7 ways to amplify your DTC e-commerce brand on social media
Building an incredible social media presence doesn’t have to be overwhelming. These seven tips help you engage current and future customers through social media marketing and effectively promote your business to drive sales.
1. Choose the right platforms
Customers expect to connect with brands on their terms, through the platforms they know, love, and use every day.
DTC brands need to build an engaging presence on social media channels where their current and future buyers spend time. According to research, social media users use an average of seven platforms every month.
“Meet them where they are, find out where they are, and meet them there. Speak their language naturally. Make sure you have the right people in-house on your team,” Mari says.
The first step to choosing the right platform in social media marketing is gaining a deep understanding of your customers. Zero in on who they are, what they want, and why they love your product. Use data and customer insights to learn about the journey they take between learning about your brand and buying from you—which almost always includes social media touchpoints.
Then, consider their demographics. Which social media platforms do they spend their days scrolling? Meet them there.
The strongest brands build community through their social media channels, so be sure to go where you can most naturally gather your customers.
2. Strategize your content and add value
Social media marketing is the perfect strategy to show your personality as a brand.
Are you funny and playful? Suave and chic? Value-based and deeply ethical? Convey that through your posts. Showing your personality through content is a way to help potential customers see that you’re a brand they want to align themselves with. As a result, they’ll see that purchasing from you brings them closer to who and how they want to be.
Each time you create content, start with a purpose. Every post should add value beyond just promoting your product. Are you informing, entertaining, or inspiring users?
Offering actionable resources in your niche can turn passive scrollers into followers, fans, and customers. King Arthur Baking Company sells a variety of baking products. But they’ve built a loyal audience on Instagram by providing reliable recipes, baking tips, and easy-to-follow videos that help viewers bake better.
Another guiding principle to help you create content strategically is focusing on engaging social media users in a conversation. Ask questions and inspire conversations through your content. When users respond, you should like, reply, and even reshare their participation—like how ice cream brand Jeni’s shares its customers’ responses to their unique flavor announcements. Showing that you’re approachable tells customers your brand cares about connecting with them, which leads to long-term loyalty.
At the same time, ensure that you don’t do something that’s not a part of your brand’s personality.
“As a business owner, if you're like, oh, well, everybody's doing these crazy dances and lip-syncing—let's do that. But let's say it completely doesn't suit your personality, or it's off-brand. You're going to end up not really resonating,” Mari says. “People are going to be like, what's that brand doing? It doesn't feel like them. So do your best to stay on brand and relate to your audience as real people.”
3. Use social on a schedule
While it may be tempting to create posts when inspiration strikes, that approach often leads to haphazard, low-quality content that won’t connect with your audience.
With the marketplace—and social media feeds—more crowded than ever, consistency is key. With social media marketing, you need to communicate your message and promote your brand over and over to have a chance of capturing customers’ attention.
Setting a schedule lets you strategically map out content to align with product launches and new campaigns. But be sure to leave flexibility to adjust as needed to trends or unanticipated topics that will spark conversation among your customers.
It also ensures that you engage your audience regularly. Once you set the rhythm, buyers will start looking forward to that particular type of content from you according to schedule.
Conflict-free DTC jewelry brand Brilliant Earth delights its 777,000 Instagram followers with daily planned posts. They also respond to timely trends by using relevant, popular sounds in reels to increase engagement and reach.
Over time, a combination of consistency and timely creativity will help you achieve trackable progress toward short-term and long-term social media goals.
4. Address problems quickly
Responding to dissatisfied, disappointed, or disgruntled customers is just as much a part of your social media brand as anything else you post or comment.
Whether someone comments negatively on your post or tags you in a complaint about your product, be sure to respond as soon as possible to show your concern -- show your audience that you're using social media for something beyond social media marketing.
Acknowledge the issue and, if appropriate, apologize—particularly if they purchased something with you and they’re upset with the quality or have a problem with the order. Go above and beyond to offer them something in return, whether a smooth exchange or return experience or a discount on a future order.
Make sure they know you value the relationship with them and show your commitment to making things right as quickly as you can. Want to see this in action? Beyond connecting in a playful brand voice to its 2.1 million Twitter followers, Southwest Airlines excels at responding to customer issues. Their replies to frustrated customers demonstrate care, acknowledge issues, and answer concerns. This is a great way to deliver a personalized experience—something that is crucial for maintaining brand loyalty.
5. Use data to deliver a personalized experience
Creating a personalized experience across channels should be a priority for all DTC brands. A great way to do this is by running targeted social media marketing campaigns across platforms, such as Instagram and Facebook.
Mari Smith recommends leaning into the trends by using short and long-form video posts—Meta, in particular, is betting big on video in order to compete with the popularity of TikTok and YouTube.
Supplement these video campaigns with personalized conversations across apps that your audience uses to communicate regularly, such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, or Email, to create an even more personalized experience.
Social media offers a wealth of information about your audience through rich data about your customers and followers. The more of this data you collect, the more segmented and individualized experiences you can offer. Freshmarketer offers 360 insights into your audience for a complete picture of their journey and engagement with your brand. It has all the tools you need to collect relevant audience data and create tailor-made campaigns that convert.
6. Link arms with influencers
Influencer-led social media marketing campaigns help DTC brands connect with customers via accounts they already follow and admire. Through paid partnerships, these social media accounts with high follower counts can quickly spread the word to large audiences.
Because they often have a highly defined personality or niche, an influencer’s vote of confidence speaks volumes about your product. Their shoutout to your product increases awareness and can quickly bring new traffic and followers to your social media accounts.
When new customers are introduced to your brand by an influencer they know, they feel more of a connection to you than if they encountered your ad or sponsored post without context. That connection can make people more likely to purchase and become loyal customers.
For instance, luxury bedding brand Brooklinen works with home decor influencers on Instagram to amplify its reach in a more trusted way.
7. Share user-generated content
User-generated content (UGC) is the kind of good press money can’t buy.
UGC is the result of delighted customers who love your product and organically tell your friends and followers about it through a positive review, unboxing, or shoutout. Unsponsored and unprompted, UGC is social media gold for DTC brands.
What’s more, UGC is real and relatable—it shows your customers that people just like them (without a huge following) vouch for your product. In fact, they like it so much that they took the time to share it on their social media accounts. Their shoutout spreads the word to their friends and family, people they know and trust, meaning potential customers will be even more receptive to the recommendation.
“I love to see good, solid, genuine product reviews where you can tell somebody is doing an unboxing and reviewing and trying something on,” Mari says.
With all of those wins in mind, be sure to like, comment, and share when UGC comes your way. Like responding to customer problems, this shows your brand is approachable and personable. Engaging UGC has been a major win for travel brand Away, which has amassed a following of almost 600,000.
In addition to making your brand look good and promoting your product in a high-trust way, UGC is a time-saving addition to your content calendar, giving you quotes and quick shares that fit with your brand.
Build your brand with social media