How to Leverage Social Media for the Robotics Industry

When it comes to digital marketing, social media is here to stay. Here’s our four-step guide to leveraging social media for the robotics industry.

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Highlights:

• Having a documented strategy is key to reap the benefits of social media marketing.
• Define your audience and establish concrete goals for social media campaigns.
• Set metrics and use data to adjust your strategy consistently over the long term.

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The demand for high-performance robotic systems is growing steadily and showing no signs of slowing down. In fact, New Equipment Digest predicts that the robotics vertical within the materials-handling-equipment sector will grow by over 8%, reaching $20 billion by the year 2024. To capture the benefits of the sector’s growth, robotics companies need to invest in digital marketing. Social media for the robotics industry holds tremendous potential — if it’s leveraged properly.

In our work with clients across various verticals in the supply chain, including robotics, we frequently hear that they have been skeptical about the potential of B2B social media use. While social media management does require time and resources, robotics companies should absolutely be reaping the benefits of social media marketing.

Read on for tips on how to create a strategy and leverage social media for the robotics industry.

4 steps to developing a strategy for social media for the robotics industry

1)      Define your audience.

For supply chain companies, one of the biggest predictors of success in a social media marketing campaign is a clearly documented strategy. A big part of that is defining your target audience. Chances are, you have some target buyer personas already. Keep these top of mind as you create your social media strategy.

What are the unique needs and challenges faced by your audience? Where do they go online for information? What are their goals? What do they value from you? The more you ask and answer questions about your audience, the better positioned you are to create a strong and effective social media strategy.

2)      Determine your goals.

Next, consider what your goals are on social media. You’d be surprised how often this step gets skipped. Marketers are often pressed for time or resources and think of social media marketing itself as a goal, rather than defining specific, measurable objectives for their social media campaigns.

When it comes to social media for the robotics industry, common goals often include increasing brand awareness and authority, generating leads, or establishing thought leadership. But before you embark on a social media strategy, consider what your company specifically needs to achieve.

3)      Define your metrics.

One of the best things about having documented goals for your social media strategy is that it helps you define what metrics you should be using to track your progress toward those goals. Measuring social media ROI is no easy task, but there are plenty of tools and strategies that can help. While your full list of metrics will be determined by the goals you set, robotics companies should be tracking at least these four metrics:

1. Where traffic is coming from
2. Revenue derived from posts
3. Visitor behavior on your site
4. Social media conversions

In addition to the analytics tools offered by social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, Google Analytics can give you a bird’s eye view of your social media efforts, as well as delving into detail on the metrics that matter most to you. For more, be sure to check out our guide to getting the most out of Google Analytics.

4)      Choose your platforms.

Not all social media platforms are created equal. When it comes time to choose your social media platforms and create a strategy for each, it’s important for robotics companies to consider where their audience spends their time online (see step 1).

As you identify what social media channels are the best fit for your company, keep in mind that the characteristics of each platform should inform what content and how often you should be posting. Twitter, for example, lends itself to short-form, pithy content or links and frequent posting, while a more visual platform like Instagram only requires 1-2 posts per day.

Going forward: using your metrics to stay agile

Once your strategy is established, you can simply put it into place, start posting content, and forget about it, right? Wrong. Effective use of social media for the robotics industry requires ongoing evaluation and adjustment.

If you’ve defined the right metrics to track, the data you collect should help you determine where your efforts are successful and where your methods need to be adjusted. As you refine your strategy and learn the needs and preferences of your target audience, you’ll find that social media is an extremely effective tool for capturing leads, broadening your brand’s reach, and building your reputation.

Related posts:

• This Is How Often B2B Companies Should Post on Social Media
• Is Your Content Strategy Really a Strategy?
• Infographic: 3 Steps to Prove Social Media ROI