Today, we will examine two interconnected aspects of social media strategy that have distinct focuses and goals.

By the end of the article, we will know exactly what the meaning of both is, how both aspects work for social media strategy, what the difference is between both, and also how they are interconnected and why both matter.

Firstly, let’s look at what social media marketing is.

When you plan a social media strategy, you take an action; that is what is to be taken in the form of social media marketing. Its primary goal is to get the result for business growth and success. It does it by bringing new customers and clients, by bringing traffic to the website, or by boosting sales.

When we look at social media marketing, there are different manners/activities to

execute that are

1. Content—Creating and publishing the content, i.e., posts, reels, images, and videos. Content creation plays an important role when we talk about social media marketing.
2. Campaigns—paid ads and promotions for the brand.
3. Engagement—Engagement could be drawn by interacting with comments, messages, and shares to drive the actions immediately.
4. Analytics—Analyzing the click-through rates, conversion rates, return investment (ROI); basically, using that data to track the key performance indicators (KPIs)
5. Example—Running a Facebook ad campaign, and the target is to generate 100-150 sales or 600 website visits.

What is social media branding?

Social media branding is something that is mainly focused on the image of the brand/platform. It’s not to drive the numbers but to build the image for the brand; this could be done with the help of logo designing, brand name, and many more things. It’s about building your business identity and building the perception for the business, building a reputation for the long term, maintaining the trust, and also maintaining the connection with your audience. It’s about how people feel about your business.

How can we measure branding, not just with the numbers, but

• How is the consistency of your design, tone, and content style?
• How does your brand evoke the value and the emotion of people
• How much can your audience trust you?

How are social media marketing and social media branding interconnected?

Both are somehow deeply connected. When you want that short push for the brand, then marketing can surely help to achieve that, but it’s not important that people will remember you after that one purchase.

• As a brand, you might get the sales result through marketing. But marketing without branding is incomplete.
• Now, maybe you will get that trust and admiration for your brand from your audience, but you will not be able to drive the sales through that admiration without the branding.
• Example: We can take Nike; they are positioning themselves with the tagline ‘Just do it.’ They are also creating a brand image with this by running targeted ads and campaigns with the athletes, cricketers, and celebrities’ collaborations that boost sales, which is done by the marketing.
• Together, both generate the best outcome—marketing attracts, and branding retains.

What is the difference between marketing and branding?

If we say marketing works in favor of numbers and branding for the image, then that will not be wrong. So basically, if marketing is to promote and build the traffic and drive the sales, branding is to maintain that image.

• We get measurable results in marketing, but branding is perceived value and emotional connection.
• Examples of both are customer comments like ‘I love the vibe of your brand’ or ‘Your service is amazing.’ These kinds of marks from the customers come from branding.

On the other hand, Campaign B brought 500 new followers and made 200 people visit our website; these kinds of things happen because of marketing.

Conclusion

It’s not about choosing between marketing and branding, but it’s about how you keep that balance between both and how you blend both.

Through marketing, you can bring the numbers and visibility, and through branding, you can shape the way people remember your brand. Numbers can fluctuate, but a strong brand image lasts for years.

In short, marketing will bring people to your brand, but branding will make them stay in your brand.