facebook also offers several other possible calls to action. Again, you’ll need to be a page admin to make any changes to your page.

With call-to-action buttons, you can make it easier for customers to connect with you directly and initiate the buying process. One of the most important buttons is the Message button, which allows users to contact you directly through Facebook Messenger. You can also set up autoresponders that answer frequently asked questions and guide users to take the next step, such as emailing you, calling you or visiting your website.

There are other buttons you can add to your page, depending on the type of product or service you offer. For example, you can let users shop, book a service, start a food order or learn more about your business. This guide from Facebook walks you through the steps to add these types of buttons.

Furthermore, you can add these call-to-action buttons to your Facebook ads. Facebook walks you through the process in this article.

Tip #3: Upload Your Subscriber List to Facebook

If you have access to your page’s Ads Manager, you can create a custom audience using your current subscribers. Navigate to the Audiences section and, under the Create Audience button, you have an option to create a custom audience using your customer list.

This way, when you run Facebook ads, you can create offers that specifically target people who have already opted in to your list. If you have segmented lists, you can further target different groups of customers based on their past purchases and interests.

Tip #4: Run Retargeting Ads Alongside Email Marketing Campaigns

After you run an email campaign, you can retarget the customers who clicked through to your website. You’ll need to install a tracking code on your website to capture the information of those users.

Then, run ads on Facebook that retarget those same customers. When those users go to Facebook, they’ll see ads for whatever they were looking at on your website.

Ever wonder why that pair of shoes you were looking at popped up on your Facebook feed? That’s retargeting.

Here’s a more detailed breakdown if you want to dive in deeper: How to Use Retargeting Ads to Gain a 200% ROI

Tip #5: Send Email Subscribers to Your Social Pages

Just as you’re driving followers over to your website, you can use email to drive traffic to your social media pages. This can be done in both subtle and overt ways:

Include icons with links to your social profiles in the footer of your emails.
Create social media contests with links to your social profiles to increase engagement. For example, you could create a branded hashtag and ask followers to tag friends and share content for a chance to win something. You can also partner with another business to increase your reach and the possibility of gaining access to a new customer base.
Share user-generated content from influencers not just on your social media pages, but also within your emails. Include links to your social media profiles.

What other ideas do you have for making sure your email marketing and social media marketing are working together? Click on the Share button for your favorite platform below and tag us with a comment!

(And yes, that was us dishing out some cross-channel marketing for you. Hey, we’re a business, too.)

Uncategorized

Top Social Media Management Tools from Rallio

Post author By Rallio
Post date April 29, 2020

When you consider the number of social media management tools available, it can feel overwhelming trying to choose the best ones for your franchise. Especially right now when you may be dealing with new challenges related to COVID-19, you need to know that any money you’re spending is being put to good use.

Rallio’s social media management tools are specifically built for franchises. We’ve taken the guesswork out of finding the best technology and services to help your business grow. As a Top Franchise Supplier on Entrepreneur.com, Rallio is the preferred supplier for franchise organizations in a variety of industry sectors.

Below is a quick rundown of the various social media management tools and services we offer. You might find you need just one of these tools, or you might need all of them. It varies from business to business. But regardless of what you may need, you can get started with any or all of them quite cost-effectively.

Rallio Dashboard

This is the technology behind everything we do. The Rallio app gives you both a desktop dashboard and a mobile app to manage every aspect of your social media pages.

Built for franchises and multi-unit businesses, the Rallio dashboard lets you control your brand’s social and review pages from one simple spot. As a franchisor or multi-unit owner, you can also syndicate content to different types of franchisees and set permissions. The powerful platform also gives you access to robust analytics, like your engagements and high-performing content.

In the database, you can see all the content you’ve created, schedule it, syndicate it, delete or edit it, and view and upload all your assets like images and videos. The Inbox pulls in all your incoming comments and direct messages and lets you reply directly within the Rallio app. Meanwhile, the Outbox shows you everything you’ve published.

You’ll also find the Sandbox, a one-of-a-kind feature with content pulled together from all your many locations. Franchisees can see which local content is performing the best in their brand — and either get ideas to create posts or even reuse content on their own page!

After all, you’re in business for yourself but not by yourself. The Sandbox gives you a virtual space to come together and gain inspiration among fellow franchisees.

Another unique feature is the Reviews tab, which pulls in reviews from the major review platforms and lets you respond directly to Google My Business and Facebook reviews.

