What is SMM? How to promote a business on social media? Promotion on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, Pinterest

Maxim Dimura

14.09.2023 | 6 minutes of reading

Updated: 18.08.2024

Social Media Marketing (SMM) is one of the business promotion methods that involves attracting a target audience to a website from social networks, forums, and web blogs. In such a social network as Facebook, which remains the leader among others, the number of active visitors per month has already exceeded 2.5 billion. Other social networks, such as Instagram, TikTok, are also not losing popularity, and the growth of active accounts continues to rise.

SMM promotion is considered one of the promising methods of marketing. To confirm this thesis, here are some statistical data:

The average internet user spends about 2 hours and 30 minutes per week on social networks.
20% of internet users consider social networks as a source of information.
As of early 2023, Facebook had 16 million Ukrainian accounts.
50% of Facebook users from Ukraine log into their account at least once a month via desktop or mobile app.
In January 2022, the average Facebook user in Ukraine made 21 ad clicks.
More than 40 million users worldwide log into TikTok daily.

smm statistika What is SMM?

SMM Opportunities for Business Promotion

Social networks are where the target audience for almost any business niche can be found. SMM is not just paid targeted advertising but also daily interaction with subscribers (who can become regular customers), updating content (entertaining, informative, educational), and quickly responding to potential clients’ inquiries in comments or personal messages. SMM promotion on social networks allows direct interaction with potential clients:

Introducing the brand, building recognition, and creating a loyal attitude.
Receiving feedback on your products/services.
Working with reviews, handling objections, and delivering the desired information.
Engaging users through discussions, contests, and more.
“Nurturing” potential clients to take targeted actions.
Warming up the client base for further interaction.

A significant advantage of social networks is that their audience can be relatively easily segmented. Facebook, TikTok, and other platforms have been collecting user information for years and know more about them than anyone else. These insights can be used for targeted advertising campaigns. For example, on Facebook, you can set up ad displays for an audience that shares behavioral traits and interests with your target audience or show ads to parents, business owners, or specialists in a particular field.

Targeting is a mechanism for displaying advertising messages on social networks only to segments of the audience that are potentially interested in them. To target ads when setting up a campaign, you need to provide as accurate information as possible about those who might find the ad interesting — this could include gender, age, marital status, country of residence, etc. And the algorithms of the advertising cabinets, such as Facebook, will take care of ensuring that users from the specified segment see the paid ad.

For example: you have a travel agency and you want your exclusive offers to be seen by potentially interested users. In this case, Facebook has a selection called “people who travel frequently.” And this is just one example of precise targeting for your audience. Specialists who set up targeted advertising make selections so accurately that your business receives the expected results from the launched advertising campaign, leading to satisfied clients and increased company revenue. Advertising on social networks is one of our company’s main services, and each advertising campaign is an individual approach, specifically tailored targeting to the right audience.

Or another example. You have a new app created for iOS users. Facebook allows you to select iOS owners, which means your potentially interested audience. The question then is what exactly is the app’s specificity. But depending on the specifics, Facebook also allows you to select user interests.

In addition to targeting, filling pages and communities with content, and organizing feedback with subscribers, SMM in 2023 includes:

Building relationships with influencers;
Creating a strong connection between online and offline campaigns;
Monitoring and analyzing the effectiveness of any actions taken on social networks on behalf of the brand.

In other words, today’s SMM specialist is a manager capable of organizing and supervising the marketing promotion process in the environment of social networks and apps.

Neural Networks in SMM – The Trend for 2024

In 2024, SMM automation capabilities are reaching a new level. Now it is possible to almost fully automate social network management, from content creation to its publication and interaction with the audience.

Neural networks and AI services allow you to generate unique posts and images, plan publications on different platforms, and promptly process comments and user requests. This revolution in digital marketing opens up new horizons for those ready to use cutting-edge technologies to achieve better results.

Automating Content Creation and Publishing with Neural Networks

Content creation and publishing automation is one of the key aspects of modern SMM. In 2024, marketers will increasingly use neural networks and AI services to simplify and speed up these processes. These tools not only save time but also significantly improve content quality by ensuring its relevance and personalization.

Content Generation with Neural Networks

Today, neural networks like GPT-4 can generate texts that are hard to distinguish from those created by humans. These algorithms can take in keywords, topics, or even individual phrases and create posts, articles, and product descriptions based on them.

For example, at BUSINESS SITE, we actively use such solutions to speed up the content preparation process for social networks.

