Using Social Media to Build Your Business Connections and Connect with Your Audience

Social media has become an essential tool for businesses looking to grow their network and strengthen relationships with their audience. For small businesses, in particular, social media offers a cost-effective platform to build meaningful connections, enhance brand awareness, and ultimately drive sales. 

It removes traditional barriers of geography and budget, allowing small businesses to compete on a more equal footing with larger companies. By actively building a network online, small businesses can access new customers, gain valuable feedback, and create partnerships that would be difficult to establish otherwise. It’s not just about selling — it’s about creating lasting relationships that support long-term growth.

So how you can use social media strategically to connect with your audience and turn those connections into business relationships? And how to you use social media to meet your business goals?

Let’s take a look!

How Social Media Helps You Meet Your Business Goals

Social media is not just about visibility; it’s a powerful way to achieve your specific business objectives. Whether your goal is to increase brand awareness, drive traffic to your website, generate leads, or improve customer service, a well-planned social media strategy aligns your activities with these goals. By leveraging tools like targeted ads, influencer partnerships, and direct engagement, you can create measurable outcomes that contribute directly to your business growth. Platforms offer built-in analytics so you can test different content, track performance, and refine your approach to optimise results over time.

All these should be part of your overall marketing strategy that includes social media. Your social media strategy needs to support your marketing strategy and include how you use social media build and develop your network that you can then covert to business.

5 ways to Enhance Your Social Media Strategy

Share Valuable and Relevant Content

Consistently posting content that resonates with your target audience establishes your business as a trusted source. This could be tips, industry news, how-to guides, or behind-the-scenes looks at your business. Content that solves problems or entertains encourages followers to engage and share. Consistency doesn’t mean a posting schedule; it also means consistency in messaging. 

Use Storytelling to Humanise Your Brand

People connect with stories more than facts. Share your journey, customer testimonials, or challenges you’ve overcome. This builds emotional connections and makes your brand relatable. People buy from people so putting your customer at the centre of your strategy and you at the heart of your brand will help build that connection. 

Engage Actively with Your Followers

Reply to comments, answer questions, and like or share user-generated content. Active engagement shows you value your audience and encourages more interaction. It also builds relationships that are easier to move to DM’s, InMail’s and in person meetings.

Collaborate with Influencers and Industry Peers

Partnering with influencers or other businesses can expand your reach and introduce your brand to new audiences. Choose partners whose followers align with your target market. Consider webinars, collaboration posts and joint projects to further develop your offering and increase your social media reach. 

Run Interactive Campaigns and Contests

Interactive content such as polls and quizzes, encourages participation and increases visibility. It also gives you insights into your audience’s preferences. Use them to research a new offering, product launch or even point of view. 

Once you have included above in your social media strategy, you need to develop those connections to ensure that you also build an engaged audience that can be developed into a business relationship. 

Building a Commenting Strategy to Develop Business Relationships

A commenting strategy is vital for turning casual followers into meaningful business connections. No one likes to be ignored, so think of people commenting as starting a conversation. It is your opportunity to make a person feel welcome and noticed. And it works both ways. You can use commenting to start a conversation with a potential customer and show them you are interested in their product or service.

Think about the following:

• Be Genuine and Personal: When commenting on posts within your industry or your followers’ updates, add thoughtful insights or questions. Avoid generic phrases like “Great post!” Instead, explain what you found valuable.
• Focus on Building Rapport: Use comments to start conversations rather than just promote your business. Show interest in others’ work and experiences.
• Respond Promptly: Always reply to comments on your own posts to keep the dialogue going.
• Track Key Contacts: Identify important potential clients, partners, or influencers and regularly engage with their content.
• Balance Promotion with Value: Offer useful tips or resources in comments where appropriate instead of overt selling.

There is of course more to using social media commenting strategies, but the important thing is to start. In the next blog, we will take a look at different strategies and tools to help you manage your commenting on social media platforms.

Using social media thoughtfully can transform how you connect with your audience and develop business relationships that matter. Start small, be consistent, and focus on genuine interactions — your network will grow naturally over time.

Checklist: How to Build Business Connections on Social Media

• Define clear business goals for your social media presence 
• Identify and understand your target audience 
• Choose the right social media platforms for your business 
• Create and share valuable, relevant content regularly 
• Humanise your brand with authentic storytelling 
• Engage actively by responding to comments and messages 
• Develop a commenting strategy that fosters real conversations 
• Collaborate with influencers and complementary brands 
• Run interactive campaigns such as quizzes or polls 
• Monitor social media analytics and adjust your strategy accordingly 
• Be consistent but flexible to adapt to trends and audience feedback 
• Use social media tools to schedule posts and track engagement

Struggling with your social media? Why not book a call to see how we can help!