Nowadays, rarely do we find people that are not connected to at least one platform on social media, whether it is Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. It’s unimaginable that a business is not promoting itself digitally. It’s almost as if it’s mandatory to be using these media platforms that can do wonders for your company. Many people are spending time scrolling down in their newsfeed and are literally bombarded with news and advertisements. That means that your target audience most probably is using these platforms and you can get their attention there. But, you have to avoid making the most common mistakes in social media promotion.
Most businesses take advantage of social media for their promotion, however, not all of them are successful in getting customers there. It is not enough to just create profiles of your business on different platforms as there are certain tricks and tips you need to follow to get the most exposure and the best results. Most importantly you have to know what NOT TO DO to avoid making the most common mistakes that a company can do while trying to promote itself on social media.
1. Incomplete profiles and low quality cover photo
When you have decided that you are going to use social media to promote your business, naturally the first step in doing this is to create a profile of your company on each platform that you are planning to use. One of the most common mistakes in social media that a business can do is not completing the profiles, or in other words not giving enough information about the company, the services that it is offering, and contact information. On top of that, if the cover photo that you choose for your profile does not tell people what your company is all about or it doesn’t support your brand, your company won’t be noticed at all in the social media world.
To avoid this from happening, spend some time in choosing the most suitable picture that would portray your business in the best way and give as much information as possible, so your audience can find you easily and understand your brand.
2. Promotion without a social media marketing strategy
This is a mistake that many companies do when promoting on social media. Their idea is just to be present and people to hear about them but they don’t really have a precise plan on how to do that. They don’t have a schedule. You need to have a strategy about how you are going to present your business to your audience. In order for you to prepare this strategy, there are a few questions that you need to ask yourself and use the answers as your guide. For example:
- What are your goals?
- What is your Target Audience?
- Which will be your tactics?
- How much time and money are you going to invest in it?
- Do you have the right team with the same vision that will work on your goals?
If you don’t have the strategy prepared, your team will just be wasting time posting and sharing on social media without any results.
3. Inactivity on your profiles
Now that you have your strategy you can’t allow yourself to leave your followers for days without any news from you. It’s a huge mistake to neglect your profile. Whenever a person goes on a page and sees that the last post was published a month ago, they lose interest. If you post regularly, you have more chances to engage with your audience and get their interest. You will also look professional.
4. Bad content is a huge mistake in social media
This is another mistake that can happen when you are trying to avoid being inactive. You shouldn’t post just for the sake of posting. Bad content won’t target your audience and it will make your page look “all over the place”. Always dedicate more time to the content on your profiles. This is what makes people want to read more about you and follow you. Your audience will be happy to have you in their news feed and would even sign up to read more if you have something good to tell them.
5. The content doesn’t create engagement and shares
If this happens then you are doing something wrong. As mentioned earlier, it’s crucial to create great content, but you also need to know how to serve this to your audience. If you just write a post and it’s not catchy for the eye, people might not read it and wouldn’t realize its quality.
To avoid this, always use good quality photos in your posts – this is what always catches the attention of the audience. Everyone will be enticed to click on a post if they see an interesting photo – that is of course related to your content. Also, you must be very careful with clickbait posts as even though people will click on them, they would lose interest once they see the content. Your company may lose its credibility in the eyes of the tricked potential customers.
6. Your brand doesn’t have a personality
This might sound crazy, but your page on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or any other platform needs to be people’s friend. You need to give it a personality. Your audience needs to feel as if they are talking to one person and get all the answers they need. Also, you need to make sure that you are engaging with your audience – answer the questions in the comments, ask them questions in your posts, and motivate them to click on your page and find out why you are so great.
7. Your page shows that you want only sales and likes
At first, you might say – well that’s logical, everyone who creates a page or profile for a business has the same goal. That is true, but your audience shouldn’t read only that on your page. Don’t forget to put yourself in your fan’s shoes and find out what they would like to read and see.
If every post is a call to action, this might put them off because they would feel like they are just a number for you. What you need is a person who would follow your brand and be treated well by you.
For example, if you have a page where you sell products online, make sure that you have a few informative posts. Not all of them should be asking your followers to buy something from you. Give them more information about your company, about the trends in your industry and just write about something that is interesting for your readers.
8. You want to be present on all social media platforms
This is impossible. Yes, you can create your profile on every platform that exists, but you definitely won’t have the time to dedicate to each and every one of them. We mentioned earlier in this article that one of the most common mistakes is having an inactive profile. Well, this would happen to you if you want to be present on every social media platform. It is a lot of work to create content and engage with your followers on 10 platforms. You must carefully choose your platforms and be active only on those where your target audience is. For example, you can’t publish the same content on Facebook and on LinkedIn. Facebook is a more casual platform where you can publish informative and funny posts, but LinkedIn is more of a professional network where the audience wouldn’t be happy with seeing the same posts as on Facebook. For that reason, it’s best to choose 3 or 4 platforms where you can dedicate enough time for each to present your brand.
9. Fake followers
When you go to a page and see that it has over a million followers you would think “Wow, this page must be very good and probably has many buyers”. Well, this is not always the case. Many people buy fake followers, just to look like they have a big audience. This might help at first, but this won’t give you a great picture of how many real followers you have and how many people are really interested in what you have to say or sell.
Sometimes, going slow and steady can be the better way to go than go fast and fail quickly. People want the truth and authenticity.
10. Lack of customer service
We already mentioned this, but it is so important that it has to be pointed out again. You need to engage with your audience, find out what they like and dislike, answer their questions, and give them the support they need. The loyal customer comes from successful customer service. If they feel that they have someone that will solve any problem they have, they will come back to you every time.
To sum up, creating a social media marketing strategy is not as easy as it seems. You need to remember that you need to be original and have a defined brand. And not only that, you need to know how to present it to your audience. Make sure that you spend enough time on creating content, publishing it, and engaging with your followers. The success will come by itself if you follow these guidelines and avoid these common mistakes.