When you're thinking about creating a social media strategy for your business, a few leading platforms probably come up to mind correct away: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and mayhap YouTube or Pinterest, depending on your industry.

However, in that location are many types of social media sites out at that place, with new platforms and formats popping up on the regular. Some of them are pretty niche, while others have the potential to get the next Instagram or TikTok.

One thing that's inverse since the early days of social media is that many platforms used to focus on one office, such as social networking or image sharing. At present, most established social media platforms accept expanded to incorporate live streaming, augmented reality, shopping, social audio, and more.

So, instead of giving you lot high level descriptions of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn (you tin can notice that anywhere!), we grouped a broad variety of platforms into nine general categories that focus on specific use cases and what businesses tin can achieve by using them.

Bonus: Read the footstep-by-step social media strategy guide with pro tips on how to abound your social media presence.

With the always-growing number of social media platforms, information technology can be overwhelming to constantly wonder whether each of them is worth your time.

To avoid spending likewise much of your time learning the ropes of every new platform, let your social media marketing strategy guide your decisions, and just bring together the networks that support your goals.

Follow these three tips to build your own criteria that will help you lot evaluate any new social media platform, no affair what information technology is or how it works.

Know your audience

The first question you should ask before joining a new social media platform is: where is your audition?

It makes more sense to go where your audition is already hanging out than to join a new platform and attract your audience to information technology.

The second matter to understand is how your audience is using that platform. What blazon of content are they looking for? Which types of accounts do they follow? Are they passive consumers or content creators?

For detailed insights into how people use different social media platforms, swoop into our State of Digital 2021 study.

Facebook leads on use of social platforms as news source

Source: Digital 2021 report

Go on upward to date with social media statistics

Whenever a new social media platform emerges, it's essential to know the difference between a shiny new object and a fast-growing platform that has the potential to stick.

Although no one tin tell the future, one style to know if a platform has staying power is to compare its statistics to established social media platforms.

If you're not sure where to find contempo stats, nosotros've got y'all covered:

  • Instagram Statistics
  • Facebook Statistics
  • Twitter Statistics
  • YouTube Statistics
  • Pinterest Statistics
  • TikTok Statistics

Align to your key business goals

Enquire yourself: which platforms match my business goals best?

For example, if one of your goals is to increase awareness nigh a new production or service that could do good from video tutorials, you should focus on video-just platforms (like YouTube and Vimeo) or video formats bachelor on the sites you're already active on (like Instagram Stories and Reels, Facebook Alive, etc.).

Types of social media platforms and formats you should know in 2021

1. Social sound platforms and formats

Examples: Clubhouse, Twitter Spaces, Spotify

Used for: Listening to live conversations on specific topics.

How your business can use them: New social audio platforms (like Clubhouse) and formats (like Twitter Spaces) accept thrived during COVID-nineteen lockdowns while people have been at home with more than fourth dimension to join live conversations.

The most significant reward of audio social media platforms and formats is the high attending and engagement you lot're likely to get from opt-in listeners.

Lively, engaging conversations can aid you lot build your image as a leader in your niche and innovate your concern or products to valuable audiences already interested in topics related to your niche (otherwise, they wouldn't exist tuning in).

Here are some thought starters for using sound social media platforms:

  • Host manufacture panels.
  • Circulate news and big announcements.
  • Host interactive sessions (such as AMAs) with your audience.
  • Record interviews during a live Clubhouse/Twitter Spaces chat and upload them every bit a podcast (example: The Social Media Geekout bear witness).
  • Build your business concern' thought leadership through a 30-sixty minute evidence.

Matt Navarra does a great job of combining Twitter Spaces AND podcasts:

2. Video social media platforms and formats

Examples: YouTube, TikTok, Instagram Stories and Reels, Facebook Watch

Used for: Watching videos in short and long formats.

How your business tin can use them: Video social media platforms are great for capturing attention, driving make awareness, and bringing products to life in a way that withal photos can't.

Whatever video content that you publish should be designed to entertain, educate, and/or inspire your audience. Videos made purely to sell aren't going to engage viewers.

Some of the all-time examples of businesses using video social media platforms are:

  • Ryanair on TikTok — highly entertaining, show a good understanding of the humor and nuances of TikTok users.
  • Notion on YouTube — creates educational content that'due south both helpful and inspiring for its users.
  • Beautiful Destinations on Instagram Reels — provides travel inspiration through short, professionally shot clips.

3. Disappearing content formats

Examples: Snapchat, Instagram Stories, Facebook Stories, LinkedIn Stories

Used for: Sending imperceptible messages privately and publishing timely, in-the-moment content for all of your followers to view for upwardly to 24 hours.

How your business concern tin can utilise them: Ephemeral formats like Stories are well-suited for posting timely content, such every bit announcements, limited edition items, or alive events.

Almost Stories and Snapchat content besides feels more genuine and less polished due to the 24-hour shelf life. As such, it allows businesses to bear witness a more than man side.

Here are some ideas for how your business organization tin can use disappearing content:

  • Polls, voting (using interactive Stories stickers)
  • Teasers/countdowns to product launches
  • Backside-the-scenes content
  • Time-sensitive announcements

A groovy case is from one of my favorite local bakers, who posts their weekly specials on their Instagram Stories.

Instagram Story screenshots showcasing bakery's daily menu

Source: Instagram

iv. Discussion forums

Examples: Reddit, Quora

Used for: Asking and answering questions, networking, forming communities around niche- and involvement-based topics.

How your business can utilize them: Exist genuinely helpful to your customers by lending your business' subject matter expertise and answering questions related to your manufacture. Bonus points if you tin share data virtually your brand and products in your answers, but that shouldn't be your chief goal of participating in discussion forums.

