Olivia Atkinson
Normally its highlighted what you should do when it comes to social media rather than what you shouldn’t do. However most of you will resonate more with common mistakes that have turned into habits when promoting on social media.
If you don’t have the right strategy and plan your content on social media you risk alienating your audience.
Social media is a huge opportunity to engage and interact with your audience. If you don’t dominate the space within your specific sector then someone else will.
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1. Constantly Promoting Yourself Or Your Product
This can be a difficult one to understand as the majority of companies talk about themselves without realising. You’ve got a great service or product so you’re obviously going to want to promote it, but there's certain way to go about it.
You would have experienced yourself pushy sales talk, whether it be on the phone, in person or on an email.
Think how you react to the language associated with selling. You switch off, walk away from the conversation or delete the email without a second thought.
This is because our brains cut off interest if there’s even a whiff of sales talk. This is the same with social media content.
If all you post about is the offers you have on, how great your product is and why your company is the best then you’re making a mistake.
Again you want people to think your product is great and that your companies the best but they want to make that decision on their own.
Your job is to provide them with the content to support these perceptions, share current projects, testimonials, informative guides, and ensure you have the right specification documents available.
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2. Not Using Data The Platforms Give You
Some people aren’t aware or know how to access data that platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn give you. They’re normally located in your settings section and named ‘analytics’.
This data is crucial to you, not only to see what topics are the most popular but which format, time, and platform your audience prefers.
Some advanced analytics might give you information such as ‘Your posts perform better at midday!’ but you may have to work it out for yourself with the data presented to you.
It’s also a good idea to do testing, change the time you post, does it affect its performance? If it improves it then change something else, do people prefer to see it in a video or image format?
You can continually improve how you post on social media by regularly reviewing the results. It will give you a real insight into your audience and help you understand their behaviour on particular platforms.
The easiest way to use analytics, is to do more of what works.
3. Not Interacting With Your Audience
It sounds so simple, but people are conscious of seeing comments posted and doing nothing about them. Even if the comment isn’t directly asking a question or starting a conversation, you should reply as it shows you’re acknowledging it.
Even replying with a ‘thank you!’ shows you’re going out of your way to respond. People appreciate and remember the little things.
It also represents your company as a very friendly one. They might not remember what the post was about but they’ll remember you.
It’s also an opportunity to start a conversation, if people are commenting it means they are active, so ask them a question back to keep the conversation going.
By engaging with your audience on your posts you will increase overall engagement as more people are likely to see your post.
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4. Not Creating Original Content
If you’re never creating anything new then your audience won’t interact or engage as its irrelevant to them, they’ve seen it before.
Create new original content that’s dedicated to your audience having a problem and your service or product being the solution.
You’re more likely to get shares and engagement if the content is high quality and valuable. People will want to share your content if it adds value.
When it comes to content creation, its quality over quantity every time. Producing a great piece of content that hits all your customers pain points will be a lot more popular than general information about your company.
5. Thinking Social Media Is Only For Marketing
Even though the use of social media grows year on year some companies still believe it’s a waste of time and only good for marketing. Social media can be used for so much more than that and is in a lot of companies.
Below is a list of the reasons each department has for using social media.
Marketing:
- Create Brand Awareness
- Reach A New Audience
- Drive Website Traffic
Sales:
- Educate Prospects On Your Specific Product/Service
- Drive More Qualified Leads
- Start Conversations
HR:
- Improve employer branding by sharing work culture
- Connect With Potential Hires
- Increase Job Advertising Reach To A Bigger Audience
Customer Service:
- Address Customer Comments And Questions Directly
- Improves Brand Image When Other People Can See Customers Are Being Responded To
Conclusion
Its always advised how to be great on social media so it can be easy to fall into habits which could be keeping you from reaching your goals.
By assessing the mistakes companies make when using social you can step back and review how you act. Are you ignoring comments, posting irrelevant content and not reviewing the data properly?
If you struggle with social media or want to learn more about how Insynth can help then get in touch today.
About Insynth
As the only HubSpot certified agency to major on construction marketing, we bring together construction marketing strategy, digital strategy, website design, SEO, content marketing, email marketing, sales automation, marketing automation and HubSpot CRM implementation to produce successful campaigns and great results for our clients.