Social media offers businesses the incredible opportunity to digitally connect with a target audience and nurture those potential clients into customers. No matter where your business location is, you can use social media to generate brand awareness, uncover leads, develop sales, and grow revenue.
Social media marketing starts with a firm understanding of how, when, where, and what to post. As expected, social media efforts fall flat for those who don’t take the time to learn the basics. Let’s review the most common social media marketing mistakes businesses make.
Inconsistent Posting & Interaction
Picture this; you have an item you want to purchase online from a relatively unknown company. You hop over to their social media pages to look at reviews and notice that they haven’t been active on their page for over a month. You also see they haven’t responded to comments on many of their posts. Does their inconsistency in posting and general unresponsiveness sway your desire to buy from them? For many, it does.
Spending a few hours each week to develop content for your business can create a professional presence that your customers desire. Furthermore, scheduling 20-30 minutes each day to respond to comments or messages will help create a positive experience for current and potential clients.
Content Overload
While inconsistent posting is a no-no in the world of social media, posting too often can do just as much damage to your company’s image. There’s a fine line between remaining active, relevant, and present on social platforms versus spewing out content without a proper strategy.
Many businesses feel that posting multiple content pieces per day will attract more leads. When, in fact, posting too often can be a significant turn-off to prospects. If you’re filling up followers’ news feeds with content that isn’t engaging or valuable, you may notice that you’re receiving more unfollows than follows.
There is no rule of thumb related to the number of times you should post on social media each day. However, you can review analytics and insights detailing your audience’s engagement rates, which will help you decide whether to ramp up your content posting or dial it back.
Pro Tip: Quality content that is insightful, engaging, and provides value for the consumer will always do well on social platforms.
Branding Inconsistencies
Your company’s brand is much more than a logo or a tagline. It’s the tone that your organization uses to connect with followers. It’s the imagery, layout, colors, and overall design of the content. Ultimately, it’s the way consumers recognize your business online.
Not every business invests the time to learn how to efficiently and effectively market their brand online, however. Unfortunately, this results in companies using multiple color schemes, writing styles, or tones in their content, which ultimately confuses followers.
To keep your social media on-brand, consider being consistent with:
- Logo usage and placement
- Social Banners
- Bio/About Sections
- Tone or Brand Voice
- Social Handles
Showing up on social platforms with a consistent brand identity will ultimately lead to improved visibility of your products or services. In a competitive digital world, brand recognition is imperative for business growth.
Too Much Self-Promotion
People flock to business pages on social media to learn about products or services, not to view a sales pitch. Yet, as we scroll through our news feeds, we see post after post with promotional offers and sales-driven text. It’s a massive turn-off for many who have a genuine interest in your products or services.
Although we expect a business to highlight its products or services, promotional posts should be a small percentage of your overall social strategy. Instead, you should focus on engaging your audience to learn more about why they follow your brand. You can then create content that speaks to those key insights, making your followers resonate on an even deeper level with your content and brand.
Conclusion
Although there are no rules of engagement regarding how to represent your business on social media, there is a lot to be said about having a content strategy. A little planning and careful execution will create loyal followers and long-term customers.
We understand that not all businesses have the resources available to commit to a consistent social media strategy. Lead Revenue takes all the guesswork out of social media, offering a complete suite of services to perfect your social media presence, creating an influx of leads and loyal followers. Are you ready to step into the digital age with Lead Revenue?
