Social media can be a difficult and overwhelming task to manage. There are so many different social media platforms, and each one needs its own individual plan. In order to get the best results from your efforts, it's important that you have an effective strategy in place first. The following list is designed to help you identify what you need in order to create an effective social media marketing plan on any network!

-What is your goal?

-Who is your ultimate objective, interest, engagement or conversion?

- What does success look like to you?

How Do You Develop Your Social Media Marketing Strategy

• Know Your Audience - Tailoring your marketing campaign to the desired audience will result in an effective social media campaign. Determine how many people you hope to reach and what they like being marketed. For example, if you're content is mostly geared towards helping new parents educate their children about staying safe when out in public then most of your content will be geared towards parents with younger children.
• Study your industry and know the influencers -- In order to make a social media marketing strategy work you need to have knowledge of who or what will help it.
• Keep tabs on your competitors -- Don't let competition spook you. In fact, if you think that there are none it should make you wonder whether or not you have a viable product or service. Keeping an eye on your opponents can only improve the quality of your approach.
• Define Social Media Networks -- Once you identify your audience and industry, based on competition and the knowledge you have about your company, you can determine which networks to invest your marketing effort.

Determine Your Resources & Budget

• Staff -- Do you have people who can help with your marketing?
• Contractors -- Do you know of contractors who can help with these? If not, ask your colleagues. Make a list of contacts who could assist you.
• Software --What types of software might you need to help you with organizing, planning and implementing your marketing plan?
• Marketing budget -- How much money will you devote to your marketing plan?
• Time -- Counting the time that you need to invest is an important consideration for managing profiles on social media marketing.

Determine How You Will Manage Social Media Marketing

• Social Media Management Software – Social media management can be difficult to fulfill by yourself. There are many free or paid software available which make social media management a lot easier, such as HootSuite.com.
• Virtual and staff contractors -- Choose who will be responsible for organizing, planning, and implementation of your social media marketing plan. You can hire an inexpensive social media manager or virtual assistant from Fivver.com or Upwork.com.
• Select a project management system and add social media marketing along with the people who will be responsible for tasks.

Develop Campaign Goals & Objectives

•  Messaging & offers - Create messaging and offer content for each social media platform that you choose to work with through.
• USP -- Your unique selling proposition. Focus on what sets you apart from the competition to help differentiate yourself.
• Calls to Action -- You should also consider the impact of each message that you submit on social media. Are you trying to stimulate curiosity, inspire a prospect to research your product or service?
• Your Why-- Always keep your why in mind as it will keep you focused on your objective messaging.

Optimize All Content & Marketing Materials

•  Prepare Marketing Collateral -- Press releases, blog posts, articles, images and more all need to be prepared with each platform, and message that you have in mind. You won't always want to share the same image on Pinterest that you do on Facebook without some modifications.
•  Optimize Content -- Content includes everything mentioned above. Ensure that your titles, the words you use, the benefits you describe, and the pictures you pick relate to your goals, your products, your services and your brand.

Optimize & Improve Online Real Estate

•  Webpages -- Is your webpage responsive? If not, it's time to ensure that it is. Responsive design is imperative with social media marketing because most people use their Smartphones to access social media.
•  Blogs -- Can your audience read your blog from any device? Just like it's important to design your website so that everything on there is responsive and works well, the same goes for your blog.
•  Newsletters -- If you send out a newsletter is it focused, targeted, relevant, and responsive? Does it focus on providing the customer the education they need to make good choices?
•  Overall Branding -- Be consistent across all social media platforms with your brand but also change something up for each social network based on that network's personality.

Complete & Customize Your Social Media Profiles

On each platform it's important that you personalize your profile, optimize images and make the social media unique to that particular platform, but still representative of your brand.

•   Facebook -- Tag people & pages. Update daily. Ask for shares, comments & likes. The more engagement you have, the more of your audience will see your updates. Do the same for others in your industry. Try using promoted posts to get more targeted likes.
•  Google + -- Add new people to your circles on a regular basis but not all at once. Weekly is best. Host a hangout on a topic in your industry. Attend hangouts on relevant topics. Share & post new content daily.
•  LinkedIn -- Connect with new people and related companies each week. Try to set a weekly goal. Ask for recommendations of any one you've worked with on a regular basis. Don't use the auto feature and send a mass request, make it more personal and build your profile and network slowly. Update your status daily.
•  Pinterest -- Post examples of your work each week, follow other people's pin boards, try to add at least one new board a week in a relevant category with at least five pins inside.
•  Twitter -- Tweet daily. Retweet daily. Use appropriate #hashtags. Strategically follow new people each day. Don't follow everyone in one day, adding a few people over a longer period of time is best.
•  Your Blog -- Shoot for 20 blog posts a month, share with all your social networks with a unique blub for each network. Ensure that your titles contain relevant keywords in the titles and content of the blog posts.
•  YouTube -- Each week subscribe to at least one new channel related to your industry. Look for relevant videos to share on other social networks weekly. Record short tip videos each week to share with your audience. (Tip: Record your Google Hangouts)