Text creation is just one aspect of automation.

An important element of SMM is creating visual content that not only attracts attention but also holds it.

Here, services like Midjourney or DALL·E can help, as they can generate images based on text prompts.

These tools allow you to create unique visual materials that match the brand’s style and concept.

Automated Content Planning

After the content is created, it needs to be properly distributed and scheduled for publication. This process can also be automated using services like Make.

Make is a tool that allows you to automate many tasks related to SMM, including content creation and publication, as well as managing marketing campaigns.

Example of using Make in SMM:

Suppose you have a series of articles or posts that need to be published at a specific time. With Make, you can create automated workflows that will:

Collect content from various sources (e.g., blogs, social networks, or even from generating neural networks).
Automatically schedule posts on different platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn.
Track engagement and the effectiveness of each post, providing reports and real-time analytics.

One of Make’s advantages is its ability to integrate with other services and platforms like ChatGPT, Gmail, or WordPress. This allows for creating more complex and multi-stage automations that cover all stages of SMM — from content creation to publication and analysis.

Case Study: Automation for an Online Store
For example, for one of our online store clients, our team set up automation using Make and ChatGPT. Links to new content (products, promotions, news) were placed in Google Sheets; Make used a webhook to check the file for updates. If an update was found, Make instructed ChatGPT to create an announcement and generate an image for social networks, and then automatically posted the new content with a unique image and text on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter).
This process allowed us to reduce content preparation time by 90% and improve audience interaction quality, as the posts became more relevant and personalized.

Automating Audience Interaction with Neural Networks

Automating audience interaction is one of the key trends in SMM, already significantly improving customer service quality, user engagement, and reducing response times. In 2024, these technologies will become even more advanced, providing marketers and companies with new tools for communicating with customers on social networks.

Chatbots and Virtual Assistants

One of the most common ways to automate audience interaction is by using chatbots and virtual assistants. These tools, based on neural networks, can handle a large number of user inquiries, respond to frequently asked questions, and even solve customer problems in real-time.

For example, ChatGPT or its more advanced versions can be integrated into social network platforms to assist users online. In projects by the BUSINESS SITE team, where clients needed 24/7 support, the introduction of chatbots reduced the customer service department’s workload by 60%, while maintaining a high level of user satisfaction.

Processing Comments and Messages

Neural networks are also used to automatically process comments and messages on social networks.

For instance, tools like ManyChat or MobileMonkey can be configured to automatically filter and classify messages, helping to quickly respond to important requests and prevent crises. These services can analyze the tone of comments, identify keywords, and, if necessary, forward complex requests to a real specialist.

For one of our education clients, we set up a system that automatically analyzed comments under posts and highlighted those containing requests for additional information. This significantly reduced response time and increased the conversion of inquiries into course registrations.

Personalized Recommendations and Offers

Neural networks can also be used to send personalized recommendations and offers based on user behavior analysis.

These can be automatic newsletters with product or service offers that match the client’s interests and preferences.

For example, Drift is a platform that integrates AI assistants to create personalized dialogues with clients, capable of making recommendations based on previous interactions.

In one of the projects the BUSINESS SITE team worked on, we used AI to automate sending personalized offers to users’ messengers, which led to a 25% increase in repeat sales.

Sentiment Analysis and Behavior Prediction
Modern neural networks can analyze not only text but also the tone of messages, identifying audience sentiment. This is important for quickly responding to potential issues and improving interaction strategies.

For example, tools like Sprinklr or Brandwatch can analyze brand mentions on social networks and help marketers respond quickly to negative comments or improve service quality.

One case where we used sentiment analysis helped prevent a crisis situation for a retail client. The neural network detected a rise in negative comments, and the team was able to respond promptly, offering customers a solution that reduced the level of negativity and strengthened trust in the brand.

Automation with neural networks is not just a convenient tool but a real breakthrough that will allow you to optimize processes and achieve new heights in efficiency. In the 2020s-2030s, the capabilities of these technologies will only expand, and those who start using them now will gain a significant competitive advantage. Your audience is waiting for high-quality, relevant, and engaging content — and neural networks are ready to help you deliver it.

Features of Social Media Promotion

Work with social networks should begin with identifying the target audience. Every SMM agency starts with a questionnaire in which the client describes their ideal customer: approximate age, occupation, interests, status, place of residence, etc.

It’s important to note that the target audience profile is based not on the client’s words but on the results of analysis and research.

