5 Common Social Media Mistakes to Avoid

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Nowadays many businesses have a presence on social media. However as simple as it seems, social media can become a double edged sword…

Used correctly and it can become a useful and solid part of a business’s marketing strategy however used incorrectly it can be actually become damaging to your brand.

There are endless faux-pas to avoid – many of which you will fall foul to and inevitably learn from over time through your own practice experimenting with different posts and by speaking to others.

However whilst you this takes time there are some quick areas you can check and fix to kick your social media onto the right path. Today’s post lists some of the most common slip-ups we have seen when working with small businesses and what you can do to fix them. Any of these seem familiar?

1. Lack of Personality

Social media is supposed to be a social tool. We understand that finding the right balance between personality and professionalism can be difficult. You don’t want your company to come across as a joke but you do want potential customers to warm to you. Your industry and company culture will often dictate the best balance. For example if you run a corporate business people may not trust jokey tweets and memes, whereas this may be more suitable for a fashion brand.

To find the right personality first consider your target market and talk to them in their language. Are they old? Young? Predominantly female? Predominantly male? How does this affect the way you come across? You should also consider the brand’s tone of voice used in other communications such as email and how that can be conveyed on social.

Try and avoid changing the way you speak on each network (that’s a sure fire way to lose your brand voice!) Instead you should be selective in what you post on each channel. Business blogs might be more suitable for LinkedIn whereas videos are more effective for Facebook.

You should also look at your Header and Profile images – Are they high quality? And do they reflect your business properly?

2. Avoiding Advertising

Advertising on social media is an effective way to drive new business. It can be as simple as boosting a post on Facebook or promoting a Tweet on Twitter. Social media advertising is a great choice for small businesses as it can cost as little as £1 a day, it is easy to track results and you can make adverts highly targeted, particularly on LinkedIn and Facebook. If you haven’t yet looked into this as a way to improve your social media channels then you should take some time to look into it this weekend!

3. Lack of Engagement

Similar to point one not engaging with your followers is an easy mistake to avoid. You should be searching your brand name daily – not everyone will tag you directly and you may miss mentions. You can even set up social media tools to help you track anyone who speaks about your brand or products to help you keep on top of who’s mentioning you, and where. Make sure to interact with people who follow you or who comment on your posts.

4. Avoiding Analysis

Without analysis how you can decipher which content is working best? If you haven’t already, have a look at your channel’s insights – many platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn have built in analysis tools to make it easy to see the demographic of your audience, when they are online, when is best to post and your most popular content. You can then use this information to better plan the month ahead. Notice evening posts get more engagement? Then avoid posting in the morning. Updates with photos get more likes make a point to create more visual content.

Like we said in the beginning of this post, the more you share the better knowledge you will gain. Periodically reviewing trends over time (such as every month or three months) will help you to refine your content and understand the habits of your audience to better target them with your posts.

5. Lack of Goals & Targets

Similar to the previous point you need to set out goals with your channels. What are you wanting to achieve with each network and how will you monitor results? Consider making changes to better focus customers into your sales funnel. If you are wanting to promote specific areas of your business consider how social media can be used within or to support that marketing plan. If you want to increase the number of newsletter sign-ups for your website you could run a competition where customers have to join your mailing list for a chance to win. Offer something your company sells or provides as the prize to keep consistency with your company.

Need Help With Social Media Marketing?

If you would like further help improving your business’s social media marketing get in touch with Adeo Group today: info@adeogroup.co.uk

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