Online marketing in Kansas City doesn’t have to cost a bucket of money. In fact, a major component of online marketing can be run completely free of charge: social media. Of course, these platforms have tried monopolizing on their popularity. Social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn allow businesses to pay for a prime position on their site. With Facebook, you can promote posts to reach a larger audience. Twitter allows you to create ads. Pinterest promotes pins that don’t necessarily belong in your feed. LinkedIn lets users run ads or pay to advertise open positions within their company. What can get tricky though is choosing which platforms are worth the investment. We’ve provided a breakdown of the demographics for each of these social media sites/apps to help you figure out your budget and time allocation. By funneling your social media budget into sites that you know your target demographic is active on, you ensure you get the most bang for your buck.
Facebook:
It’s the social media site that our mom, grandma, great-grandma, mailman, professor, EVERYONE is on. It appeals to all genders, ages, races. It’s one of those sites that you feel obligated to have, just so people know you’re a real human being. Understanding specific demographics helps you plan out how much of your time and budget you want to allocate toward this universally-appealing site.
Facebook boasts 2 billion users every month, making it the leader for social networking sites. It skews slightly more toward women, with 83% of females on the site and only 75% of men. Users are evenly spread between rural, suburban and urban areas. As far as age group goes, numbers taper off around the 65+ group (62%). The United States is the top country for FB usage, especially since the site is banned in some counties (ie: China). From these numbers, you can see that Facebook users are pretty evenly spread among ages, gender and environment.
Alright so what does this mean for your social media budget? It means that Facebook is a great platform to invest in, but the site knows its worth. Promoting your posts can be a great use of ad spend if you’re running a promotion or contest where you can ‘share to win’ but may not be worth it if your posts aren’t very exciting to begin with. Keeping up with your business’ social media account is a great use of your time, but keep in mind that not all your followers are going to see your posts. You can try tagging larger companies (when relevant) or adding in hashtags to boost exposure. Where we’ve gotten the most website traffic is when a larger company shares our post. You can accomplish this by writing posts that are lists (ie: ‘Top Places to Eat in St. Louis’), mentioning businesses within your article or featuring a guest blogger that you can then tag.
Instagram:
This platform has a reputation for feeding into millennial self-obsession. If you look past the selfies though, you’ll find a plethora of stunning photography, educational material and behind-the-scenes looks at the brands we know and love. Their database of 600 million active users is a testament to their popularity. With their new slider option and array of filters, it’s no wonder. If a social media site can make a person famous, why not your brand?
59% of people between the ages of 18 and 29 use Instagram. This number drops to 33% for people 30-49 years old and again to 18% for those ages 50-64. The site has more women than men (38% of population versus 28%), and there are significantly more urban area-dwellers on Instagram than those who live in the suburbs. Unlike Facebook, Instagram skews more toward younger people and women. Keep this in mind when choosing which sites would benefit your brand the most. If you sell a visually-appealing product, like clothing or home interior products, this is the platform for you. Here’s a thorough guide to get you started.
Twitter:
If I’m being honest, I mostly use my personal Twitter account to see other people’s commentary when my favorite shows air. We freak out together, cry together, GIF together. There’s a lot of funny content on this platform, and reacting in real-time to what’s going on on-screen really enhances the community aspect (even if you have no idea who the other people in your community are). For businesses, this is my favorite platform. It makes content sharing easy, and it’s a great resource for me to keep up with marketing news and learn new things. Tagging other users is easy, and you don’t have to buffer your link with a ton of text—in fact, you’re limited to 150 characters! For us minimalists, that’s a dream come true.
The highest percentage of Twitter users comes from the 18-29 age range, with numbers tapering off the older you go. Gender-wise, the site is split about 50/50. Education doesn’t seem to have a major influence on the types of people this site attracts, but there is still some difference between the 29% of adults who graduated college that are on Twitter and the 20% of adults with a high school diploma or less that are on Twitter. Look at these stats:
- 30% of adults who make over $75,000 use Twitter.
- 28% of adults who make $50,000–$74,999 use Twitter.
- 23% of adults who make less than $30,000 use Twitter.
- 18% of adults who make $30,000–$49,999 use Twitter.
I’m assuming part of this high percentage has to do with the fact that so many celebrities are active on Twitter (and they make a ton of money), but this stat says something about the users; They’re rolling in it. If you’re selling a pricey product, Twitter might be the way to go. I use Twitter more for creating brand awareness and drawing in traffic, but restaurants and other retail markets promoting time-sensitive specials or new products could really benefit from using Twitter.
LinkedIn:
LinkedIn is kind of like the boring, responsible older brother to all the other social networking sites. If you’re looking at B2B marketing though, it’s the way to go. These posts need to be more formal and less promotional in nature. You can fuel your content marketing by sharing some informational blog posts, or keep people updated on the status of your company.
There is a higher percentage of men on LinkedIn than women (31% vs. 27%). 34% of people aged 18-29 use the platform, indicating that it’s a good place to build connections with young professionals. The highest percentage of usage is in the U.S., followed by India. It is utilized more in urban areas than rural areas (34% vs. 18%). Half of the population that has graduated college uses LinkedIn. This drops to 27% with a partial college degree and 12% among those with only a high school diploma. As far as income goes, 45% of adults who make over $75,000 use LinkedIn. Compare that to the 15% user rate among those who make $30,000-$49,999. These numbers indicate that your audience will be looking for content that provides them some value, either through knowledge or status advancement. This would be a good platform to advertise those ‘5 Ways to Guarantee Success’ blog posts. Business-oriented material and B2B companies should be especially active on LinkedIn once they implement their online marketing in Kansas City.
Pinterest:
Alright so this is one of those platforms that gets branded with stereotypes, too. You hear ‘Pinterest’ and you think of young women pinning about their future wedding, recipes, inspirational quotes, etc. And it’s true that 45% of women are on Pinterest versus 17% of men. There’s a definite gender skew, due in part to this enduring stigma that Pinterest is ‘for women’. However, you’ll find categories related to men on the site as well, such as ‘men’s fashion’. Among those who are 18-29 years old, 36% are on Pinterest. Ages 30-49 have 34% and ages 50-64 have 28%. There’s a high percentage of Pinterest users among those in suburban areas (34%) compared to rural areas (25%).
What these numbers indicate is that you’re better off going with Pinterest if your target demographic is women, no matter the age. I’ve seen a lot of stuff on Pinterest related to nursing and teaching, so this might be a good venue for you to share your stuff if you supply medical equipment or school supplies. I’ve also seen a lot of photographers do well on Pinterest, partially because they use the right tags to draw in their audience. The nice thing about it too is that they’re very subtle in letting users know that the pin is promoted. Pinterest and Instagram are very similar, so you can do a lot of cross-over marketing with your visual content.
Contact Us
If you’re interested in social media marketing but aren’t quite sure how to get started, contact us. Our expertise with online marketing in Kansas City has given us the skills to tackle any social media marketing project. A good first step is to map out who you want to target and figure out which of these sites has the most users who match your demographic. You can also check out these stellar social media accounts (based out of KC!) for inspiration.