Facebook vs MailChimp

How Do You Communicate With Your Customers?

Whether you’re excited or dreading the coming of the silly season, most businesses will be winding up for the summer break. 
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For many Christchurch businesses, this involves a change in opening hours. Perhaps you’re taking more time off than the stat days? Maybe you have a summer special or message you want to promote to your customers. What’s the best way of doing this?

Facebook

Social media is fantastic for communicating with your customers. You can let them know about your business’ holiday opening hours, any summer deals, and thank them for their loyalty over the past year.

A word of advice when using Facebook. Even if a customer has “Liked” your Facebook page, it doesn’t guarantee they will see your post. As there is nothing to stop a business owner posting upwards of fifty times a day to Facebook and spamming people, Facebook itself regulates how much of your content your customers see. Sneaky right?
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Plus, not all of your customers log on to Facebook at the same time. Some will be more active than others, and not everyone is social media savvy. 

When deciding which of your posts your followers will see, Facebook prioritises shorter updates over long, rambling ones. Ideally, you would write a post about your Christchurch business’ holiday opening hours. Later, another one about your big summer promotion. Another one wishing people a happy Christmas and thanking them for their business in 2016.

​For maximum coverage and to ensure your message reaches more people you may consider paid Facebook advertising, boosting your post’s reach. Or, you may write and schedule multiple Facebook posts on the same topic, providing a couple of reminders over the course of a month so more people know what you’re up to.
There are other ways to let people know what’s happening with your business over Summer.

E-Newsletter

Social media doesn’t exist in vacuum. In fact, it works best when cooperating with your other marketing efforts.
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Do you keep records of your customer’s contact details? If not, it’s a good idea to start! With an e-newsletter, you save on the printing, stationery and postage costs of traditional newsletter efforts. 

MailChimp is a highly efficient and easy to use e-newsletter service. It’s free to sign up, and if you have fewer than 2000 subscribers, you can send up to 12,000 emails a month for free.

MailChimp also has fancy features, helping you become more efficient and get the most out of your e-newsletter campaign. How many people opened it? How many clicked a link to your website? How many people took action on your summer special? MailChimp allows your business to track those metrics so you can make each e-newsletter campaign better than the last.

In one MailChimp Newsletter you can include all the information you want to pass on to your customers, so you don’t need to worry about multiple posts. Unless your e-newsletter gets blocked by a spam filter, it will be sitting in their inbox the next time they log on.

Now, this shouldn’t become an argument between MailChimp versus Facebook. One is not better than the other, and each serve a very different purpose. The point is, between a coordinated Facebook campaign and a MailChimp e-newsletter you can maximise your business’ reach and inform your customers.
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Got some ideas? Want to know more about social media and MailChimp marketing? Contact Inform PR for a free coffee and chat about your Christchurch business’ marketing needs so you can have peace of mind heading into the holidays.

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