PRESENTING: How to market your startup on social media to grow your business and gain boatloads of customers

• Marketing your brand is the most important thing you can to do gain customers - whether that's through social media, email, or advertising.
• Influencers have become a major asset to a brand's marketing strategy, and businesses are finding that micro- and nano-influencers are increasingly effective.
• Business Insider has talked to founders, attended panels, and surveyed entrepreneurs to find out what marketing tools and strategies helped them build their businesses.
• Subscribe now to read these features and more on BI Prime

Marketing your brand is the most important thing you can to do gain customers - but that can come in multiple forms.

Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook have the biggest impact, but also present challenges standing out in a highly saturated market. Some brands also find success through email campaigns or ambassador programs.

But first, you need the right resources to create content for marketing your brand. There are countless apps to help you create and plan posts for Instagram, so we asked entrepreneurs to list the ones they find most useful.

Services like Canva can be used to create social media posts, ads, flyers, menus, business pitches, and almost anything you can stamp your logo on. Business Insider compiled a guide to Canva's most useful features, like pre-designed templates and a brand kit.

Influencers have become a major assets to any brand's marketing strategy - whether they take a photo with a physical product or a plug a digital service in their caption. Consumers are turning to the people they relate to and businesses are finding that micro- and nano-influencers are increasingly effective in that way.

Below, read our stories on how startups and founders are using social media and marketing to grow their businesses.

Siblings Emily and Mark Stallings cofounded phone-case startup Casely and boosted their sales to $10 million. They created their Instagram account three months before launching their products to generate buzz - now they have over 200,000 followers on the platform. They reveal how they contact and work with 'micro-influencers' on Instagram to hype their products.

Read the story here.

Toymaker Skyrocket has a formula behind its best-selling toys to cater to these viral and trending videos. Last holiday season, the company recruited more than 100 influencers on YouTube and Instagram to launch its Blume doll, which was one of the year's most popular toys.

Read the story here.

Claire Diaz-Ortiz, a former Twitter employee who is now a social-media consultant, says brands need to stop trying to go viral and instead focus on the value they were providing to consumers. Instead, she suggests creating more meaningful engagement on social media through conversation and customer service.

Read the story here.

At Mastercard's first Small Business Summit, one panel of women with a variety of experience in content creation and marketing discussed ways small businesses can make the most of social media. Entrepreneur and TV host Marie Forleo said content gives businesses "an opportunity to inspire trust and confidence in your audience long before they ever do business with you."

Read the story here.

E-commerce founder Adii Pienaar said a low open rate is a major threat to business owners hoping to boost sales through email. He provided six templates for small business owners looking to create engaging email campaigns.

Read the story here.