Editors Note: This was republished with permission from Eduard Klein and the original story can be found here .

The Cannabis market has shown stellar growth over the last few years. As the regulatory framework continues to favor this industry and legalization becomes the norm, the upward trajectory of this industry and associated businesses will remain on track.

In the US, adults over 21 years of age can use cannabis for recreation. 11 of the 50 US states have entirely decriminalized the consumption and ownership of cannabis. At the same time, 33 states allow medical marijuana for patients suffering from chronic illnesses.

And with this advancement comes the opportunity to sell cannabis and related items legitimately.

If you are already a player in this industry, you compete with more than 20,000 businesses in the US alone.

However, since selling or using Cannabis is still restricted in many countries, there is a limit to how much and where you can advertise.

Using Social Channels To Increase Brand Awareness For Your CannaBusiness

Businesses in other niches aren’t subjected to such extensive advertising and marketing restrictions when using mainstream media. They can even use social media sites to advertise, find buyers, increase awareness, make sales and build loyalty.

An estimated 3.6 billion people are using social media worldwide, and this number is expected to increase to 4.41 billion in 2025. Research shows that 76% of consumers have bought a product they spotted in a post on a social media platform.

That explains why social media is essential to businesses – including those in the cannabis industry.

Unfortunately, canna-businesses don’t have the luxury of using these platforms. The big social media sites have concrete policies that limit the marketing and advertising options available to businesses in this niche.

Cannabis businesses face undue restrictions on social media marketing or see their social media accounts get shut down permanently if they try to circumvent these limitations.

This has led to the promulgation of niche social media sites that are entirely dedicated to cannabis users and businesses in this niche. These platforms are more likely to have targeted audiences who’d be interested in what you have to offer them.

You can sign up for these cannabis-themed social networks and benefit through a robust social media marketing strategy to grow your business.

Before we explore these platforms in further detail, let’s learn more about the kind of social media marketing tactics that’ll make your brand a hit and get you the attention you need to succeed on these sites and in the industry at large.

6 Ways To Promote Your Canna-Business On Cannabis-Themed Social Networks

According to recent research, the cannabis industry will be worth $39.4 billion by 2023 .

This presents several opportunities for cannabis entrepreneurs to take their brand to a more global audience using online resources.

That’s why it’s good to create a robust online presence on cannabis business social networks. For that, you need to implement the following tactics that are proven to offer desirable results:

Offer Content That Educates Your Audience

People don’t follow brands that are overly promotional and bombard their audiences with marketing campaigns.

That’s why a key cannabis business social network marketing tactic is to offer educational and useful content that piques the interest of your targeted audience. Don’t tell your prospects to buy, but show them the best option and they’ll automatically choose to purchase from you because you have their best interests at heart.

When it comes to cannabis, people are quite curious about news or information linked with its medicinal and recreational use. According to Danny Keith, CEO and Founder of Cannabis Club TV , there is a considerable requirement for educational content for new cannabis users on safe product consumption.

So, if you can inform and educate people,   you are giving all the reasons for your potential customers to trust you and buy from you. The chances are that your audience will want to share this information with their social circles, thereby increasing the engagement of your social media posts.

For example, Cannabis Oil for Cancer posted a humorous, engaging, and informative post on different types of weed and how they can be used for medicinal purposes to treat depression and ADHD.

Leverage The Power Of Hashtags

Hashtags are short, catchy labels that make it easier for people to find content on a specific theme or topic.

When cannabis brands utilize hashtags for their businesses, they leverage the potential to reach a substantial organic audience for free while also allowing social media users to find the information they need.

To cut through all the noise and connect with your prospective buyers, create relevant hashtags that make the right noise in the social media space. However, avoid using hashtags that have previously sparked any type of controversies or issues with other businesses in your niche. You don’t want that kind of baggage.

Some popular hashtags include #cannabiscommunity, #vapelife, #medibles, #cannabisculture, #cbd, #thc or #hightimes, to name a few. Try searching for these on social media networks to see how other brands use these to make their posts more searchable. They work just as well on mainstream networks as they do on cannabis-only social platforms.

Partner With Other Businesses

To increase your social media influence and establish yourself as an industry leader, you need to follow and engage with other brands that are relevant to your business.

For example, if you own a dispensary, you can connect and engage with the brands you sell to cannabis users. Like and share their content and social media posts to increase your social media presence and even tap into their established audience base to increase your potential customers.

