Social Networks: Our Complete Guide for your E-commerce

ProServiceAppeal

• July 25, 2022

With the emergence of new buying habits, using social networks to sell is proving to be an effective solution. For a company, it is now impossible to ignore social networks in their communication strategy, these social networks are even vital for some companies. Indeed, 87% of buyers are influenced on social networks for the decision of a purchase.

To help you in your social media strategy and in the development of your E-Commerce, we have produced a Guide to Social Networks . This guide is taken from our E-Commerce training . Find all the infographics, key figures, the different image and video formats to use as well as many tips.

With TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest… the list of social networks is big. However, in order to be able to take full advantage of the potential of social networks and optimize your chances of success, it is necessary to properly target each social network, because not all of them are suitable for your business. This will depend on several factors such as your activity, your objectives, your target or the content you want to share.

In this article, we have made a list of the most popular social networks in France and we are going to give you all the figures, all the keys to choosing and using the social networks best suited to your activity!

Why use social networks to sell?

With no less than 80% of the USA population present on social networks , these have become a necessity to be visible. Indeed, among these users are probably hiding some of your customers and future customers. Social networks have clearly changed the way consumers will interact with your brand, discover your products, and make purchasing decisions.

Social selling

Social selling is an approach that consists of using social networks in the sales process in order to develop your business. The objective is to detect users who correspond to your target (buyers persona) and convert them into potential customers. It is a process of research, selection, interaction with potential prospects via social networks like greatsmm.pro.

This is why we observe more and more “e-commerce” functionalities on the various social media. It is now possible to promote and sell your products directly through features and advertising. There is almost no border between e-commerce sites and social networks.

Be visible on social networks

Social networks offer you the opportunity to make yourself seen by the general public, to make your brand known, it is a very good way to improve your notoriety. This is an opportunity to highlight your products and also to seek out new customers. If you share the right content on social media, at the right time, on the right platform, you’ll have every chance of reaching them.

In addition, it is an excellent channel for improving your referencing and the traffic of your e-commerce, the more people talk about you on social networks, the more you are visible, the more your Internet users will share your content and the more the possibility of reaching new customers will be great.

Be closer to your customers thanks to social networks

Social networks are one of the best tools to allow you to get closer to your customers and your prospects thanks to their targeting.

You will be able to get in touch with them directly, answering their questions, thanking them for their interest in your company or even keeping them informed of your news. In addition, through the various feedback from your customers, you will have the ability to improve your products or services. Social networks are a mine of information for monitoring and knowing the needs of consumers in your sector of activity.

Social networks are also the possibility of federating a community which will be able to meet your expectations in terms of purchases, feedback, but above all which can act as a group of ambassadors for your brand.

List of the main social networks

The list of social networks is vast, but before launching headlong and registering on each of them, you must know on which social networks your target is. Here are the most popular and most used social networks in France:

Facebook, the leader of social networks

Facebook remains the number 1 social network in France. The Facebook group, recently renamed Meta, has more than 40 million monthly active users. It is the reference social network in France and particularly suitable for BtoC. 91% of top e-commerce companies have a Facebook page.

Messenger, also part of Facebook, also attracts a large audience, with more than 33 million unique visitors each month in France. There are 40 million businesses that use Facebook Messenger for their business.

Hearing

Facebook has many users, resulting in a plurality of profiles that can be found on the social network. Thus, all categories of people are represented, the average age of users is 25-34 years old. Even if we notice an aging of the Facebook population, 60% of daily Facebook users are in the 25-49 age group. The distribution of men and women on the platform is almost equal with 51% women and 49% men (Digimind).

Goals

• Build a community and retain it;
• Deploy an additional online sales channel, which can meet the usage or consumption habits of some of your prospects;
• Generate traffic on your e-commerce site;
• Promote your products and develop your online sales;
• Set up targeted and attractive marketing campaigns with advertising.

