Failing at social media marketing

One of the most common phrases I hear is “social media doesn’t provide my business any true ROI”. Well, maybe you’re not going about it the right way. I mean, we all want immediate results, right? Social media has never worked that way and we live in a culture that refuses to respond to brands that constantly sell you. Ever consider providing valuable content before you ask to do business? This sets the narrative that you’re more about relationships and developing trust in advance of asking for the sale.

If you’ve been on social media for any amount of time it’s quite obvious that people don’t want to be constantly marketed to. As businesses we have to adopt our communication style to this consumer and their particular behaviors on each social media platform. Please don’t get me wrong, I believe in asking for the sale but you must give value first. This can include helpful tactics, free white papers, fun posts about your company culture, client testimonials and endless other possibilities that establish a trusted following.

Content has to be well thought out and professional in appearance. To get started, you don’t have to spend enormous graphic design fees but it can’t look completely amateur either. There are some easy-to-use graphic design websites (e.g. www.canva.com) for beginners.

Distribution is just as important as content development. Each social media platform has differing audiences and the posts have to be customized for each network. Hootsuite is a great tool for organizing your strategy but you need to create scheduled posts based on the specific demographic and functionality of each social media network. A single post launched to all your social sites is a terrible idea.

Final thought — you can have success in social media marketing but know it’s a LONG-TERM investment and takes hard, hard work.

Connect on twitter at englisheric or our agency site at www.creativewhy.com