According to a recent blog post on Hootsuite, “The typical social media user now spends 2 hours and 25 minutes on social media each day, equating to roughly one waking day of their life every week. Added together, the world’s social media users will spend a total of 3.7 trillion hours on social media in 2021 – equivalent to more than 420 million years of combined human existence.”

Wow.  Take a moment to let those statistics sink in, because they are astounding.  What do these numbers mean to us as retailers? I think the main takeaway is that most interactions with our customers outside of our brick-and-mortar walls are very likely to be on Facebook and/or Instagram. So even if you don’t want to boost posts, do paid advertising, sell through Instagram, or hold Facebook live events, your store’s presence on social media matters.

Facebook is still the most widely used social media platform, with over 2.3 billion active users (people who have logged in within 30 days), which translates to as many as 2/3 of all American adults.   Instagram is the second most popular platform, with 1 billion users a month – a high percentage of whom are under 35. In a survey commissioned by Facebook (which is not impartial, since they own Instagram), 81% of respondents said Instagram helps them research products and services.

It’s essential that you establish your store’s presence on these two platforms, and use them to build community and brand awareness. Plan to add new content at least 3-5 times a week, and to log in daily to respond to comments.  You might want to authorize one or more staff members to post for you – we find that this is a great way to increase the variety in our Instagram feed. Engaging photos and videos are essential for getting noticed. Pro tip: when you click on the “likes” a post on your Facebook business page has received, you’ll receive a prompt to invite the person to follow your page if they don’t already. We’ve built a nice following by remembering to do this.

Both Facebook and IG (Instagram) now offer stories, inspired by Snapchat, at the top of their feed. These ephemeral images and videos are the first thing that someone sees when logging on, and they are only available for 24 hours unless archived. There are lots of filters, texts and overlays that can be used to spice up these short offerings.  Another pro tip: it’s easy to create great looking graphics and animated GIFs for all your social media posts using Canva.

Social media is here to stay, and will continue to be an important way to let potential customers know about your store and its products.  Now a great time to make managing your marketing strategy on Facebook and Instagram a priority, especially since face-to-face contact is limited by the pandemic.

Happy Retailing,

Carol “Orange” Schroeder

P.S.  Please note that there will not be a Specialty Shop Retailing blog next week