One thing to note: On Reddit, information technology's highly frowned upon to insert any self-promotion into answers. If y'all're posting every bit a business concern, make sure to respond the original question and only add together links to your products if they're genuinely helpful. Earlier posting in a subreddit, check the rules to verify if including links to your own business is allowed.

While Microsoft didn't create the /r/XboxOne subreddit, in one case they saw how pop it was, they started engaging with Redditors past hosting AMA sessions with game developers.

/r/XboxOne subreddit

Source: Reddit

5. Shoppable social media platforms and features

Examples: Pinterest Production Pins, Facebook Shops, Instagram Shops, TikTok, Shopify, Douyin, Taobao

Used for: Researching and purchasing products from brands direct through social media platforms.

How your business organization can use them: Take advantage of born mobile-friendly features to let your audition to purchase from y'all without having to leave a social media app.

Features like Pinterest Product Pins, Instagram Shops, and TikTok'due south in-app shopping allow you to connect your product catalog straight to your profile on each app.

Even if your followers don't like to make purchases on social media platforms or have longer buyer journeys, shopping features tin can allow you to tag products, add boosted product info and drive traffic to your website.

Some great ways to utilize shopping social media platforms:

  • Limited edition drops, eastward.chiliad., announcing an sectional product launch on social media and linking or tagging the product via your product catalog
  • Social selling
  • E-commerce (many social media platforms have east-commerce integrations, such equally Shopify, which you can access directly from your Hootsuite dashboard)
  • Retargeting, eastward.g., creating custom audiences based on who has engaged with your Facebook/Instagram Shops

Y'all tin can also host live shopping events on social media. Livestream shopping has become a huge marketplace in China, encouraging platforms like Instagram to introduce Live Shopping.

Instagram Live shopping

Source: Instagram

vi. Social media live streams

Examples: Twitch, YouTube, Instagram Live Rooms, Facebook Live, TikTok

Used for: Broadcasting live video to many viewers. Live video streams can range from i person showing themselves and what they're doing on their screen to professionally organized panels with multiple speakers.

How your concern tin can apply them: Livestreaming's popularity exploded during the pandemic when people were stuck at dwelling house during lockdowns with nothing to do.

Nevertheless, you don't need a global pandemic to get viewers to picket your live streams. There are many ways to make tune-in-worthy streams, from interviewing well-known guests through doing exclusive product reveals to hosting AMA sessions with your business executives.

Livestreams besides offer the opportunity for users to interact alive with the hosts, so it's vital to monitor and engage with comments during the stream. Read more tips in our guide to social media live streaming.

When COVID-xix put Formula i races on hold during 2020, several drivers started streaming themselves playing driving simulators on Twitch, which became hugely popular with fans.

vii. Business social media platforms

Examples: LinkedIn, Twitter

Used for: Connecting with professionals in your industry or potential clients.

How your business can use them: Business organization social media platforms offer many potential uses: recruiting and hiring talent, edifice B2B relationships, and connecting with professionals in your niche.

Platforms like LinkedIn are ideal for B2B purposes, considering they allow brands to connect with new audiences, meeting them where they go to network and exercise business.

But LinkedIn is not the only business organization-frontward social media site out there. Twitter offers businesses the chance to observe relevant conversations, and add to them in meaningful ways. A bang-up instance of this is Adweek, which hosts a weekly conversation for digital marketers called #AdweekChat.

There are as well communities congenital around industry-specific hashtags on Twitter, like #MarketingTwitter and #FreelanceTwitter.

Pro tip: Fix upward a keyword-based cavalcade using your industry's hashtag in Hootsuite to monitor for advisable conversations to participate in.

8. Closed/private community social media platforms

Examples: Discourse, Slack, Facebook Groups

Used for: Creating communities, with the possibility of requiring registration or other screening measures for new members.

How your business tin can utilize them: Businesses can use private groups to bring members of their customs together to bond over shared challenges, help answer each other's questions, and feel a sense of professional belonging.

As the group admin, your business concern has the right to fix rules about things like cocky-promotion. Many groups (particularly on Facebook) require members to answer a few questions before joining to screen out spammers, but you can as well use these fields to inquire members to opt-in to your e-mail marketing list.

A great instance is the Instant Pot Facebook Group, started by the brand in 2015 and has grown to over 3 million members who love sharing recipes and production tips.

Instant Pot Facebook Group

Source: Facebook

nine. Inspirational social media platforms

Examples: Pinterest, YouTube, Instagram, blogs

Used for: Searching for information and finding inspiration for anything from cooking to travel to decorating to shopping and more.

How your business concern can use them: Curate visuals and inspire your target audience with content tailored to their preferences, and weave in your ain products where relevant. Use collections, playlists, tags, and guides to group your content and create themes that match your audience'southward interests.

Inspirational social media platforms like Pinterest and YouTube are well-optimized for search, which ways your posts should include keywords, hashtags, and images that marshal with what your audience unremarkably searches for.

Travel bloggers oftentimes do a slap-up job of optimizing their blog posts and YouTube videos for searches similar "What to practise in [Destination]" and "[Destination] Travel Guide."

Hungry Passport YouTube travel guide

Source: Hungry Passport on YouTube

Whether you're edifice a community or evaluating new platforms for your business to join, there are many types of social media you can use. Some are pretty much mandatory for any business, while others only make sense if they align with your specific niches or use cases.

Whatever your needs and goals, it's a rubber bet y'all'll detect a way to use social media to benefit your business.

Easily manage all your social media profiles using Hootsuite. From a single dashboard, you can schedule and publish posts, engage your followers, monitor relevant conversations, measure out results, manage your ads, and much more than.

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