In the six years since I started doing social media & marketing for startups, it’s safe to say plenty has changed. New players have entered the field (hello, Bluesky and Threads), while old players have undergone pretty major changes (Twitter becoming X, TikTok’s near-death and resurrection). How do you navigate all these changes as a small business?
One thing that’s remained true through all these shifts is that people crave genuine connections on social media, both from fellow people and brands. Authenticity and knowing your “core people” are key to connecting with people on social, and forming those two into an actionable strategy. Below, learn how to make a social media marketing strategy to grow your small business.
- Step 1: Know your audience’s characteristics, interests, and online behaviors
- Step 2: Boost engagement with the right social platforms for your brand and audience
- Step 3: Set goals & KPIs to keep your social media strategy focused and competitive
- Step 4: Plan & publish content that’s valuable and relatable to your audience
- Step 5: Measure & adjust your strategy as necessary
- Step 6: Nurture & reward your most dedicated fans to secure their loyalty to your brand
- 3 good social media marketing strategy examples from brands
- Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
- Bottom line
Step 1: Know your audience’s characteristics, interests, and online behaviors
Any good small business social media strategy starts with knowing who your audience is — not just their general demographics like age and location (though those, of course, are important) but also as real people. This includes the topics they’re interested in, their pain points and challenges, and how they spend their time online — including what social media platforms they’re on.
Say, for example, you own an ecommerce fashion brand focused on sustainability and you want to target Gen Z women on social media. Aside from knowing their basic age range and interests, find out their social media behaviors, issues and challenges they discuss most, and what they interact with the most. For example, do they prefer reading blogs about sustainable fashion or watching TikTok videos?
Use the following questions to help you learn more about your audience.
- What topics do they post about most on social media?
- What issues do they bring up most often (in relation to your industry)?
- What discussions are they joining? What kinds of posts do they comment on?
- What values or causes do they care about most?
- What memes or trends resonate with them? What’s their sense of humor?
- What social media platforms are they most active on?
- What’s their overall sentiment about brands in your industry, and what do they expect from them?
Spend time on social media yourself to learn these characteristics about your audience. Create profiles on different platforms and “go undercover” as one of your target audiences to see what kind of discussions they’re having and how they behave. See what brands they follow. Join groups, read comment sections, and take notes using the guide questions above.
Step 2: Boost engagement with the right social platforms for your brand and audience
When I was new to digital marketing, one of my biggest rookie social media mistakes was trying to reach my audience on every platform. I was on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok, trying to connect with everybody all at once. That only led to burnout and failing to reach any KPIs. I also didn’t build long-lasting relationships with any audiences I did manage to reach.
The key to social media and small business marketing today is consistent engagement, not reach. Finding your core people is more important than trying to reach everybody all at once. So, choose one or two platforms where your audience is most active based on your research from step one, and set up accounts on them.
For instance, Instagram is a very visual platform, so it lends itself well to visual brands like travel, food, or fashion. Meanwhile, Reddit is a good place to engage subcultures and niche interests. The platforms where your audience is most active are where their engagement rates are highest (i.e., where they’re liking, commenting, and posting most).
Instagram has always been one of the most visual social media platforms. 
Meanwhile, Reddit has discussion threads for everything from e-sports to crocheting. (Source: Reddit)
2025 social media platforms at a glance
| Social media platform | Number of users | Key features |
|---|---|---|
 | 3.065 billion¹ | Diverse audience base, interest-based groups, Facebook Marketplace |
 | 2.504 billion¹ | Long and short-form video content, active creator community |
 | 2 billion¹ | Visual-forward platform, Instagram Stories, Reels, and Instagram Shop |
 | 1.582 billion¹ | Short-form vertical videos, authentic-feeling content, TikTok Shop |
 | 611 million¹ | Microblogging platform, real-time news updates |
 | 498 million¹ | “Pinnable” visual content, creative and crafty community |
 | 320 million2 | Ability to create and publish threads in one go |
 | 27.44 million3 | Microblogging platform with customizable feed |
| ¹Statista ²Backlinko ³Backlinko | ||
Step 3: Set goals & KPIs to keep your social media strategy focused and competitive
No social media marketing strategy for small businesses is effective without clear goals and key performance indicators (KPIs). Outline what you want to achieve on social media and how you’ll measure those achievements. Set clear timelines for each goal. Below are some examples of realistic but challenging social media goals.
My best advice: Focus on one goal at a time first when you’re starting out. This keeps your strategies focused and not all over the place — and prevents burnout.
| Goal | KPI |
|---|---|
| Build a steady social media following | Reach 500 followers in three months |
| Create an engaged social media fanbase | An average engagement rate of 1% on all posts by the first month |
| More website visitors from social media | 30% more website visitors coming from Facebook and Instagram by the end of the year |
Step 4: Plan & publish content that’s valuable and relatable to your audience
You already know that social media thrives on content. But to get audiences genuinely interested in what you have to say, your content should speak to their interests, challenges, and pain points.