A well-prepared profile of different segments of the target audience helps to form a focused approach to those whom the business wants to see as its customers. When there is a description of the average buyers, it is easier to understand: which social network they use the most, what format they are accustomed to communicating in, what content they prefer to consume, who they consider influencers, and so on…

This information will not only help attract target subscribers but also correctly direct targeted advertising, develop a content plan, and engage visitors in active interaction.

If ordering SMM services from specialists is not in your plans and you intend to work with social networks on your own, still take note of this brief checklist for forming a target client profile:

Specify basic demographic indicators (gender, age, job, etc.).
Identify and write down the client’s problems and pain points that you can solve.
List the key priorities of your client (what they look for when choosing a solution, e.g., price or availability of a specific service).
For each avatar (a general profile of the target client), create a sample value system (e.g., sellers of dog clothing should ensure their clients love animals, while confectionery distributors should aim at generous parents or adult sweet lovers who do not plan to start a strict diet soon).
Analyze using special services, what information your clients are looking for on social networks, whether they prefer to read or watch content, whom they trust — Yefrosinina or Dorofeeva, etc.
Additionally, their hobbies, habits, and any other relevant facts may be useful.

This information can be gathered through surveys of existing or potential clients, studying the audience of thematic groups, forums, and communities. As for social networks, you can conduct a survey in stories or under a post. Professionals use special programs and online services for segmenting and creating avatars of the target audience, as well as relying on their own and others’ cases, research, and statistics. Be interested in the desires and opinions of subscribers. Brands use this information to create successful new collections and fully satisfy customer expectations.

A key task of SMM in social networks is to build brand recognition. Pay attention to branding your pages, communities, and groups.

Define the visual elements of the brand that you will use and design the cover on Facebook, profile on Instagram, header on X (formerly Twitter) with them. Then decide on the style of content presentation and who will be responsible for it.

SMM marketing is not just about working with followers and friends who are loyal or neutral to your brand. There will always be haters who may provoke conflict or a surge of negativity. Therefore, it’s worth assigning a person the role of an expert, who will be responsible for providing information on complex issues and mitigating conflict. But even the presence of haters is not a verdict but rather an indicator of your business growth. There will always be advocates who will defend the brand, but having your own expert is a significant advantage. The brand expert can effectively handle objections, provide comprehensive answers, and defuse conflicts.

It is also important to gain brand advocates. These are clients who share information about your product unconditionally. They talk about it and recommend it simply because they like it.

How to Build Communication with Your Consumer?

An SMM marketer will offer you an optimal strategy based on the social network’s features and your target audience.

SMM on Facebook involves posts with text and multimedia (often images, sometimes videos or audio recordings), Messenger newsletters using a Facebook chatbot.
SMM on Instagram and Pinterest is characterized by photo posts and short videos, accompanied by descriptions and hashtags, and stories that disappear within 24 hours.
On Twitter, content should fit into short text messages, no more than 280 characters.
The trendy TikTok format is short videos, reminiscent of Instagram Stories, already promoted on VK and Facebook. However, TikTok’s video duration is gradually increasing, creating healthy competition with Instagram and YouTube. TikTok now offers three video options: 15 seconds, 30 seconds, and 3 minutes. Instagram is not far behind with Reels, its TikTok-like short video feature (you can edit and choose music just like TikTok users do).

Content Recommendations for Social Networks

Test different content formats and focus on what your target audience likes the most.
Don’t skimp on text and visuals; in social networks’ endless feeds filled with promotional and informational messages, it’s increasingly difficult to stand out. Sometimes brighter doesn’t mean better. It’s important that a professional designer works on the visual component.
Be recognizable — this point follows from the previous one — otherwise, you’ll simply be overlooked. Therefore, each content unit must be branded: with a signature slogan, character, logo, jingle, a brand-related joke, or presented in an easily identifiable style. (Coca-Cola’s polar bears are hard to miss, and Monobank’s signature cat is also well-known by now).
Stay relevant. Consider how your content will be consumed and adapt accordingly: Instagram users don’t read long texts, Facebook users are ambivalent about memes, and every platform has its peculiarities.

Rely on video. This applies to content for Instagram (Reels videos) and TikTok. Relevant videos can go viral, which means recognition and new clients for your company.

A general SMM strategy can include cross-posting, but content should be adapted to the platform’s features. For example, a video can be posted on YouTube, a link to it and a description of the event on Facebook, photos and themed images with a brief description on Pinterest, and a short announcement on Twitter.

