So you’re about to start a business, probably having perfected a skill and are ready to start from where you are. It’s a business you’re starting from scratch with probably very little capital, so getting an office or shop space at the moment may not be ideal.
Many started in their garage or a room set up for this purpose. And if it’s food-based, then most likely, your kitchen.
Before the business gets to the point where you start talking about a workshop, factory, or warehouse, there’s a place you start showing up daily. This place is called social media, and many startups and business owners are leveraging it positively to their advantage.
It’s one thing to have a skill and passion, and it’s another thing to convert it to profit. Business can be learned. Many people come out of training or venture into businesses and then face this wall. How to start selling and raking in the profits, who to talk to, how to sell, etc.
Social media gives this platform to showcase goods and services at little or no cost. Just have a good phone and data. But still, many do not know how to navigate this space.
First things first. Make your wall a real place where people check out and come away feeling you’re real and they know you. This is because, in the psychology of buying, people buy you first before whatever you’re selling or offering. Let’s start with a good profile and cover photo. Look nice, friendly, and professional too. We don’t want to see pictures of animals, landscapes, or anything funny, no matter how much you love those things. People need to see your face to first connect with you.
Next is your name. It should be spelt out correctly. No nicknames, no abbreviations. No Sexy Joe or Sassygirl… etc, especially if you’re not in entertainment.
Then your bio. Your bio tells us who you are, what you do, and basically what you’re here for. So take your time and list them out. Your bio should read something like this: Writer, TV presenter, businesswoman, and coach who is passionate about seeing people grow and succeed. A bio like this will arouse enough curiosity for anyone to check your page out and see what you mean.
This takes us to our next place. Your timeline. It’s always disappointing to check out people’s pages and all you see there are mostly shared and tagged posts. You don’t share your thoughts, stories, lessons, experiences, or products/services. All you do is share from every other page and allow yourself to be tagged with 99 other people every other day. A timeline that’s littered in this manner gives the impression of a hacked account or a potential scammer.
If you’re a sales rep for a company, we want to see you talk about the products of this company. The feedback, results after use—that sort of thing. On social media, nothing kills your visibility like shared posts. It’s better to copy, paste, and credit the owner.
Now, must you only post about your business? The answer is no. If you do that, you become predictable, and in the long run, people become bored and start skipping your posts. If you put out, say, 10 posts in a day, then 4-5 of those posts should be about your business. The rest can be things that people like to engage in. It can be a question, seeking people’s opinions, a contribution to a trending issue, lending your voice to a cause, a meme, or any fun thing. Remember, you’re not selling products only. You’re selling yourself.
You also have to keep showing up every day. That way, whenever a need arises for anything you offer, you or your product will quickly come to mind. Showing up daily simply means impressing your brand repeatedly in the minds of people. You don’t talk about your offerings for 2 days and go silent or get tired the rest of the week. You need to understand that when you’re starting, you’re the customer service, marketing manager, social media manager, admin, accountant, photographer, and even logistics/delivery man. As business grows and demand increases, you outsource or bring more people on board.
As a marketing manager, you will learn different and more creative ways of marketing or advertising your products. This is a whole course on its own. But the more you do it, the better you become. You would even learn how to sell without saying, ‘come and buy.’ As a photographer, you will learn to take clean, clear pics of your products with your phone before you start taking more professional pics and with good lighting, a good phone, and even AI, this is becoming easier by the day to achieve.
If you noticed, what I’m talking about is your page and not your business page, where you run ads. Running ads will cost you good money and you may need a team to plan a proper ad campaign that could run for 6 months to a few years. So for now, your wall may just be where to start. I know people who made more money selling stuff on their timelines than when they ran ads on their business pages and that’s because of what I said earlier. People buy you first. On social media, people want to feel like they know you and trust you before they give you their money.
One last thing. And don’t take this lightly or are ignorant but it is what it is. Don’t be a snob online. There are people online who never engage in posts. You give what you get. If you’re a snob, never commenting on other people’s posts, liking, and the rest, in time, people will begin to treat you the same way. This can be bad for business. It’s so weird putting up a business post and getting only one or 2 likes or no likes at all and no comments because people read it or not and just scrolled past because you never engage with their posts. This may sound petty to you but it is what it is.
I hope you found this useful.
- Joy Mfon Essien is an Entrepreneur and the CEO, of Discover Essence Media, Millionaire Woman Soapworks and Delicioso Foods. Writer, TV presenter and producer, Wellness Coach and mom of two.