Build Your Social Media Networks

•  Connect -- You probably already have people that you can connect with on each social media platform you join. Shoot for about 25 connects/followers/likes etc... to start with and then build on that each week.
•  Engage -- Understand social media etiquette for each network you choose to post on. Be professional, make it about them, and seek to be a resource. The more you make it about them, and building relationships, the better social media will work for your business marketing.
•  Share -- Don't just share your own work, share other people's work that is relevant to your industry and audience. Always remember the audience, ask yourself "Is this relevant to my audience?" If yes, share, if not don't.
•  Recommend -- It might seem counter-intuitive to recommend other businesses, products, and services to your audience, but the truth is, sometimes someone else will be better for the job. If you recommend good people, they will return the favor.
•  Build Expertise & Credibility -- Share original content, relevant studies, books, webinars, and more with your audience when related. By adding in your own content and comments about the things you share you will build up your expertise. By sharing only relevant and screened information you build your credibility.

Monitor Your Metrics

•  Engagement Level -- Before starting with metrics you should know your objective and have a way to measure that objective. Using a tool like HootSuite.com can help you measure engagement on a whole new level.
•  Customer Satisfaction -- Are your customer's satisfied once they convert? If you're not sure, try asking them to use social media.
•  Calls to Action Effectiveness -- Are your calls to action working and producing the results you expect? If you're getting results but not what you expected, try testing other ideas to see what works best.
•  Feedback -- Always ask for feedback from movers and shakers and experts as well as your contacts, friends, followers, and likes. Let them lead the way and you won't be disappointed in the results.
•  Other -- Any objective that you have should be reflected in a metric that you can monitor. Objectives are always exact and measurable.

Using this checklist to help set up your social media marketing plan can help you remember what's important and avoid missing relevant ideas.

 Develop Your Social Media Marketing Strategy

•    Feedback - Always ask for feedback from those who actively engage with you. Ask for feedback on both content and advertising.
•  Implementation - Create a routine that's easy to follow so you can always be working towards your marketing goals. Streamline your process when possible by using apps or other software tools.
•  Followers/Likes -- Monitor this metric because it reflects how active and engaged followers respond to your content.
•  Calls to Action Effectiveness -- Are your calls to action working and producing the results you expect? If you're getting results but not what you expected, try testing other ideas to see what works best.

Social Media Management Brainstorming Sheet

• Choosing to embark on a social media marketing campaign is only the beginning. You have to go in with a real plan of action, understanding your goals, objectives and the tactics that you will use to create success. This checklist along with explanations should help you create a social media marketing plan that gets the results you want.
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• My main vision for my business is: ______________________________________________
• ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________
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• My target audience is: _________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________
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• My audience uses the following social media: _____________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________
• _______________________________________________________

My main competition is:

• ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ My unique selling proposition is: _______________________________________________
• ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________
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• My overarching goal for this campaign is: _______________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________
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• My resources include: (tools, software, money, contractors, etc...)  ___________________
• ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________
• __________________________________________

The tactics (actions) I will take include:

• ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________
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The metrics I will measure are: _________________________________________________

• ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________

Dr. Khalilah Johnson, Chaplain, is an Executive Contributor for Brainz Magazine, International Bestselling Author, Motivational Keynote Speaker, Trauma & Resilience Expert, Corporate Consultant , Communication Architect & Growth Strategist.

As a Corporate Consultant she gives strategy for best business and marketing practices and training for awareness that help organizational leaders create Trauma Informed workplaces and employees reduce stress from burnout, secondary & primary trauma and compassion fatigue.

Dr. Johnson has over 20 years experience as a communication specialist and is a level 6 digital marketing professional certified by Digital Marketing Institute, American Marketing Assoc. with special certifications received by Google, Facebook, Hootsuite and HubSpot Academy.

Her professional training includes over 40 specialized certifications in the areas of holistic healing, psychology, marketing & business.

She is the CEO of Redefined Academy, Brazen Nation Media, Redefined Unlimited Executive Coaching Firm & Power After Trauma