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Social Media Marketing: What Not To Do
There is plenty of advice out there about how to use social media marketing to your advantage. There are so many methods to learn about when you’re using Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ etc that sometimes companies forget about what not to do. There are many common mistakes people make when using social media for business marketing, and many of them can be pretty costly.
To avoid undoing all the good work you’ve done, here are just some of the top social media no-nos.
No Spamming: A good rule of thumb with social media is this: if someone hasn’t asked you for information on your products then don’t send it to them. Spamming is becoming an increasing problem in the social media networks but this really isn’t the place for it. Leave advertising for other mediums: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc should be the place for interacting with others, building up business contacts, sharing information and gaining knowledge. Just establishing yourself as a useful person to know in the industry can do wonders for your business – but if you try to bombard other users with spam they will quickly block you from their feeds.
Don’t Be Inconsistent: It’s no good posting comments or participating in discussions several times in one week and then staying quiet for a month. If you’re going to take the trouble to engage in social media for business then you need to make it a regular thing. For the best results you should be trying to make yourself a familiar presence. Try to post something, however small, at least every other day.
Don’t Be One-Sided: If you want to win lots of followers, then you have to be a follower too. Sign up for newsfeeds that are relevant to you and comment on other people’s posts. This will create awareness of your online presence and should hopefully lead to potential business contacts signing up to your feed – provided, of course, that your comments and updates and useful, knowledgeable and relevant.
Don’t Get Carried Away: By this, I mean that you shouldn’t become so absorbed with your social media marketing that you completely abandon offline marketing. Social media is only one piece of the complete package and it’s absolutely vital that you maintain a good balance. Make sure you leave aside some resources for advertising, promotional event, trade fairs etc. Or why not combine the two by looking for opportunities to integrate your social media with offline marketing?
Don’t Hire The Wrong Marketer: You may well need to hire a marketing expert to teach you how to use social media to your best advantage. But remember, your marketing will only be as good as the team that implements it so make sure you take your time choosing just the right person. Many people will try to dazzle you with technical terms but won’t actually have the skills to back up what they say. If possible, find someone that comes with a personal recommendation or is willing to give you references for previous satisfied clients.