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Why You Need Social Media Marketing for Your Dispensary
You didn’t work through extensive paperwork and invest substantial capital to open a dispensary that doesn’t turn a profit. You need your investment to pay off, and you want your business to succeed. For that to happen, you’ll need to generate a recurring base of customers and drive sales. But how?
Effective social media marketing will place your brand at the front of your consumers minds. You want your dispensary to be the first place a consumer thinks about when they want to buy cannabis. Social media marketing is one of the best ways to make that happen.
Think of it like this: In 2024, social media has become as essential for marketing as TV, radio, and newspapers were twenty years ago — it’s a consumer’s go-to source for information about products and brands.
When consumers see a cannabis dispensary posting valuable and engaging content that they find interesting, they’re more likely to pay attention to it and follow that dispensary’s social media channels. Once they decide to follow, they’ll naturally continue to see and pay attention to what the dispensary posts in the future. As a result, they’ll begin thinking of that dispensary when they’re ready to purchase products or even when they’re just visiting the area. This is the goal of social media marketing. It’s all about becoming the first dispensary that comes to mind when a consumer begins thinking about buying cannabis products.
Here’s what you’ll need to do to make the most of social media marketing for your cannabis business:
Step 1: Cannabis Social Media Management Plan
Before you develop a plan for your cannabis social media management and social media posts, you’ll need to make sure you’re very familiar with your target customer base so that you can develop customer personas that will compliment your business model. Once you’ve done that, figure out what social media platforms you’ll be using.
Keep in mind each social media platform’s differences. For example, X or “Twitter” is made for short form text – which is great for drawing attention to other content like videos and blogs. On the other hand, Facebook is best for long-form, standalone content, and posts that share other content that’s otherwise only be accessible on platforms like YouTube, or your website.
Take all of your cannabis social media ideas and create a structured content calendar that incorporates every platform you plan to use. Think of your content calendar as a strategic plan for your content development and social media posts, and ensure your content calendar aligns with your business’ goals. While you’re planning for the month, be sure to tap into current trends and relevant news. Plan your content so that everything you post can include an image or video, since posts with visuals are proven to generate over two-times more engagement than those without.
Your posting frequency matters too. Hubspot statistics show that brands typically find the most success by posting either three or four times a week. But slightly deviating from your content calendar, or posting more than three or four times a week isn’t necessarily always a bad thing, as long as your content provides value.
Step 2: Creating Valuable Cannabis Social Media Content
Creating valuable, relevant content is a very important aspect of effective weed social media marketing. Your audience won’t be interested in your content unless it offers them value by evoking an emotional response. Simply trying to sell a product at a specific price isn’t enough. Instead, your content should enrich their lives in some way. This can be achieved by crafting content that is both interesting, engaging, and emotionally captivating.
Value can come in many different forms, and it’s up to you to decide what’s going to work best for your business. Feel free to check out other successful brands and cannabis businesses online to draw inspiration, but avoid directly copying your competitors. If you want to stand out, originality is key.
You can add value to your content doing at least one of these things in every post.
- Solving a problem
- Answering a question
- Addressing Concerns
- Relieving fears
- Making the viewers life less challenging
For example, you could produce point-of-view videos that take the viewer on a journey through your store, paying close attention to the decor and enhancing the customer experience. You might show behind-the-scenes videos that reveal the production process, post about your engagement with the local community, or share any other relevant content that people will find genuinely interesting, rather than focusing on pricing information or your latest promotion.
With that being said, sprinkling in some promotion isn’t always a bad thing. It’s definitely good to advertise your promotions and reel in customers with an irresistible deal. But remember, moderation is key.
Statistics show that the 80/20 split is the best approach to social media marketing. At least 80% of your content should be providing value and at most 20% of it can be sales promotion. Whenever you can, disguise your sales promotion by tacking it on at the end of your value-driven content, or disguise your promotion as valuable content. This could be as simple as making a creative and engaging post about the product that you’re promoting, and then mentioning the sale towards the end of the post.
Step 3: Monitoring Cannabis Social Media Posts
As soon as posts begin rolling out, you’ll need to monitor them and engage with your audience. That might be answering questions, liking comments, and doing your best to promote reposts. Creating content that inspires your audience to share it with others will be one of the most challenging, but rewarding aspects of your cannabis social media management and marketing strategy.
