Social media channels are one of the most important ways for foreign trade practitioners to find customers. It allows us to directly reach potential overseas buyers, showcase our products and brands, build trust and relationships, and thus lead to transactions. Social media channels can help import and export trade practitioners to understand the target customers' corporate messages. You can directly see the corresponding position personnel on the social media, and the online communication is highly efficient. However, social media requires time to operate the account or expand friends in the early stage. Once the operation is wrong, it will be easily considered as malicious marketing by the system, which will lead to the consequences such as cancellation.

1. LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a professional social networking platform, mainly for business people, providing career development, recruitment, training, industry information, etc. LinkedIn has more than 700 million registered users, covering more than 200 countries and regions around the world, and is an important channel for foreign trade practitioners to find overseas partners and customers.

LinkedIn's advantages are:

• It is a professional platform, users are registered and used for business purposes, so it can avoid the interference of some irrelevant or low-quality information.

• It can help us pinpoint our target customers. Through the search function or recommendation function, we can find the right contacts according to industry, region, position, company and other criteria, and view their profiles and backgrounds.

• It allows us to show our professional image and value. By improving our profile, posting industry news, sharing expertise, and participating in discussions, we can improve our influence and credibility on LinkedIn.

• It allows us to build and maintain relationships with our customers. By sending private messages, comments, likes, retweets, etc., we can maintain communication and interaction with our customers and increase trust and stickiness.

The disadvantages of LinkedIn are:

• It is a pay-based platform, so if you want to use more features and services, such as seeing who has seen your profile, sending more private messages, using more search terms, etc., you need to buy membership or advertising services.

• It is a highly competitive platform, and since LinkedIn brings together a large number of foreign trade practitioners and buyers, it takes more time and effort to optimize your profile and content in order to stand out among the many competitors.

• It is a relatively conservative platform, and since users on LinkedIn are more professional and formal, you need to pay attention to etiquette and cultural differences when communicating with customers to avoid being too casual or offensive.

2. Facebook

Facebook is the world's largest social networking platform with over 2.8 billion monthly active users covering almost all countries and regions in the world. Facebook not only provides personal social services, but also provides corporate pages, ads, groups, live streaming and other functions, which is an important channel for foreign trade practitioners to showcase their products and brands and attract traffic and customers.

The advantages of Facebook are:

• It is a platform with huge traffic, and because of the variety of users and content on Facebook, it allows us to reach more potential customers, no matter what kind of products or services they are looking for.

• It is a diverse platform, as there are a variety of features and services on Facebook, such as business pages, ads, groups, live streaming, etc., thus allowing us to choose the right way to present our products and brands according to different goals and strategies.

• It is an interactive platform. Since there are various ways to communicate and interact on Facebook, such as private messages, comments, likes, retweets, hashtags, etc., it allows us to build a closer connection and trust with our customers, thus promoting conversion and repurchase.

The disadvantages of Facebook are:

• It is a highly competitive platform. Since there are a large number of foreign trade practitioners and buyers on Facebook, it requires more money and effort to optimize one's page and ads in order to get more attention and clicks among many competitors.

• It is a platform with strict rules. Since Facebook has a strict audit and management mechanism for users and content, you need to pay attention to abide by its rules and policies when using Facebook to avoid being blocked or downgraded.

• It is a fast-changing platform, and since Facebook is constantly updating and improving its features and services, you need to pay attention to its dynamics and changes when using Facebook and adapt to its new rules and trends.

Twitter

Twitter is a micro-blogging social networking platform that allows users to post messages (called tweets) of no more than 280 characters and share and interact with other users through its website or mobile application. Twitter has over 330 million monthly active users, mainly in the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom and other countries.

Twitter's strengths are:

• It is a real-time platform, and since information on Twitter is updated very quickly, it allows us to keep abreast of developments and trends in overseas markets and seize opportunities and needs.

• It is an influential platform. Since there are many famous people and organizations on Twitter, such as politicians, celebrities, media, etc., it allows us to leverage their influence to increase our brand awareness and credibility.

• It is a concise and clear platform, and since the messages on Twitter are short and concise, it allows us to use the least amount of words to convey the most effective message and attract the attention of our customers.

The disadvantages of Twitter are:

• It is a platform with a high volume of information. Since there is a huge amount of information on Twitter that is constantly refreshed and updated, it requires frequent posting and retweeting of tweets to get your message seen and noticed by more people, as well as attention to filtering and processing useful information.

• It is a platform with high limitations. Since there is a word limit for messages on Twitter, you need to pay attention to the wording and grammar when expressing your products and brands to avoid misunderstanding or negative impact.

• It is a risky platform, because there are many sensitive and controversial topics and people on Twitter, so you need to pay attention to avoid these topics and people when using Twitter to avoid unnecessary trouble or damage to your brand image.

Conclusion

In conclusion, social media channel is one of the important ways for foreign trade practitioners to find customers, but they also need to choose the right platform and method according to their goals and strategies, and also pay attention to avoiding some potential risks and challenges. Only in this way can we find customers and more orders on social media channels.