The popularity of Instagram has a downside – everyone wants to promote only on Instagram. Entrepreneurs using social media say that they aren’t interested in any other platforms, they only want to be present on Instagram. Furthermore, even most SMM managers recommend focusing on Instagram. They don’t want to put any effort into promoting on other platforms.
This is a wrong way of thinking. Why?
There is a couple of reasons:
- Instagram is not the only and not the most popular platform. The Instagram audience is smaller than on YouTube or VK. It’s true that Instagram is one of the most effective platforms from the selling point of view, however, it isn’t the only one.
- The best idea is to promote on several platforms, with one of them being the major one. You can use the same content for all social media accounts. As a result, the users can follow you where it is the most convenient for them. If a person prefers using Facebook (lots of people do so) or VK, they won’t open Instagram just to read your recent updates.
1. YouTube
The first alternative platform is YouTube. There are many reasons why YouTube is important. The first one is that YouTube has long-term content, i.e. posted videos can be popular and efficient for years. The platform has many opportunities for free promotion and versatile audiences. YouTube is the only social media platform where the 65+ and 13-17 age groups are equally present: every age segment can find videos of their interest there. YouTube is especially relevant if the aim is to develop a personal brand. In combination with Instagram, it is even more effective. You can add more depth to your personal brand and show your expertise. To sum it up, YouTube is great for creating important, long-term content.
2. Vkontakte
The second platform is VK. VK is still the most popular Russian social media. A study by Mediascope shows that VK has the most active audience that keeps growing along with the number of messages, comments, and posts. From a promotional point of view, VK has a number of strong sides.
The system of communities
First of all, the user interface in communities, groups, and public pages of the platform boasts a variety of tools that Instagram doesn’t provide. For example, VK is the only social media where the page can be customized according to the visitor. The data that the users see when opening your group or clicking a widget depends on their profile. For example, men and women see different adverts; they no longer have to choose to view male or female apparel collection. The page can also change depending on the location of the user. Even if the user doesn’t choose the city, the system will automatically recognize it and show store locations there.
Onlypult posts to all social media platforms, provides analytics data, builds teamwork and saves you time.
Mailout feature
VK has a unique mailout system. It is one of the best automatic funnels implemented on social media so far. It allows to significantly increase the reach and engage automatic funnels.
Targeted advertising
Another peculiarity is targeted advertising. Along with advertising on Facebook and Instagram, VK has a very powerful advertising system with numerous advantages. For example, micro-locations are better implemented on VK. Parsing audiences on Instagram is less developed, while on VK it works almost perfectly. That is why we strongly recommend adding VK to your promotional portfolio.
3. TikTok
TikTok is new to our list. People used to see it as an entertaining social media platform, but an educational format is also getting popular there now. TikTok has a number of advantages.
Free promotion
The main advantage is that there is a lot of free promotional tools. Instagram is fully commercialized, and, in most cases, you will need considerable investments to promote your account there. YouTube requires a special type of qualitative content, on TikTok, however, you can promote for free.
Besides, there is a variety of tools to choose from:
- hashtag system to gain new audiences;
- hashtag challenges;
- mutual following that is still effective on TikTok;
- getting on the “For You” page.
On TikTok, the audience increase is still proportionate to the quality of your content. So, use this opportunity while it is still free.
Targeted advertising
A targeted advertising system is also quite peculiar here. It helps to attract new audiences, but there are certain positive and negative sides. Unlike other systems, commercial advertising doesn’t work very well on TikTok. If you just upload your promotional video on TikTok, it won’t work as well as a custom-made video in TikTok format. If you do customize your videos though, targeted advertising will produce much better results.
4. Facebook
The next platform is Facebook. Two important formats should be mentioned here.
Targeted advertising and personal brand
Facebook is still one of the best platforms, along with Instagram and VK, for targeted advertising and building your personal brand. Business pages always get fewer followers than individual accounts, which stopped the trend of creating business accounts for attracting audiences. That is why Facebook now focuses on targeted advertising and personal brand promotion via personal accounts.
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5. Telegram
Telegram has a lot of promotional tools at its disposal. The key ones are promotion through channels and chats (called groups and supergroups) and chat-bots. There are many different strategies; most importantly, Telegram has a lot of users.
6. Other platforms
Such platforms as Snapchat and Twitter, other social media, and mobile messengers can be helpful, but they are more context-oriented, with certain requirements to use them.
You may think that everybody uses Instagram. It is not always true. It can be you and your social circles, but by analyzing statistical data, we can see that audiences are still spread among different social media platforms.