Remember all that research from step one? This is where it comes in handy. Post content — whether videos, carousels, infographics, or memes — that’s relatable and of real value to your target audience. Every post you publish should fulfill one of the following intent buckets:
- Fulfills one of your goals
- Offers value to your audience
- Makes you relatable to your audience
It helps to have a content calendar designed around your objectives but allows room for spontaneity and creativity. Buffer and Later are some of my favorite social media marketing tools for content calendars, or it can be as simple as a monthly content spreadsheet.
Using a spreadsheet, you can list all your planned social media content for the month, the platform they’ll be posted on, and the intent buckets they fall under. You can also track their status (if they’re being created, published, or on hold) and plan their captions and publishing dates. It’s a handy way to keep track of all your posts from one platform.
I prepared a template of my content calendar, which you can download below.
Content calendar template
Step 5: Measure & adjust your strategy as necessary
No social media plan for small businesses is ever set in stone. As your business shifts and grows, so should your social media and marketing strategy. Track your posts according to the goals and KPIs set in step three. Keep doing what works and adjust what isn’t.
This is important because social media marketing all comes down to trial and error. For instance, at the startup I worked for, I found that simply posting blog links on our Facebook page wasn’t getting the clicks I wanted. So I started turning the blogs into infographics and adding the links to the full articles in the comments, which worked a lot better and created more engagement.
Over just 28 days, after changing the way I posted blog links to Facebook, my engagement rates increased by over 325%, with the majority of engagement coming from shares.
Other adjustments you can also make are different posting times and days, post formats, frequencies (once a week vs twice a week, etc.), and different caption tones and styles.
Step 6: Nurture & reward your most dedicated fans to secure their loyalty to your brand
The best social media marketing strategies aren’t just about reaching new people but also about keeping your best followers close and turning them into loyal fans. These are the people who drive real value to your brand and secure its longevity.
A good example of a brand that does this well is Refy. It took its most loyal customers on an all-expenses paid community trip to Mallorca. The key here isn’t the trip itself but the fact that it took its followers instead of the usual high-profile influencers, securing their loyalty even more. It also boosted the brand’s reputation as a company that truly cared for its customers.
Your loyalty program needn’t be as lavish, but the key principle is the same: nurturing your most loyal and engaged followers keeps them engaged and dedicated to your brand. Below are some easy ideas to get started.
- Add your most engaged Instagram followers to your Close Friends list and offer them exclusive discounts on your Instagram Stories.
- Create a signup form on your social media pages for an exclusive membership and offer your members exclusive deals and discounts.
- Offer a free gift to the first 20 people who comment on your post or reply to your Story.
3 good social media marketing strategy examples from brands
The best way to learn how to craft a good social media strategy is to look at brands that have done it well. Below are some of my favorite brands with excellent social media marketing strategies to take notes from.
Example #1: Little Moons
Little Moons is one of my favorite small business brands on TikTok because it has an excellent mix of content about its products, employee ambassador posts, and viral trendjacking. All throughout, it has a strong, playful, and accessible brand voice. And it consistently replies to user comments.
Example #2: Lemon & Tulips
Instagram thrives on visual content, which is a natural fit for the florist brand Lemon & Tulips. Audiences want to see the business’s floral creations, which is exactly what its feed is composed of, along with the occasional snapshot of events it’s catered to. It’s an excellent example of playing to the platform’s strengths and doubling down on what content works best.
Example #3: Death Wish Coffee
If you have a unique brand identity, social media is the place to use it and find like-minded people, like Death Wish Coffee. Its Facebook posts mix of product shots, branded memes, and plain text posts. What’s present through them all is its unconventional, tongue-in-cheek brand voice, which gets it plenty of engagement.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Which platform is best for social media marketing?
The best social media marketing platform for your brand will depend on your target audience and brand identity. Facebook has the most diverse audience if your target audience is wide and encompasses many ages and locations. If you’re targeting a specific niche or subculture, Reddit and X are great for interest-based micro-communities. Meanwhile, Instagram and Pinterest are a natural fit for highly visual brands.
Is social media marketing free?
Yes, social media marketing can be completely free. It’s free to set up business accounts on any platform, post content, monitor insights, and interact with online communities. Social media will only cost money if you set up ads, although you can set your own budgets for ad campaigns. Meta ads through Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger even have a minimum ad budget of $1 per day.
How do small businesses use social media marketing?
Small businesses can use social media marketing to reach new audiences and then keep the right ones staying and coming back for more. It’s also a way to build close relationships with fans and form an active online community — more than just advertising their products and services. Social media can also be a great tool to reward your most loyal followers by inviting them to an exclusive community and offering gifts and incentives to secure their loyalty.
Bottom line
Social media marketing is all about good content, connecting with people, and authenticity. People don’t come on social media with the express intent of buying a product or service but for genuine interactions with fellow users and brands. And if a brand’s content is good enough, they’ll keep coming back and staying longer. Research your audience, choose the best platforms, publish and measure content, and reward your most loyal fans.