Don’t overuse cross-posting and auto-posting by sending the same content to all social networks. This can be perceived as spam.

A social network is not just a place to post your content but also an opportunity for your subscribers to create content on their own. How does it work? Let’s illustrate this with a fitting example. Lay’s offered its audience on social platforms to suggest flavors they would like to try. The company used the suggested ideas when releasing a new product. That’s how the popular Lay’s chips with fiery wasabi flavor came to be.

An SMM specialist can suggest other, no less effective ways to engage the audience on social media platforms: conducting contests, giveaways, prize promotions. Here are some simple tips for holding these events:

When organizing, stick to the business theme: give away your products and discounts on your own products, encourage likes and reposts of promotional posts.
Make sure the terms are simple and understandable for everyone.
Be prepared that many prize lovers who are not interested in your product may join through promotions.

Benefits of SMM for Your Business

Working with social platforms is a special type of business promotion that allows you to receive feedback from your clients.

Here you can better understand your target audience by bringing them together through fan pages, corporate pages, groups, and communities, receive feedback to improve your business.

Social media-based promotion has several advantages:

The low cost of SMM promotion (you can start with minimal investment).
At first, you work to build your image, then your image works for you.
A wide audience reach and the ability to carefully select target users.
The ability to choose payment for impressions or clicks. If you choose to pay per click, money is only deducted when the user clicks on your link.

SMM on Facebook uses targeted advertising capabilities: showing ads to a target audience selected by criteria (gender, interests, location, education, etc.). Each user group, united by a common criterion, can be shown a separate ad. You can test different creatives for different audiences or different creatives for the same audience to identify the best-performing creative and continue promoting it.

With targeting, you can advertise services or products without having a website, directing visitors to a community or store based on a social platform. You can send users to Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp. The main thing is to respond quickly to inquiries and provide complete information so that the user eventually makes a purchase from you. Retargeting on social networks is used to “close” the audience that visited your page but did not take the desired action.

Retargeting ads can not only bring users back to the site but also show them the products they were interested in. The cost of SMM services for setting up targeting/retargeting campaigns in agencies depends on the complexity and volume of work.

When developing a company’s presence in social media, remember that their primary purpose is to generate profit. To convert subscribers into clients and use social media as an additional sales channel, follow these recommendations:

Direct users from social networks to the information section of the main website, where they can quickly decide on a purchase.
Include contact information in your profile and fill photo albums with product images.
Redirect users to landing pages — pages for promotions, main products, etc.
Motivate users to leave their contact details in exchange for bonuses or discounts.
Communicate: respond to private messages, questions, and suggestions in comments as quickly as possible. Your goal is to be a friend, a buddy, a good acquaintance who is always ready to answer questions and won’t keep you waiting long.

Don’t forget to grow your group and attract new subscribers.

This can be done not only through advertising but also by publishing posts by bloggers and influencers, engaging in discussions in related groups, responding to comments, and using appropriate provocations. For the initial stage of promotion, SMM agencies in Kyiv offer automatic “boosting” of subscribers: target users are more likely to join groups with an initial number of participants over 2-3 thousand.

Important: don’t overuse boosting. This risks not only account blocking (without the possibility of recovery) but also losing reach and even future reputation. It’s appropriate only when a new group is created and new subscribers might be wary if they see zero or only a few members.

Advertising with bloggers is one of the best tools for popularizing and selling your services/products. When choosing a blogger, it is important to pay attention to: the quality of the audience (who comments and likes the posts), statistics on story and post views (ask the blogger or their manager), the number of subscribers, and the ratio of this number to the audience that actively participates in comments, watches stories, and likes posts.

For SMM on Instagram, Facebook, and other social networks that you use to pay off and bring positive results for the business, you need to develop a content marketing plan. Many SMM promotion agencies in Kyiv rely on the target client’s profile when developing a plan. This allows the SMM manager to create an optimal strategy that includes:

Types of content (a plan for publishing entertaining, educational, commercial content, formats: video, photo, audio, graphics, etc.).
Frequency and timing of publications (taking into account the behavior of the target audience).
The goal of the placement (purchase, website visit, participation in a promotion, etc.).

