How to Use Social Media to Promote Your App

You invested your time and resources in the grueling, lengthy, and costly process of creating an app. As someone who has done that before, I can relate to your current feeling. It appears as though you have finally managed to go past the finish line. Now what? Your application might be wonderful, but it is of no use if it does not get to the client’s hands. Sure, users can find your app through general browsing and searching on app stores. Using such methods as app store optimization, you can strategically position your app and get it ranked. However, that cannot be relied on as the only source of new downloads.

That is why it’s essential for a brand to have an active social media presence. Social media is great since it is a cost-effective and easy way to help you reach more people and get them to download your app. Whether the app is still being developed, new, or has existed for many years, social media can always be leveraged to increase download rates. What is more, through social media, you can get present users to allocate more time to making use of the app, which will eventually result in more money and higher conversions.

If the strategies of marketing applications on social media are new to you, you are in the right place. You can utilize this guide to take you through the ways of employing social media as a marketing platform for your applications.

Below is the information you need:

Promote the App Before Launching

As briefly stated before, you can make the most of social media while the application is still under development. Do not wait for the application to be fully developed to start marketing it. As soon as you can, begin hyping up your app to get as many people waiting for it as possible. The Swift Life mobile application made excellent use of this strategy on its accounts on social media. This should be easy for existing companies because they already have their profiles up and have a number of followers. For apps that are just starting as a fresh business, the owners would need to start as soon as feasible.

The first stage is to develop a profile on every social media platform. That is, you should establish some presence on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Snapchat etcetera. Having accounts with more platforms will increase the likelihood of getting exposed to potential users. Once that is done, make an effort to attract as many followers as viable. Engage with them and give them the reason to follow you by offering them content that is not only interesting but informative. These discussions could be about things like what your app does, who your company is, and how the app will improve the users lives. This is the stepping stone for building a robust presence in social media. If you do all these, by the time you are launching your application, potential users will have a vivid picture of your application and brand and will be prepared to download and install the app.

Marketing on Facebook

Facebook is the crème de la crème of marketing as far as social media marketing is concerned. As such, it should be your first online marketing destination. This platform is this significant because it has more users than any other social media platform. Further, unlike the others, it allows one to post the largest array of content. You are permitted to post an infinite number of videos and photos, and the characters you can include on a post is not capped at any number.

Besides marketing through your profile, you even have the option of doing a sponsored campaign if you do not mind parting with a little more money to market your application. The good thing about sponsored posts on Facebook is that they ease the process of targeting the audience using parameters such as gender, age, and related demographics. Ads can also be targeted by location.

These data that should already be in your possession as it makes part of the market research that you should do before creating your app. Now, you only have to implement this information to the specifications of particular adverts to ensure that the promotion gets to certain audiences. To be concise, it is one hundred percent necessary to own a Facebook page for your app and company regardless of the nature of your sector.

Instagram Marketing

Instagram mainly just pictures. Even so, it is still an excellent tool for mobile marketing applications. What is more, Instagram is evolving; that is, now one can add a maximum of 10 photos per post. In addition, one can add videos that are at most one-minute long. If you have no desire to post daily on Instagram, there is the choice of engaging followers through the Instagram stories. Posts put on the Instagram story will stay on for 24 hours then clear. However, they will act as a steady reminder that your application exists. Recently, new features were added to the Instagram story. The additions allow you to use your story to take a poll; a feature that increases the level of engagement with the audience. That is among the reasons why this social media platform has the highest rate of engagement regarding seconds on the site compared to the rest.

Another way through which you can increase the level of engagement with the audience is to run contests. This strategy is a perfect way to get consumers excited about downloading and using your application. Specifically, you can try to get your followers to post images that promote your app and brand on their handles as a way of registering for the contest. Once they have done that, their followers – many of whom may not know about you – will learn about your brand and app. In this way, you stand a better chance of exposing your brand and expanding. Lastly, Instagram is an excellent way to reach younger audience.

Perfect the Art of Conveying Your Message in Just 280 Characters

Twitter requires you to exercise brevity while preparing promotional content owing to its 280-character limit. However, that does not make this platform any less valuable as a marketing tool.

It is paramount to ensure that your brand’s Twitter profile is active as this aids in increasing the number of downloads. Personally, I have a keen interest in using Twitter as an engaging platform to communicate with potential app users. For instance, assuming you have an app that relies on GPS technology to track cyclists. It provides them with information regarding the distance covered, their speed, elevation, how much calories they have burned and so on. Well, some ways exist via which you can utilize one of Twitter’s unique features – Twitter advanced search query – to easily connect with the potential end users of the app.