If you like healthy competition, the Leaderboard keeps a running tally of how your locations are performing on their social media pages — from assets submitted to engagement on posts.

Once you start using the Rallio Dashboard, you’ll no doubt find it addicting — and so will franchisees. Get everyone in sync for a consistent, powerful brand presence from corporate down to the location level.

https://www.facebook.com/TutorDoctor/posts/10157235049042374:0

Rallio Local

Rallio Local combines the power of the Rallio technology with the creativity of real people. With Rallio Local, you work with actual humans on every aspect of your social media. You also get all the bells and whistles of our technology to make management and measurement simple and streamlined.

Our team creates and schedules weekly, custom, local posts to your social media pages. We pair you with a Social Strategist to deliver hyper-local content that gets seen by your audience through fully managed ad campaigns. It’s this type of engaging, real-life content that gets your audience in your business and your pages.

You also receive custom responses to your online reviews, social media comments and direct messages. If you prefer to have someone else manage and grow your social media presence, the Rallio Local program would be the best for you.

https://www.facebook.com/PetSuppliesPlusGoshen/posts/2875486582487415:0

Rallio Activate

Your employees are already on social media all throughout the day. Flip the switch with Rallio Activate, and you can leverage the power of your employees to reach customers like never before.

Incentivize employees with rewards programs that you create, and collect assets into your brand’s image library. Have them submit their own photos and videos to earn points, and publish your brand-approved content on their personal profiles.

With Rallio Activate, you build confidence in your brand. It’s human nature to trust the recommendation of a third party over the brand itself. Rallio Activate builds upon the positive experiences that employees are having with your company to light up your social media presence even more.

Revv

Ever wish you had an easy way to get more positive online reviews? Revv is the tool for you.

Easily send out quick surveys after a sale to ask customers about their experience. Positive feedback sends customers to the review platform of your choice. Negative feedback gets taken offline so you can contact the customer directly and resolve the problem.

With Revv, you not only get more positive reviews, but you also get a chance to handle any issues and make your business even better. With online reviews being so important right now — more so than ever — it’s imperative you have a way to connect with customers after the sale and make sure everything is just right.

Which Rallio Social Media Management Tools Do You Need?

Goldman Sachs predicts the pandemic will force “an acceleration toward an e-world.” In that world, social media and your online presence will play even more important roles in your business’ success.

Rallio’s suite of social media management tools and services are designed to help you navigate that “e-world” with greater ease. Whether you want to be fully involved or take a hands-free approach and let us handle it for you, we have a solution for every need and budget.

Now that you’ve read through the options, the next step is to schedule a demo. It takes less than 10 minutes and the rewards can be exponential if you get started today. Give us a shout at sales@rallio.com and we’ll get you plugged in.

Tags social media management tools

Social Uncategorized

How to Spring-Clean Your Social Media Marketing Strategy

Post author By Rallio
Post date February 13, 2020

In between scrubbing your baseboards and organizing your junk drawers this spring, remember to dust off your social media marketing strategy, too. Tidying up your accounts will help ensure your online profiles are working overtime to generate leads and build relationships through daily engagement. The alternative — ignoring your social media — could leave you with minimal impact and even tarnish your online reputation.

When you don’t pay attention to your social media pages, they tend to accumulate digital “dust” in the same way your windows accumulate dirt. You may notice from time to time that the glass looks a little dirty, but you figure you’ll get to it tomorrow — and then tomorrow turns into next month … turns into next year.

Eventually, you have to either close the blinds and hope no one notices, or tackle the project and get those windows sparkling again.

Make it a priority to give your accounts a thorough vetting, not only in the spring, but on a regular basis. The following checklist will help you prioritize your “spring cleaning” duties across the platforms, polish up your social media marketing strategy and delegate anything you want to get off your plate.

Update Your Profile and Cover Photos

If your brand’s logo, marketing colors or other visual elements have changed, you want your imagery to reflect your most up-to-date branding. That picture of you with your dog might have worked when you were first getting started, but as a business, it’s important that you distinguish your business pages from your personal pages.

Make sure the image is high-resolution, and keep it consistent across all your social media pages. It’s much easier for people to identify you across networks if the picture is clear and looks the same from one platform to the next.