How to Evaluate the Effectiveness of an SMM Campaign

If you decide to order SMM services from specialists, you will be able to judge the results of the work done based on the reports provided by the contractor. But if you are promoting on your own, you should regularly conduct an SMM audit to assess the effectiveness of the work carried out. The criteria for evaluating the effectiveness of SMM depend on the initial goals the company has for engaging in social networks. In the digital environment, a KPI (Key Performance Indicator) is often used to measure this, with desired values for different parameters set during the campaign planning stage. And it’s not a fact that one campaign will have only one KPI.

When forming KPIs in SMM, the following indicators are typically considered:

The number of subscribers and its growth/decline dynamics;
User engagement — likes, reposts, comments, mentions;
The quality of traffic driven to the website or landing page from social networks;
The percentage or proportion of users who performed a targeted action, such as paying for an order or writing a message to request a consultation.

This list is very general and mainly helps to understand what to look for when assessing whether the chosen course for working with social networks is correct. When contacting an agency, an SMM specialist will tell you much more about goals and indicators and will also form specific KPIs that reflect progress toward the actual goal of investing in advertising. After all, no one needs millions of subscribers who will never become clients.

Popular Social Platforms and Their Features

Facebook

This social network unites a solvent and demanding audience that values quality and useful content. It gathers the largest number of people with higher education, as well as IT professionals. If these people are part of your target audience, it is worth focusing on Facebook promotion or ordering SMM services in Kyiv (in your city).

Facebook sorts posts in the news feed by two principles: latest and popular. Popular posts include those with a large number of likes and shares, as well as paid advertiser material. This should be considered when forming content.

The Facebook platform has built-in ways to track the effectiveness of an SMM campaign. In addition to standard metrics, there is the Facebook pixel, which promptly transmits data about user behavior from the social network to your site.

X (formerly Twitter)

On this platform, content appears as short text messages – tweets, which are no longer than 280 characters. The advantage of Twitter lies in its speed: messages are quickly composed, and current news spreads instantly through retweets.

Twitter allows you to add images to tweets, use hashtags, and run contests and promotions. Although Twitter is not the most popular platform in Ukraine, there is still a point in promoting there in 2023. Some Ukrainian brands’ cases show high effectiveness of Twitter for image advertising, and due to the contactability of the audience on this microblogging platform, it is convenient to get feedback, establish contacts, and gain a loyal audience, engaging customers at different stages of the sales funnel.

YouTube

YouTube is a powerful platform for promoting any business, especially if your product or service can be visually presented. A corporate YouTube channel helps increase brand awareness, attract a target audience through video content, and improve your site’s search engine rankings.

YouTube allows you to create a variety of content: tutorials, product reviews, client testimonials, entertainment videos, webinars, and more. Integration with other social networks and the ability to conduct live broadcasts make YouTube an essential tool for increasing audience engagement. SMM on YouTube is aimed at building a loyal audience, increasing conversions, and strengthening the brand’s online presence.

Instagram

Instagram has long since ceased to be a feed of food photos and pouty lips. In 2023, 13 million Ukrainians are registered on the world’s first and most popular social network for visual content. We don’t have exact data on what is most commonly purchased through Instagram, but it’s far from just cosmetics and clothing. Both major brands and indie entrepreneurs are eager to invest in promotion on this platform because of the high engagement: people mainly scroll through the feed attentively and interact well with advertising formats.

The main type of content on this network is visual. Pinterest drives more traffic than other social platforms and is suitable for promoting goods, services, and content. The only requirement is beautiful and high-quality images that genuinely inspire and appeal to people. Pinterest users react to content purely emotionally, and adding a product photo to their board signals an intent to purchase it. Statistics show that 62% of users plan to buy the added products, and 21% make purchases.

TikTok

TikTok is a mobile social app with a monthly audience of over 18 million active users. Promoting on TikTok has become a key tool not only for media personalities but also for banks, supermarkets, and even government institutions. The content format here is short videos, mostly of an entertaining nature. However, lately, there has been a trend toward the popularization of educational content, for which TikTok is likely gradually increasing video duration. Research shows that about half of TikTok’s regular users are teenagers, but successful cases of some global brands indicate the possibility of capturing a significant number of solvent users in the app. The age of the TikTok audience is increasing, and viewing this social network as just a “teen hangout” is a mistake.

The key promotion format on TikTok is working with bloggers, and its native options — banners and inserts — are also effective but are currently only used with a substantial budget. This is due to relatively weak audience segmentation and targeting capabilities compared to Facebook.

Which social network (or several) is right for your business? Leave a request for a consultation with our specialist.