5 Sins of Social Media
1). Not posting content
As social media becomes more and more influential in the lives of many, it’s becoming increasingly hard to come up with reasons or excuses as to why your business isn’t posting content regularly. Customers see this as a red flag. A page lacking in content raises questions: Does this business communicate with its online following? Is this company keeping up with the times?
Inconsistent posting is associated with laziness or indifference. Customers might ask, “If a company can’t even manage their Facebook page, will they be able to take care of me when I’m their customer?” This is an easy conflict to overcome. It’s as easy as posting fun, engaging, relevant content and taking back control of your pages. Own your page!
2). Not responding to reviews
There are quite a few explanations as to why business owners don’t think they should respond to customer reviews. Here are some common concerns:
- It doesn’t sound genuine — it sounds fake.
- There’s no point, reviews are going to keep coming in regardless.
- There’s no benefit to responding.
Do the benefits of not responding to reviews outweigh the risk of replying to reviews? The answer is no. By not responding to reviews, you’re still sending a strong message to your customers. The message is that you either don’t care enough to respond, or you’re too busy to respond. Or worse, you don’t care about your customers enough to take care of them after they’ve made their purchases. Responding to reviews is turning into a quintessential part of customer service. It’s not about whether you do it or not, it’s about how well you do it.
To address the common concerns above, customers don’t think that review replies sound fake. Quite the opposite actually. They appreciate when business owners take time out of their day to personally respond to their reviews. Those reviews are for your future customers. They are the ones that will be researching you on your social media channels and seeing how you react with your followers, and more specifically, how you react to conflict.
3). Poor aesthetics
Marketing experts say that you should be updating your landing pages and websites at least every 2 years. When is the last time you’ve updated your website? The same goes for profile pictures and banner/cover photos on Facebook and Twitter. People like to see catchy and engaging images. The good news is that this is the easiest of the 5 sins to fix. It’s as simple as snapping a picture on your smartphone and updating your pictures across the platforms. No one wants to see a vertical picture of your storefront that you captured on your flip phone 6 years ago.
4). Only posting ads, services, products, and promotions
While it’s a good idea to use social media as a platform to promote your services, products and specials, it’s a bad idea to only post this type of content. Imagine that you are following your dentist’s Facebook page but she only posts content about the price of root canals and specials on veneers. How long would you follow this page before you got tired of all the ads and services being thrown into your face?
People want to see fun, engaging, local and memorable content. Don’t be afraid to mix it up! Promotional posts are okay, but you should try to limit these types of posts to 1–2 times per week.
There are even dental pages that are crushing it on social media by engaging with their followers, asking for feedback about their experience and responding to reviews! Keep in mind, no one likes going to the dentist.
5). Not giving your followers an incentive to keep following
Having page followers is great, because these people opt in to see your content. They can comment, like and share your content with their friends. But, just because they are followers today, doesn’t mean they’ll stay followers tomorrow. You must give them a reason to stay.
One idea is to offer exclusive promotions to certain platforms like Twitter only or Facebook only specials. Another great idea is to run contests and giveaways. Followers are appreciative of pages that make an effort to engage them and offer them something unique. You should provide your followers with a sense of value that they can associate with your pages.
Don’t let one of these small sins cost your business sales, leads, followers, and conversions!
Optimize Social Media provides social media & reputation solutions that evolve with our clients. As social media experts we manage Facebook, Twitter, Google, Yelp, YouTube and Instagram accounts for our clients on a daily basis. We help the modern business owner implement a specialized social media strategy so that they can make more money in real life. Enjoy our blog.