This tool is very useful, especially when searching for related keywords, trending topics (hashtags), accounts, and locations to link up with your soon-to-be consumers. In the case of the bicycle, application on the example above, you could use keywords such as "bike ride" and get to analyze the results. From the search results, narrow down to those that match your target market and tweet to them directly advising them on how to improve their riding experience by downloading your app. You can use this platform to reach out to as many people as possible and attach benefits to your app by explaining how it can solve their problems. It is obvious that this strategy involves some work and takes time, but it is an effective way to boost the number of downloads for your app.

Use Live Videos

Today, you can promote your app in various ways on multiple social platforms including through live videos. YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram, for instance, provide live streaming options through which you can engage with people.

Live video streams create a more genuine interaction with followers, and that has benefits like:

• Encouraging those who are thinking of getting your application to download it
• Enticing present users to keep using the app
• Boosting the likelihood of attracting more purchases through the app

With in-App Sharing

It is advisable to treat your application as an extended part of your accounts on social media. This strategy is applicable and effective irrespective of the type of app in question or the industry you are in. To achieve this, allow those using the app to connect with the rest then afford them the opportunity to share content from the app on their respective social media accounts. For this to be effective, you ought to have share icons that are easy to access and clearly visible within the app.

Most importantly, make sure that people using their social media accounts on their cellphones are able to share easily the content through the mobile platform. This method of advertising is easy and inexpensive since your users do all the work for you. You only need to give them the option then watch them do the rest for you.

Discover the Power of a YouTube Channel

In most cases, people overlook the influence of YouTube as a social media marketing tool. This misconception keeps them from enjoying the benefits that this platform has especially in reaching many potential app users. To say the least, any brand with no presence on YouTube is missing an enormous opportunity because most people view YouTube as the preferred mode for accessing video content. Look at it this way. Your future and present app clientele have an active YouTube presence, and some even make use of the YouTube mobile application.

One major advantage of using YouTube is that all the content can be repurposed easily. Once you make a video available on YouTube, there are various options at hand in relation to distribution. You can implant the video on the brand’s website or share a link on Twitter or Facebook page. In addition, you can share YouTube videos with individuals on your email subscription list or tease your Instagram followers with one-minute fragments of your YouTube videos.

Use Hashtags

Hashtags have gradually become an essential component to boost interaction and experience of social media. Getting your brand to be the topic of the day on these podiums is a vital way of increasing brand visibility and reaching more users. Hashtags are useful as they aid in encouraging user-generated content thereby boosting interactivity and sharing of relevant user-oriented information. With the growth in technology and social media advancement, running promotions on many online social platforms are feasible; thus, connecting with app users is relatively easy. Based on these campaigns, create hashtags and pick winners from all submissions made using those hashtags. Hashtags offer an excellent chance for one to create brand awareness especially if the hashtag trends globally, nationally, or even locally. Think of how many people who will interact with your content through a single click on your hashtag.

Utilize the Power of Social Influencers

It is a requirement for social media marketers to think outside the box in a bid to design more ways to promote your app. At this stage, getting to know some of the social influencers is important in reaching as many people as possible. It is essential to consider social influencers as a feasible alternative for app advertising owing to the huge following they command on their various social media accounts. Their audience is aware of their personalities and has built trust with their opinions.

Influencer marketing is arguably the fastest expanding mode of getting customers from various online platforms. In order to reap the benefits of social influencers, you need to keep abreast of the latest mobile trends. Several online platforms enable you to connect with the right influencers thus making it easier to engage directly with the vast audience that creates a market for your brand. One of the best tools that enables you to select an influencer based on various factors is Klear. The process starts by identifying your social network of choice than selecting which type of reach you're interested in putting into consideration the number of followers they have.

Connecting with celebrities who command millions of followers on respective platforms requires you to pay a considerable amount of cash in a bid to procure their services. However, it is preferable to engage many micro influencers as they have higher rates of engagement with their followers despite not having a huge following. Additionally, it cuts on the marketing budget. Then, upon reaching the right influencer, monitor each campaign's results. Following this, your brand awareness is built, and more people are encouraged to obtain your app.

Snapchat

As earlier noted, your target audience determines the platforms to use while marketing your app. As such, if younger users are the target users for your app, then you must consider Snapchat in your strategy to market on social media. Based on recent studies, at least 70% of people that use Snapchat are below 25 years. Unarguably, this factor needs to be put into consideration especially if you target the users in Generation Z or Millennials. On the other hand, if your software is intended for older people maybe in their fifties, then, Snapchat may not be an effective platform for marketing.

Conclusion

Creating an app is just one thing; successfully marketing it is another. Social media is among the most endorsed ways to get to your prospective clients with ease. Nonetheless, do not underestimate the need to get actively and strongly present on as many online social podiums as feasible. Explore the power of YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. Tools such as hashtags and the advanced search provision on Twitter make work even easier. Promote your application using livestreams. In some cases, you may regularly make use of Snapchat depending on your intended audience. All these platforms will be very effective in delivering results.