Social media has come to the fore for many businesses today as part of their marketing strategy. And no wonder why. According to reports, 93% of marketers are actively engaging in social media for their business. That’s because social media is where their customers spend their time.
However, many of these businesses make some or all of the five most common social media marketing mistakes.
1. Being Inconsistent
Social media is all about developing relationships with people who may or may not become your customers. However, you can’t be in a relationship with someone if you never spend time with them. The same concept applies in social media marketing. If you want results, you have to have a regular and consistent schedule for spending time on the social network of your choice. That might be once a day or even more often if that’s what your customers expect. Use scheduling tools and organize posts or tweets in advance to make sure you have consistent content.
2. Too Self-Promoted
Yes, you use social media to get more customers and increase sales, but it’s more of an indirect approach. That means you’re not trying to sell your followers every time you post something. If you take that approach, you will end up without followers. Instead, you should limit your sales posts to only a small portion of the total.
3. Becoming Too Self-Absorbing
This error is similar to the over-promotion problem, but it goes a step further. Even if you’re not trying to sell a product, you may be using the wrong language in your post. You may talk too much about yourself or your company or give your opinion on everything instead of asking other people’s opinions. Focus on your followers and what they need. Give them content that is important to them or provide information and they will want to continue following you.
4. Being Fake
It’s easy to adopt a fake persona online, thinking no one will ever find out. Even businesses run into this problem, often unintentionally. They may try to be cool or say and do what they think people want to hear. But if it doesn’t match what you see when you visit their store or office, you will be disappointed. If you’re talking about great customer service and not waiting in line, you better be prepared to deliver it in person. Otherwise, you run the risk of hearing complaints on your social network pages.
5. Not responding
Because you develop relationships through social media, you must have two-way communication. That means responding to your followers’ comments and even commenting on their pages. It’s even more important to respond when comments are negative. Remember that other people care about you and can decide whether they will follow you or use your product or service based on how you respond to “difficult questions” or negative feedback.
While most businesses wouldn’t consider themselves social media experts, if you avoid these five mistakes, you likely will reap the rewards of the efforts you put into social marketing.