Reposts will help create a larger web that’s sure to capture interested consumers that may not have found your business otherwise. But remember, posting on social media is the last step, and not the first. But don’t forget that the cannabis industry is very unique, and there are restrictions surrounding what you can post.
Advertising Regulations for Cannabis Brands
Each state has its own set of regulations that dictate what a cannabis company can and cannot legally do in terms of advertising. Typically, cannabis brands can’t advertise on things like billboards or TV, they can’t run advertisements during certain hours of the day, and much more. All of these painful regulations make social media a cannabis marketer’s best friend. Believe it or not, there were over 20 million tweets about cannabis related topics in 2023, making cannabis a more popular topic than things like the NHL, golf, and other big industries on social media.
With that being said, there are still some guidelines that cannabis businesses will need to follow while using major social media platforms, and each state’s regulators will have their own set of rules. Navigating the regulations surrounding cannabis branding can be complex, yet there are clear guidelines to help maintain compliance and integrity.
It’s important for cannabis brands to steer clear of producing content that makes health-related claims. For instance, they should not suggest that their products assist with sleep, pain relief, or any other medical condition. Additionally, cannabis brands should focus on creating content that is informative and engaging, rather than content that primarily aims to increase consumer purchases. For example, content cannot refer to volume-based discounts, and glamorize the use of cannabis. Be sure to read up on your state’s cannabis advertising regulations. But this isn’t unusual. Businesses and brands are always held at a higher standard, and have unique rules that they need to follow to use the platform, since they tend to have a direct influence on consumer’s decisions.
Make the Most of Social Media Marketing
Many business owners avoid spending the time and effort required for impactful weed social media marketing. Its value is often overshadowed by the various other tasks involved in launching and operating a dispensary. Even though social media marketing should be a top priority, it makes sense why dispensary owners often leave it on the back burner. Opening a dispensary is a very hands-on task, and it requires a lot of time and effort. But that should not cause you to sacrifice sales goals and risk the longevity of your business.
Working with a cannabis social media marketing agency is the best way to maximize your dispensary’s social media marketing impact and make the most of online platforms. CannDelta’s dispensary social media marketing services are an industry-leading option that delivers upfront and ongoing social media marketing services. You’ll get tailored content along with a strategically crafted content calendar. We’ll handle every post with proactive engagement and strategic tweaks, involving you as much or as little as you prefer. You’ll have all of the data at your fingertips showing you the impact of your social media marketing. Get in touch with CannDelta today to learn about our marketing package, which also includes website development, e-commerce, SEO integration, and any other options to choose from.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can Marketing Cannabis on Social Media be Done?
Cannabis social media marketing is one of the most valuable marketing tools for cannabis business owners. Cannabis social media posts will need to be compliant with your location’s regulatory requirements. Cannabis businesses typically cannot have any paid promotions or advertisements on social media.
How do Cannabis Digital Marketing Services Approach Social Media Marketing?
Cannabis social media marketing services approach social media marketing in such a way that the specific requirements and regulations tied to the cannabis business’ location are being followed. Navigating what cannabis business owners can and cannot do can be challenging, and heavily influence the content that’s released. Weed social media marketing services should still use all of the best practices required for impactful social media marketing that would be used by other consumer-driven businesses.
How can Cannabis Digital Marketing Services Help Dispensaries Increase Online Visibility?
Cannabis digital marketing services should include search engine optimization (SEO) to improve your businesses online visibility. SEO will improve a dispensary’s online visibility by helping search engines, like Google, recommend your website to relevant searchers. Implementing SEO to your dispensary social media marketing and online marketing strategy will be one of the most valuable aspects of a cannabis digital marketing service.
What is the Best way to Promote a Cannabis Business?
Social media marketing is the best way to promote a dispensary since there are typically heavy restrictions placed on all other forms of cannabis advertising. Even though social media advertising regulations exist, they are often less restrictive than other forms of promotion. Promoting a cannabis business is all about making your business as widely known to your target audience as possible. If you’re a dispensary owner, you want everyone in your community to know about your dispensary and shop at it instead of at a competitor’s dispensary. One of the best ways to make this happen is through impactful social media marketing. Be sure your cannabis social media ideas, strategy, and management are well thought-out and align with your brand and goals.
