When it comes to the social media marketing strategy for your mobile app there are multiple factors that come into play. You will very likely engage in paid social media advertising through sponsored ads or by using a social media influencer. But another integral part of mobile app marketing is using organic social media to create an online app community. This is one of the smartest ways to build excitement around your app pre-launch and to support continual engagement with your app once it has launched and you enter the user tracking stage.
Finding the Right Online Community
There are a variety of social media platforms for you to choose from when it comes to focusing on creating a community base. This decision is important because each of the social media sites caters to a different type of audience. Let’s take a quick look at some of the major social networking sites to see which might work best for your app community:
Instagram and Pinterest: These sites are two of the most image-based social media platforms that exist in the dominant social media sphere. If your app is one that focuses on food or clothing, either of these are likely to be the best social media option for you so that users are able to bolster community around sharing their wishlist pieces on Instagram Stories or pinning recipes they want to try to their Pinterest boards.
Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter: These sites fall into the traditional category of social networking, meaning that their primary focus is to help people grow and maintain connections in their nexus. As a business, these apps are great because they allow you to incorporate a variety of components into your social media strategy such as status updates, media, and hashtag use. Facebook specifically offers the advantage of being the most popular social media site worldwide, giving you the opportunity to build an immense social community.Â
TikTok and Snapchat: These two social media sites are special because they are two cases in which the community of followers is made up of overwhelmingly younger users. If your app’s target base is a group of people who can take a social media post and turn it into a global conversation topic in a matter of days, then these would be great sites for you. Not only can users consume content, but they have the ability to engage with it in a way that creates a sense of ownership via features like filters, duets, or voiceovers.
Honorable Mention – Clubhouse: Clubhouse is a social media app that is so new it’s actually still in beta. Only iOS users currently have access to the platform and even they need an invite from a current user to fully create a profile and operate the platform. Once inside, users will quickly realize that Clubhouse differs from other major social networking sites in that it is an audio-only platform. The app has the huge advantage of making interactions feel extremely personalized and when coupled with the exclusivity of its current form, you have a recipe for a space where a very strong community can be cultivated around your app.
Remember, each of these apps are extremely valuable when it comes to a specific base. Eventually it would be nice to have a strong handle on multiple of those listed, but begin by focusing on the one app that you believe speaks most strongly to your app’s target audience. Building and maintaining a community takes a lot of time and energy so you want to avoid spreading yourself too thin.
Communicate Consistently With Your App Community
Once you’ve set up your social accounts, you’ll want to be sure you don’t leave your audience hanging. There’s no community if you don’t lay the groundwork for people to come together in a space. One of the best ways to ensure consistency is by using a social media planner such as Hootsuite or Later in order to both plan your content, and ensure that it gets published on a regular basis. Investing in a social media management tool in order to optimize your content creation and uploads will leave you with much more time to do what matters most in building community – engaging with your user base.
Another key element of building your community on social media is committing to a brand voice for your content. You can work with a social media strategist to synthesize your online image with your app’s energy so that your brand identity is consistent whether users are logging into your app or clicking on your latest post. There are a variety of brands that are utilizing their clear voice to gain traction. Think about Flo from Progressive or Netflix’s twitter account. Both companies have a clear voice that entices people to tune into them and that encourages engagement laterally between users as well. The more consistently you present yourself, the more your community will begin to see you as familiar and genuine, and the more they will begin to trust you.Â
Commit for the Long Haul
Once you’ve chosen a platform, established your brand voice and begun using a content management system, you’ll likely be off to a great start. Once you reach this point it’s important not to drop off. Engage in social media monitoring so that you can accurately and effectively serve your community. Social media can be a great place to learn what users do and do not like about your app’s latest update or one of its key features. Once you’ve established a community you can use it periodically as an audit of what people are thinking. You can respond quickly to concerns and funnel feedback back to your app’s team in order to always be on the ball. Your community will appreciate your consistent improvement and feel excited about being able to have a say in what goes on with the app that they love.Â
Additionally, be sure to look specifically at your social media analytics in order to make sure that your community isn’t waning. If your posts aren’t getting as much engagement as usual you’ll want to investigate why so that you don’t lose traction in a valuable, but fickle, online space.