Social media remains a central focus for businesses looking to reach new and old customers online,
according to a survey of 376 business professionals about their strategies with online marketing.
Facebook still dominates among industries, with 88 percent of survey respondents saying they turn to that network to promote their brands. Marketers also are growing more satisfied with Facebook ads for outreach. The number of participants using Facebook ads and Google ads stood at 68 percent each, the first time they’ve aligned in popularity.
But while Facebook remains king, watch out for Instagram. Instagram jumped from the near bottom of popularity in the 2016 survey to now the second most-used social media platform among brands. Read more for the real estate connection:
Leverage Instagram for Your Business
Sixty percent of marketers believe social media will become even more effective over the next five years. (Read:
Using Social Media to Sell More Homes Faster)
The top modes of content for reaching prospects (in order of popularity): Blog posts, YouTube videos, email newsletters, and long-form content, such as white papers and e-books, according to the survey.
Jayson DeMers, the author of the report, says he found it surprising that link building is so underutilized among businesses in their online marketing. “Inbound links are one of the top two factors in Google’s organic search ranking algorithm, yet 43 percent of marketers aren’t using [them] at all,” DeMers notes. “It could be due to link building’s perceived difficulty – after all, it’s listed as the third-most difficult strategy to execute – but still, link building is highly underutilized compared to its known effectiveness in SEO.” Read more:
Re-Evaluate Your Linking Strategy
Source: “What Works in Online Marketing? 7 Big Takeaways From a Survey of 376 Online Marketers,” Forbes.com (May 30, 2017)