Complete Your Profile

Fill in and update all the fields on your profiles so you have complete, accurate information for all to see. Store hours, address, phone number and other important details help customers find you across the web. When it’s incomplete or inaccurate, you might not show up in search results, or it could result in confusion as to your most accurate information.

Tip: Rallio’s Business Listings feature lets you easily change your business information to update all your directory listings on the web at once. This service is a major asset for companies that need to update information or add holiday hours and quickly communicate the changes to Google, Google Maps, Yelp and other online directories.

Post Local Content Regularly

Location-specific images and videos tell a brand story in ways that stock images and “corporate” posts cannot. Feature the people, products and services you provide in authentic ways, and people will be more drawn to your business.

Better yet, incentivize employees and microinfluencers to post on your behalf. According to Social Media Today, 90 percent of consumers say user-generated content influences their buying decisions more than email campaigns and search engine results. Basically, if someone else promotes your brand, it’s seen as trustworthy. When you promote yourself, you may be ignored.

Note that videos, in particular, should be an integral part of your social media marketing strategy. Social Media Today also reports that videos generate 1,200 percent more shares than text and images combined.

Lastly, make sure you respond to your online engagements and reviews. Comment back when people react to your posts. Reply to your reviews, both negative and positive, to provide the best customer service on your social media — a channel that has become a major source of customer service inquiries.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B6tNLVeACAw/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Complete Your Bio

You only have nanoseconds, at best, to grab people’s attention on social media. A unique bio is one way you can pique their interest and get them to click over to your page. Plus, when you optimize your bio for search by including your industry-specific keywords, you can attract more online traffic. Keep the following points in mind:

Complete all sections of the bio so users can get as much information as possible about you. You can also use your bio to cross-market yourself in many cases. For example, on Instagram, you can include a link to your website or any URL of your choosing.
Adjust your bio for each platform. Each one is slightly different not only in the audience type, but also in the information to be included in the bio.
Be creative and let your personality shine. Don’t be just another boring bio that no one wants to read. For inspiration, refer to Wendy’s Twitter bio: “We like our tweets the same way we like to make our hamburgers: better than anyone expects from a fast food joint.” (By the way, Wendy’s tweets provide an excellent example of how to dominate a platform!)

Evaluate Your Social Media Spend

If you’re not spending money on social media, now is the time to reconsider. Organic reach for business social media pages has fallen tremendously in recent years. Social Media Today says a post’s average organic reach is only about 6.4 percent of the page’s total likes. To get more people to see your posts, then, you need not only engaging content, but also an ad budget for your social media spend.

It’s not something you can set up and forget about, either. It’s important to continually evaluate how your social media ads are performing and make any necessary adjustments along the way. In time, you’ll be able to better define your audience and what they like to see in your social media content.

You’ll find that with regular maintenance, your social media pages will deliver the leads and results you’re after. Think you could use a little help tweaking your social media strategy? Reach out to us at www.rallio.com for expert guidance.

Tags social media marketing

Uncategorized

Social Media Marketing Greatest Hits: Our Top Tips From 2019

Post author By Rallio
Post date December 10, 2019
No Comments on Social Media Marketing Greatest Hits: Our Top Tips From 2019

You’ve heard the expression “The more things change, the more they stay the same,” right? That’s relatively true on social media, at least in terms of the most popular trends. At its core, social media is just that: a social venue, designed to connect communities and people, to share ideas and experiences, to create a way for enterprises to reach their intended audiences in subtle, socially acceptable ways.

No matter how much social media will continue to evolve with each passing year, it’s safe to say that people will always crave those real-life connections that draw them away from the typical “sales” experience — and toward the kind of content that makes them laugh, cry, engage and grow.

With that being said, this roundup of some of our top tips from 2019 serves as a reminder of the constants in social media, with a caveat that even these tips may evolve as time goes on. Hopefully, these ideas from will carry you into 2020 as you round out your social media planning for the new year.

Get Social With New Recruits

If you’re hiring, candidates will be checking out your social media pages, so you want to be sure you’re presenting your best self online. People want to see that you have a great company culture and core values they can get on board with.

The majority of employees today are already posting employer-related messages and media assets on their social media pages, according to a study by Weber Shandwick and KRC Research. Employee advocacy gives you a chance to leverage user-generated content to your advantage for recruiting purposes.