Tools

• Facebook Ads : a promotional tool that allows you to precisely target Internet users. You can, for example, target them by gender, age, location, center of interest, etc.
• Facebook Shops : an e-commerce platform that allows businesses to easily sell their products on Facebook.
• FacebookInsight : a tool for all administrators of your company’s page. It allows you to analyze your audience through numerous statistics on publications and engagement.
• facebook pixel : Analytics tool that lets you measure the effectiveness of your advertising by tracking the actions people take on your website.
• Facebook IQ : tool offered by the platform, allowing you to obtain data and analyzes on consumer behavior, and marketing advice that you can apply on the network.

Tips

• Publish visual content (videos and images), these are the types of content that are shared the most.
• Bet on publications that encourage the reaction of Internet users with short messages and humor.
• Use Facebook Ads online advertising to be visible.
• Use Facebook Live to interact directly with your community.

Instagram, photography on social networks

Instagram, created in 2010 and acquired by Facebook in 2012, has become one of the most popular social networks among young people. The mobile platform has 22 million active users per month in France. You should know that Instagram is very interesting for e-commerce since it is possible to sell your products directly there. That’s why 81% of respondents use Instagram to discover products and services.

Hearing

Instagram’s population is quite young, 81% of active users on Instagram are between 16 and 25 years old. Among all USA users, 54% of users are women and 46% are men.

You should know that 90% of users follow brands . Want to know more about your audience on this network? Find 10 tips to find and attract your target audience on Instagram.

Goals

• Highlight your business and your visual identity
• Reach a young audience.
• Promote their products.
• Get closer to your community.
• Do influencer marketing

Tools

• Instagram Shopping : tool that allows you to add a product link directly to your photos (Instagram advertising being managed from Facebook, you must first upload your catalog to Facebook, and Instagram will import it).
• Instagram Business : Linked to your Facebook account, this tool allows you to advertise on Instagram. There are 2 types of ads on Instagram: in post format (either image or video) or in story format. Important clarification: to be able to add links in your publications, you must have 10,000 followers.
• Favikon : tool for targeting, evaluating and contacting influencers
• Mojo : tool that allows you to create creative stories to differentiate yourself.
• InShot : mobile software that allows you to easily edit your videos.

Tips

• Put your products in situation.
• Have a fairly strong visual identity (with quality photos).
• Demonstrate authenticity and spontaneity, using stories or Instagram Lives.
• Use relevant and popular hashtags to be more easily found (bet on the quality of hashtags and not on the quantity).
• Make contests
• Communicate through influencers.

Twitter, the news network

Twitter is the social network for real-time information and micro-blogging in a maximum of 280 characters. 52% of users aged 18 to 30 believe that Twitter is the number 1 social network for information (20 minutes, Opinion Way). The platform has 12.8 million monthly active users in France, among all these active users, 40% go there almost every day.

It’s a social network built on exchange, about 6,000 tweets are sent every second and you should know that 62% of USA tweeters come to chat directly with brands on Twitter.

Hearing

On this network, the age groups 25-34 (25%) and 35-44 (24%) are the most represented. Among these users, 60% are men, and 40% are women. This social network is especially adapted to the mobile.

Goals

• Monitor and control your e-reputation.
• Share content, news and show expertise.
• Get closer and interact with your community.
• Improve its visibility and take advantage of the virality of the network.
• Improve its brand image.

Tools

• Twitter for business : tool that allows you to create and distribute your advertising campaigns on Twitter.
• Tweetdeck : online tool that allows you to manage and consult several elements of your twitter account.
• Buffer : tool that allows you to schedule your tweets and publish them at the most efficient time of day.
• Audiense Connect : tool that allows you to create your own personalized chatbot to interact with your followers via Twitter by automatically using direct messages.
• Talkwalker : social network monitoring and analysis tool. The tool will allow you to control your e-reputation.

Tips

• Twitter can be used as additional customer support.
• Use popular hashtags to be more visible.
• Go to the essential, you have only 280 characters.
• Use visual content (image, gif and video) to stand out.
• Platform that requires publication frequency.
• Understand the Twitter language and its humor.
• Do not make commercial publications

LinkedIn, the professional platform

With 10.7 million monthly active users in France, it is the social network 100% dedicated to professionals, therefore to BtoB. Indeed, LinkedIn is the most used social network (84.8%) by BtoB decision-makers in France.

