Mobile phones are extremely popular devices these days. There are over 7 billion mobile phones in the world today. Mobile application usage was up 58 percent in 2015. Eighty percent of smartphone owners use their phones to access the internet. In developing markets, mobiles are often the only way to access the internet. It seems unlikely this proliferation will end anytime soon.
These statistics show that with so many people using mobile phones, the best place to market your business has become on-screen on the internet. Using mobile apps, especially Facebook, can boost your business’ potential.
When it comes to mobile marketing, it’s Facebook first
One of the most popular social media platforms to use to promote your business is Facebook. As of April 2016, there are over 1.65 billion active Facebook users. This is a 15 percent increase from 2015. At the end of 2015, over 50 million businesses had joined Facebook. There are businesses on the site promoting everything from restaurants and retail stores to law firms and doctors offices.
As a dentist, Facebook can be beneficial to your practice because patients can interact with the practice through its Facebook page. They can communicate by messaging privately or by making a comment on the practice’s comment page. Most importantly, people can leave reviews of your business, which increase your social capital and can help you to identify and target users who match your happiest customers.
The Facebook’s main pages for companies highlight what the turnaround time for a response is with each company, so it’s important to monitor your feeds. It will list if a business responds promptly or does not typically respond at all. There is also an area that lists business hours in real-time. For instance, if your office closes at 4pm and the customer visits the page at 3:30pm, it will show that the office will be closing in 30 minutes. If the office is closed, there will be a red highlight letting page visitors know that the business is closed.
The other top apps for mobile marketing
Other social media platforms that are growing in popularity are Twitter and Snapchat. Twitter has 310 million monthly active users with 83 percent of their users being mobile users. Instagram (owned by Facebook), tops half a billion users daily. As a result, there is a social platform for every market.
Snapchat is a platform that is particularly popular with millennials. It is the fastest growing social media platform with over 100 million active users. It is used by the 13-24 demographic the most, with 77 percent of users being college students, so many companies are starting to think about how to use it to reach a younger audience. Snapchat is a good app for engaging with younger patients and getting the college age demographic as they start to choose health care providers of their own for the first time. It’s also a great opportunity to educate people about what you do.
Using social media has many benefits for businesses, such as helping to build a customer base and helping businesses interact with their customers and patients. Starting is simple. Choose a platform that works best for your company. Make sure the content is updated regularly, and respond to customer inquiries and comments in a timely manner to make social media work for you.
