Is social media for you? 5 ways to find out

My dad asked me if he should be on Twitter for his business, which involves liquidating furniture. I flat out told him no.

Not every audience is on Twitter. In fact, a lot of audiences aren’t on Twitter. A November 2010 study from the Pew Research Center estimates 8 percent of Americans use Twitter.

When you dig even deeper into the demographics, it becomes obvious that a lot of the prime audiences for my dad’s business—the people most likely to buy used furniture in quantity—aren’t spending their time on Twitter.

There is the argument that if he was willing to spend time building a Twitter following, he could probably get some business from the platform. But considering there are plenty of other social media fish in the sea, it’s not his best option.

Finding your best audience

There are incredible demographic numbers available for most social media platforms now. Pew Research, in its many incarnations, seems to have a new statistic about Internet use every day. It is relatively easy to find what sites your ideal audience uses regularly.

Reaching those people where they virtually live is crucial to any organization.

Here are five tips to do this.