Strategic business goals determine the social media setup. Different social media platforms reach different markets, so you must choose your media channels well. Then, you must align the social media messages with those business objectives.

• Goals must be phrased clearly and briefly.
• They must be achievable, concrete, and measurable.
• They must be shared, discussed, and bought into.

Goals should match the means and methods of the specific social media and its technology and target market.

• Brand building — Creating an identity for your product or service takes a different approach than building sales. Branding creates an image—color, shape, and typography—customers will come to recognize. A successful brand will attract and engage customers, so they buy and commit to brand loyalty.
• Audience demographics — Brand Anvil will run analytics on your target social media. You need to know their characteristics, personalities, and shopping practices. But, you also need to know who and how their influencers work. They may read reviews, for example, so you must reach them that way, too. Or, they may prefer short content over long content.
• Align media and audience —  It only creates confusion and cost to try to reach every audience. It makes more effective sense to target three to five social media channels. Twitter, for example, is message-centric; it has no place for the visuals some brands depend on. Facebook has room for those images and videos, and users can share such images and messages. And, Instagram emphasizes the image in use to engage the viewer.
• Strategic Calendar — The social media calendar cannot be reactive and responsive. It must reach well into the future. If you schedule sales promotions, themes, or seasonal sales, you must have social media content in place for posting at a time to optimize those opportunities. But, the calendar must have room for developing postings other than content copy. Blogging, for instance, lets you engage and build interest without appearing promotional.