This helps solidify your presence in the industry as a trusted canna-business. If the brand or company follows you back or gives you a shout out, their followers will perceive you as a genuine brand.

Get Social Media Influencers To Promote Your Business

Another important cannabis business social network strategy is to tap into social media influencers who have already gained the attention of millions of cannabis users. Get in touch with a social media influencer whose content aligns with your brand values and collaborate with them.

You can choose to either work with macro-influencers, or micro-influencers. Or you could include them both to build a solid social media marketing strategy.

Macro-influencers have a following of more than a million cannabis users from different demographics. They can be extremely beneficial for creating brand awareness and driving conversions.

Alternatively, micro-influencers have a fan base of 10,000 to 100,000 people. They are famous for serving personalized content on a particular interest, and you can count on them to compel their followers to visit your website and even buy from you.

All in all, it comes down to working with a social media influencer whose followers match with your brand’s target market. They have an intrinsic ability to speak to marijuana enthusiasts and show your products to them in their own lingo.

Tweed, a Canadian cannabis company, got in touch with Karissa Pukas, a YouTube influencer with a huge follower base. She posted this photo on her Instagram page to ask her followers to visit Tweed’s website and check out their products.

You can do the same with influencers on a cannabis business social network of your choice and tap into their audience base.

Maintain An Active Presence On The Social Networking Platforms

It’s possible to increase your conversions by simply being present and active on all cannabis-themed social networks. For that, you need to create a well-planned content calendar that maps out the type of social media posts.

Create guidelines to strictly follow the content calendar and post at the pre-determined time and days.

This way your followers will know what to expect from you so that they can look forward to a particular form of content from your brand. Settle on a specific theme or topic for your posts to create a consistent brand image, attract your target audience and keep them entertained.

Analyze the performance of each post to gauge the type of content that gets the most engagement from your followers so that you can optimize your marketing strategy around that data.

Lastly, strike conversations with your followers or potential customers by replying to their comments or asking them important questions. Listen to their feedback to gauge the kind of response your posts are getting.

Build A Community

It’s possible to gain more followers for your business when you leverage the entire community on a cannabis business social network to build a digital communal space of sorts around your brand. Invite people looking for products that are similar to yours, educate and entertain them, and ensure that they become a part of your niche community to get more from you.

You can also look for events to sponsor, support a charity, or an important cause close to your heart. This makes a significant impact on your audience as they view you as an empathetic brand that takes its social responsibility seriously.

Also, attend conferences and seminars held on cannabis-related topics. Here you can meet other stakeholders in the industry to create meaningful partnerships that can prove beneficial for your brand.

Select The Right Cannabis Business Social Network

While you can use the strategies mentioned above on popular platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, you’ll be able to get more out of them on niche social sites that are built specifically for cannabis users.

Using these sites is a fantastic way to promote your cannabis products directly to your prospects.

Here are the leading cannabis business social networks to look out for:

WeedLife

This is a relatively new social network, but it has gained massive popularity among cannabis enthusiasts in very little time. It features a news feed where you can get information on the latest weed-related businesses, see what other users are posting and even connect with them through discussion groups and forums.

Additionally, WeedLife is consistently improving its features to offer social media marketing capabilities to businesses that want to use this platform to increase brand awareness and sales.

When you sign up for this platform, you get to choose between a personal profile and a business page.

Setting up your profile as a cannabis business allows you to promote your products on a user-friendly interface. You can even list your products or services on the WeedLife directory to increase your visibility to potential buyers.

This platform is also available as a mobile app that consumers download; it lets them find the nearest dispensary in their neighborhood and connect with local cannabis users.

You can even create discussion groups that include your consumers and other cannabis businesses. This is a great way to encourage conversations and help people connect over your products. Every cannabis professional should consider this platform to start its social media marketing journey.

Weedable

Weedable is a mobile app that allows you to create an online profile and interact with other cannabis fans. As a business, you can easily make meaningful relationships with customers looking to make personal connections with their favorite brands.

It also offers real-time news in the 420 culture for the weed-loving community.

Since it is a community specially designed for people passionate about cannabis, it offers an easy-to-use display section that showcases various cannabis strains, concentrates, edibles and seeds. Get your products listed here.

Also, you can use this platform to educate the marijuana enthusiasts about your brand and the safe consumption of marijuana.

MassRoots

MassRoots is the first-ever cannabis-themed social network, built to connect college students who use cannabis and are often looking for dependable dispensaries in their areas.