In total, the professional network has more than 23 million members in France and is used by 840,000 companies.

Hearing

More than half of LinkedIn users in France (54.7%) are between 25 and 34 years old. According to Digimind, 52.6% of Linkedin users in France are men, 47.4% women.

Goals

• Prospecting and developing your network.
• Developing personal branding and employee advocacy
• Promote its activity and show its expertise.
• Increase the visibility of your business.
• Share the life of the company and highlight its team.
• Monitoring and exchanging
• Recruit

Tools

• LinkedIn Sales Navigator : online prospecting tool that allows you to quickly find the most interesting prospects.
• Campaign Manager : tool that provides 5 types of advertisements ranging from Text Ads to sponsored content.
• Waalaxy : tool that automates prospecting on LinkedIn.
• Shield : monitoring and analysis tool that will provide you with complete analytics for your LinkedIn account.

Tips

• Use hashtags in your publications (between 3 and 5 maximum) depending on your target and the interests of your community.
• Use visual content (image, video and pdf) to stand out.
• Build your posts to generate engagement and comments.
• Take care of your catchphrases (first 3 lines) to attract attention
• Identify the people involved in your publication, this will allow you to obtain additional reach.
• Have a good frequency (several posts per week).

Also read: How to view archived orders on Amazon?

Pinterest, pins at the service of social networks

Pinterest is still quite underestimated in France, yet it is a very interesting social network for e-commerce, with many features. In fact, 55% of subscribers use Pinterest to make purchases. This platform can offer great visibility to your products, particularly with regard to fashion, beauty, gastronomy, decoration, or even tourism. Pinterest has 10 million active Internet users per month in France.

Hearing

Women are much more present than men on Pinterest. Indeed, these represent 60% of users of the social network. The majority of Pinterest users are in their 40s, 35% of Pinterest users are between 35 and 49 years old.

Goals

• Drive traffic to your website and improve your SEO.
• Give visibility and highlight your products with quality visuals;
• Target a female clientele;
• Take advantage of the very strong retention time;
• Sell ​​thanks to the many e-commerce features.

Tools

• Pinterest Business : tool for advertising on Pinterest.
• Tailwind : programming tool for Pinterest (and Instagram), it saves you time and gives information about your audience.
• Shop The Look : functionality that allows Internet users to click on the product they want and proceed directly to the purchase on the site.
• Try On : A try-on feature that uses augmented reality to allow users to try out products.

Tips

• Include your keywords in the name of your board.
• Pin content regularly.
• Create inspiring, right-sized, high-quality visuals.
• Create collaborative boards to reach new visitors.
• Create rich product pins.
• Make video.

Youtube, the video platform

Although YouTube cannot be considered a social network in its own right, the video platform offers many possibilities for online shops. YouTube is the second most visited site in the world, behind Google. A boon for Alphabet, the parent company of Google which also bought YouTube.

Worldwide, the video giant attracts more than 2.2 billion monthly users. Every day, Internet users watch 1 billion hours of video on the platform. In France, it is the most visited social network with 49 million active users per month.

But the USA are very attracted to YouTube, users spend an average of 13.2 hours per month watching videos and 93% of USA people go to YouTube at least once a month (Médiamétrie). Obviously if you do not make video content, you will unfortunately have to forget this platform.

Hearing

YouTube brings together all types of users, even if young people are more numerous: 18-34 year olds represent, in France, 54% of users. As for the distribution between men and women, there are 41.4% women and 58.6% men.

Goals

• Build and federate a community.
• Gain notoriety and virality.
• Enhance your SEO and bring traffic.
• Show your products in video and in action.
• Getting closer to the consumer through video.
• Find new customers

Tools

• YouTube Analytics : tool that provides detailed statistics to assess the success of your videos.
• TubeBuddy : diagnostic tool that examines your video to see if it is well configured and optimized to generate views.
• VidiQ : tool to manage and optimize your presence on Youtube.