You can even incentivize employees with various rewards for posting on your behalf. For example, if you’re hiring a salesperson, you can create a few local assets advertising the position. Pass them along to your employees, who can share the opening with their circle of friends and followers. You can then offer a referral bonus of some sort for any new hires that result from those efforts.

Drill down deep into employee advocacy, and you might see a need to clarify your company’s core values and how they’re shared and demonstrated throughout your business. When employees feel like your company truly lives out its core values and supports its employees, they’ll feel more compelled to share about their great experiences working for you via social media.

As those posts get shared, it creates a positive public perception of your location. New recruits will be more likely to seek you out and apply if they feel confident you’re a good employer who values its employees.

Read the complete post here.

Say It Louder for the People in the Back: Respond to Your Reviews

Have you ever left a review about a brand and not gotten a response? Kinda makes you not want to buy from them anymore, right? Whether a review is positive or negative, it’s imperative that you respond to all of them. It demonstrates good customer service and accountability, and it makes your customers feel like you value them. The same is true if a customer comments on a post or asks a question.

If you don’t already have a system in place to respond to your customers online, make it a priority.

Read the complete post here.

Give More, Promote Less

“People are often self-serving on social media,” says Gary Vaynerchuk, CEO of VaynerMedia, and that approach doesn’t do anything to win over your target audience. “Your content needs to bring value to the audience at no cost so they can go and do something with it.”

The most successful social media accounts serve up content that either informs and educates or entertains rather than going for the sale, says Gary. He adds, “There are no accounts doing well on social media that don’t do one of those two things.

Additionally, franchisees need to be producing local, engaging content. Why? “Because they want their business to grow,” quips Gary. “If you’re not making contextual content, you’ve lost.”

By contextual, he means that simply pushing out the same corporate content across all locations isn’t effective in terms of broadening your local reach. If you want to do business with people who actually live in your area and are likely to frequent your establishment, then you need to speak to them directly.

Read the complete post here.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B5sj1BiBg1_/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Boost Your Ad Budget

Along with having great, hyper-local content, you need a healthy ad budget to get seen in the overcrowded social media space. According to Social Media Today, you should consider increasing your social media ad budget in 2020 in order to remain competitive.

“All social media platforms are improving the machine learning behind their advertising platforms. For these machines to learn, they need data, and as social media advertising campaigns run, they collect and aggregate data in search of users who are most likely to convert,” writes author Nathan Mendenhall (@NCMSocial).

So you’re not just paying for people to see your content — because goodness knows they’re not going to see it if you rely solely on organic reach — but also for that data. Spend less, and you have less data aggregation. Spend more, and you shorten the time to convince and convert leads and generate positive ROI.

The bottom line:Social media platforms have to make money, just like you. Consider paying a little more for advertising so you can start maximizing brand reach with the people you want to reach, right when you want to reach them.

Read the complete post here.

Optimize for Search

Mobile search gave rise to “near me” searches, whereby people search for a business, product or service located nearby. If someone is looking for a pet store, for instance, they might type in or utter the phrase “pet stores near me” or simply “pet stores” — and Google will suggest nearby locations. Even without the “near me” phrase included in the search, Google now knows people are looking for local places. In fact, it’s more likely that people will drop “near me” from their search, knowing that Google will serve up relevant search results based on a person’s geo-location.

According to Google, roughly one-third of all mobile searches are now location-based, as more and more people attempt to locate whatever they need in that moment — all while on the go. In fact, location-based searches have been growing 50 percent faster than any other type of mobile search.

The implications of this growing trend for franchises are huge in terms of driving local customers into their businesses. To ensure your franchise location shows up in “near me” searches, there are two important steps to take for local search optimization. First, make sure your website has a contact page with your address and phone number. (Rallio offers a Directory Listings service to quickly update this information across the web.) Google likes to see a contact page in particular and will read the information in searches. Simple as that!

Next, set up a Google My Business profile, which will also ensure you show up on Google Maps (formerly known as Google Places). Your GMB profile is where all information related to your business will live in the Googlesphere — such as your name, address, phone number, website, location on the map, Google reviews and more.

Setting up your Google business page is a simple process you can get done in minutes. Add as much information as possible, including photos and videos, to make your business uber-searchable and to give customers a good glimpse into your location. In addition, ensure that your website is mobile-friendly so customers have a positive experience when viewing your site from their phones.

Read the complete post here.

What are some of your “greatest hits” in terms of social media marketing from the past year? We’d love to hear your ideas in the comments below.