Today, this network has more than 1 million connected users, making it the perfect place for deploying promotional tactics for cannabis businesses and dispensaries.

It is really easy to sign up and promote your cannabis brand on this site. All you need to do is register and list your business on the site to access customer analytics where you can oversee the performance of your marketing and promotional campaigns.

The most prominent feature of MassRoots is that instead of encouraging user interactions through discussion forums, it asks them to post reviews and rate products. And to make sure that users participate actively, it offers a rewards program that entices them with movie tickets, concerts, and festivals passes.

LeafWire

This new cannabis business social network is often called the LinkedIn of the canna-business community. It is a gold mine of data, methods, strategies and news on the industry, businesses in this niche and their products.

This $25 billion industry offers several opportunities to cannabis-related businesses looking for investors or the other way around. LeafWire has proven its importance by helping brands that were struggling due to the stigmas and legal uncertainties.

Not only this, but LeafWire also connects cannabis-minded individuals and jobseekers with high-profile employers. It serves as a networking site to gain access to the latest news and trends in the industry.

WeedCircle

WeedCircle is a cross between LinkedIn and Google Plus but for cannabis-themed businesses. It allows companies to sign up and network with vendors, weed-growers, entrepreneurs, dispensary owners and others in the cannabis industry.

The increasing list of users offers many opportunities for businesses to promote their products and present their brand to a vast audience. Also, since Weed Life owns it, you will find WeedCircle similar to it in many aspects.

MJLink

MJLink is a new cannabis business social network created specifically for professionals in the cannabis business community. These include manufacturers, growers, vendors, distributors, traders and several others linked with the weed industry.

All you need to do is sign up for a profile with MJLink and get access to news feeds, videos, and product listings that allow you to network with other individuals in the industry.

If you can’t advertise your business on Google or Facebook, join MJLink to find and reach out to your target audience.

Duby

Duby is an online application designed for IoS and Android as a cross between Instagram, Tinder and Twitter. It is a social media platform where marijuana lovers can post videos and images as well as connect with other cannabis enthusiasts without any worries.

Join Duby to view the top posts and videos, or you share yours with other users. These features have made Duby a haven for all the weed lovers and cannabis business owners out there that want to promote this lifestyle.

Find it on the Apple Appstore and Google Play Store .

WeedMaps

WeedMaps allows cannabis lovers to find the best strain, stores, or dispensaries in their area through a user0friendly website.

It also allows businesses to list their products, add the necessary information, or insert images and videos. So, if you are a cannabis business looking for a platform that allows you to reach out to a vast audience base, you need to sign up for this platform.

Additionally, it lets you easily promote your products through seamless advertising campaigns, including the latest deals or other enticing promotional tactics that allures your customers to your business.

CannaSOS

CannaSOS is a large cannabis business social network with more than 400,000 monthly visitors. This platform is famous for providing comprehensive information on thousands of cannabis strains, including their THC content, CBD and other compounds.

This data can then be used to offer educational content to your consumers who want to explore the world of cannabis manufacturing.

Apart from this, you can find recommendations on the best dispensary in your locality or ask for advice from cannabis-growing experts on this platform.

Additionally, you CannaSOS lets you buy and sell using its platform as it utilizes blockchain for complete financial transparency. It even has its own online currency by the name of PerksCoin.

Grasscity Forums

This is one of the oldest cannabis social media sites that began as a networking platform for cannabis growers. Since then, it has evolved into a forum where users discuss methods to consume marijuana, legalization of weed and the best cannabis dispensaries in any particular area.

You can easily join this 420 magazine forum to participate in the discussions and get important information from the weed enthusiasts about different strains, seeds, growing methods, or any cannabis-related topic under the sky.

As a business, you can easily list your products dispensary, promote them, and spark conversations among cannabis consumers on the forum.

Connect and Grow Your Brand

The cannabis industry is undergoing significant changes and gaining a bigger share of the global market with advancements and innovations. But businesses here can only thrive if they are ready to take on the digital world with social media marketing as an essential element of their promotional strategy.

Although we are aware that social media marketing poses many restrictions for cannabis businesses, that doesn’t mean that they don’t have a way out.

You just need to select the right platform and implement proven social media marketing strategies to gain traction among your consumers and grow your brand.

Start from sharing educational content rather than promotional messages and create a comprehensive plan for reaching a broader audience base. Using these tactics on the right cannabis business, social network platforms will help you get the positive results you aspire to achieve.