Tips

• Have a visual identity and be authentic.
• Have good equipment.
• Work well on your keywords, your titles and your descriptions so that your channel and your videos are easily found.
• Attract attention from the first seconds
• Work on your miniatures
• Structure your videos

Snapchat, the 100% mobile network

Snapchat is a social network entirely dedicated to mobile, thus strongly benefiting mobile commerce. The specialized photo application attracts nearly 557 million users around the world. In France, there are 22 million active users.

The success of the network is such that it leads to the sending of more than 3.5 billion snaps and 10 billion video views, daily, in the world.

Hearing

Snapchat is a social network that is mainly aimed at “young people”, 47% of Snapchat users in France are aged between 13 and 24 years old. It is the most visited social network daily by 15-24 year olds. The breakdown between men and women is as follows: 53% of users are women, 47% men.

Goals

• Bring you closer to your community.
• Hit a young target.
• Create and share viral content.
• Submit creative content.
• Highlight your products.

Tools

• Story Studio : Snapchat tool that allows you to edit your videos
• Snapchat Trends : tool to find the most popular themes of the moment on the application

Tips

• Snapchat makes a lot of filters available to its users, take advantage of them!
• Snapchat content is temporal, so feel free to post multiple times a week.
• As on other social networks, videos generate more engagement than other formats.
• Advertise to promote your business.
• Call on influencers.

TikTok, the rising social network

TikTok is the newest social network on this list. The latter was launched in China in 2016. In a short time, the network focused on short videos has become by far the most downloaded application in recent years and has amassed 1 billion users worldwide.

The USA use TikTok more and more, they spend a little more than 1 hour a day watching videos from the social network. In all, there are 14.9 million active users per month in France.

Hearing

Tiktok has a fairly young audience, 75% of USA users are between 13 and 24 years old. In France, 56% of users are women and 44% men.

Goals

• Propose relevant challenges for your company to your community
• Getting closer to your young clientele
• Create and share viral content
• Take advantage of the high engagement rate
• Propose creative and humorous content
• Humanize your business

Tools

• TikTok Analytics : tool to track the performance of your account and get to know your followers better.
• Shopping : e-commerce functionality in partnership with Shopify that allows you to buy products directly from the platform.
• TikTok Live : A feature that allows users and creators to interact in real time.

Tips

• TikTok offers a lot of effects, so take advantage of these to create quality videos.
• Make competitions: it is possible to offer gifts on the network. So attract new members to your follower base by this means.
• Don’t be too serious, the social network is made to be entertaining.
• Follow trends, including popular music and hashtags, to gain virality.
• Interact with influencers.

WhatsApp, the world’s first instant messenger

Whatsapp is an instant messaging application created in 2009. Acquired in 2014 by Facebook, WhatsApp quickly established itself in the world and in France. It is today the first instant messenger in the world.

Witnessing this success, WhatsApp announced in February 2020 that it had passed the 2 billion user mark worldwide. It is the second most downloaded application in France in 2021, behind TousAntiCovid and ahead of TikTok.

There are 24 million active users per month in France. The application is increasingly used by companies to communicate more easily with their customers.

Hearing

WhatsApp is mainly used by young people, 63% of social media users between the ages of 15 and 24 use WhatsApp.

Regarding the distribution of men and women, 52% of users are men and 48% are women.

Goals

• Get closer to your customers
• Use the app as customer service
• Respond to your customers faster and personalize the conversation
• Relay your information
• Highlight your services and products

Tools

• WhatsApp business : Application designed for the needs of small business owners. It allows you to easily interact with your customers, to present your products and services.
• Landbot : This tool allows you to create a chatbot for WhatsApp.
• Polls for WhatsApp : tool that lets you create polls on WhatsApp.

Tips

• Share all the relevant information about your business (name, logo, contact details, news, etc.) on WhatsApp business.
• Create an e-commerce showcase site with Catalog via the Whatsapp Business application to highlight your products.
• Prioritize your loyal customers by sending them personalized offers and advice.
• Share your news with “Status”. A kind of story that appears in a tab next to conversations and lasts 24 hours.
• Segment your directory to send personalized messages and offers.

