HOW TO CHOOSE
THE RIGHT SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM
FOR YOUR CANNABIS BUSINESS
As a marketing firm for cannabis products and
services, we answer
the question a lot…
“What social media
platforms should I
be using?” So, maybe
we can answer the
question on more of a
broader scope here.
When we say “social media”, we are referring primarily to Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and Instagram. We consider the second tier platforms
to be Snapchat, Pinterest and Linked In. With that
said, let me put out there that I think the most beneficial social media to a business owner (speaking from experience) is by far Linked In. Do I consider Linked In to be as beneficial of an approach
to a product or services consumer? No. Linked
In should be considered if your target market is a
business owner, for that, there is nothing better. If
your consumer is the public, move on.
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Let’s start with Facebook. Facebook is the largest
social media network out there with an estimated 1.44 billion active users. Facebook is hard to
ignore, although at times you may want to, with
the attitude Zuckenberg, et al, have taken toward
cannabis. Facebook can be frustrating, because
as a business or “fan page”, you have to literally
get people to “like” your page. That’s not easy. At
our office, we have several tips and tricks to alleviate the “like” problem, but even at that, it’s a
challenge. What I can say is be creative. Facebook
allows you to flip a personal page into a business
page, albeit you will loose all your posts, photos,
etc., but your “friends” will indeed become “likes”.
Use the “invite” function from any personal page
resources you have as well. One last thing, remember that Facebook’s audience is that of an
older crowd. That’s about as much of the farm as
I can give away.
For the longest time I didn’t understand Twitter.
It seemed like people were posting the dumbest things in strings of 140 characters. “I have to
pee”… ridiculous. However, after my staff kept telling me that our clients were receiving the most
engagement out of Twitter, I could no longer ignore it. I educated myself on the platform and began to understand the ways in which it could be
used to grow engagement, branding and a business. Twitter boasts 302 million users that have
impressive engagement numbers. Maybe it is
societies protectiveness over their precious time
that gives Twitter its increased engagement… you
know, maybe it comes back to that 140 character
thing. I mean it doesn’t take many minutes out of
our lives to post 140 characters, right? So, yeah,
Twitter can be fit into our busy lives, perhaps.
Whatever the reason, it’s a viable player. My recommendation with Twitter would be to use the
keyword hash tag function. For instance, if you
own a dispensary in Seattle, search in the keyword
box “#seattledispensary”. Those are the conversations you want to get into and the people you
want to get hooked up with. On the flipside, make
sure that you use “#seattledispensary” at the end
of all your posts.
Google Plus has gotten such a jacked up wrap. It
is not dead. It is alive and well. Let me tell you why:
Google Plus is the ONLY social media platform
that will show up in an organic Google search.
This wraps SEO into the deal. If someone searches “bud trimming” on Google, you will not see a
post from Facebook or Twitter or any of the other
social media platforms. However, you will see any
relevant post from Google Plus. The advantage in
that is priceless. As for the “circles” thing, it just
works pretty much the same way as “friends”
within Facebook functions.
Instagram was another one on my skeptical list.
I pretty much wrote that one off to what my teenage kid had her face glued to when she was rolled
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