Twitch, the #1 streaming platform

Twitch is an online streaming service, or web TV launched in 2011 and owned by Amazon. It is the No. 1 streaming platform, far ahead of YouTube Gaming Live and Facebook. In a growing market, Twitch stands out as the undisputed leader.

Every day millions of Internet users meet to watch video game broadcasts. Basically centered on the world of gaming, the platform is diversifying and we now find humorous lives, shows, debates, etc.

Twitch now has more than 7.5 million monthly active users in France. These users spend an average of 6.5 hours per month on the streaming platform.

Hearing

Twitch obviously attracts a young audience, in fact, 70% of users are between 16 and 34 years old.

Twitch also has a very male population as 67% of Twitch members are male and 33% are female.

Goals

• Reach a young and connected target
• Stand out from competition
• Demonstrate inventiveness and innovation
• Strengthen the relationship with your customers and interact directly with them
• Make your business more human and authentic
• Highlight your expertise

Tools

• Twitch Advertising : Twitch’s advertising network to broadcast your advertisements.
• Open Broadcast Software (OBS) : A streaming software that captures your screen.
• StreamLabs : Live streaming software that helps manage with viewer interactions, chat management, and donations.
• NightBot : A bot that allows moderation on Twitch.

Tips

• Have the necessary equipment (powerful computer, camera, microphone, etc.) and a very good connection.
• Have regularity.
• Organize online events to bring your community together .
• Have a real project and be creative .
• Make video advertising before the content is broadcast (Pre-roll ads).
• Advertise through an influencer .
• Test your new products.

Discord, the community platform

Discord, launched in 2015, is a platform originally designed for online video game players to chat with each other. Although Discord is still widely used by this community, the platform has expanded its target and has become popular with the general public.

Today, Discord has 300 million registered users, including 100 million active users per month, 6.7 million active servers, around 2.2 billion messages are sent each week.

It is the 10th most used social network in France with 7.9 million monthly users. Worldwide, Discord has 150 million monthly active users in 2021.

Hearing

Like Twitch, Discord is more aimed at a young and male profile, 15% of 15-24 year olds who use it daily. Even though the platform is expanding its community, you should know that 70% of users are video game players, 30% use it for movies/sports/same/dating.

Goals

• Getting closer to its customers and interacting directly with them
• Strengthen the sense of belonging to the company thanks to private servers
• Servers grouping clients together and allowing them to communicate with each other
• Collect feedback from your customers
• Regular promotion of images and products with the community (private sales etc.)

Tools

• Discord Nitro : paid subscription service with over 1 million users
• Bubble plan : to be used alongside Discord as freemium task management software in project management
• Patreon : crowdfunding website for creators

Tips

• Create a server for a club and a community.
• Set up different channels:
  • “suggestion box” dedicated to customer feedback and their suggestions
  • good deals promotions
  • customer advice
• Create roles for server moderators: they will have the power to manage the community.
• Promote strong values ​​and exclusive content.
• Animate exchanges with your community around your favorite field: games, webinars, podcasts.
• Make your server known by advertising on other servers.

Or…

There are of course other social networks, each one bringing together its specificities and its communities. One can find :

• Wechat, the Asian WhatsApp
• Tumblr , which mixes blogging and exchanges,
• Flickr , which also allows photo sharing on the Internet, and has an image bank,
• We Heart It , whose operation is strongly reminiscent of those of Pinterest and Instagram,
• Medium , which mixes blogging and exchanges, like Tumblr, organized in the form of collections,
• Reddit , which is closer to a community site organized around sometimes very specific topics,
• StumbleUpon , which allows you to discover content based on your tastes and popular content on the Internet,
• and many others …

Today, it becomes very complicated or even impossible to do without social networks for your business. Being visible on the internet and social networks is not synonymous with being everywhere at once, there is no point in spreading yourself too thin. It is important to have a clear strategy according to your activity and your target.