If your Twin Cities business has an ongoing social media campaign but you're not seeing the results you expected or were promised, you're not alone. Using social media to benefit your business isn't easy. In fact, it's very difficult. These days, it seems as though everyone who knows how to use a web browser and Facebook is hanging out their shingle as a social media specialist. The reality is that most social media specialists haven't a clue what they're doing.
I've been creating content for small business websites since 1995, and have seen many trends come and go. Social media is just one of those trends. While it can be very useful to small businesses, it can also be completely useless if it's done incorrectly. In this blog, I'll be helping small businesses of all types to understand how social media campaigns do and don't work, and why applying part of your marketing budget to a failing strategy can cause more harm than good. Here are some of the reasons small business social media efforts fail:
- Poor Concept - Social media works for small businesses differently, depending on the nature of the business. A hardware store or service business needs a completely different social media campaign than a restaurant or entertainment venue. Getting the concept right is the first step toward success. Getting it wrong is the first step toward wasting your social media budget.
- Misdirection - Far too many social media campaigns miss the point. You've spend large amounts of money developing a website that brings business to your door. If your social media campaign doesn't lead people to your website, you're wasting that resource. For success, all social media campaigns should have one primary goal: Bringing visitors to your carefully-designed website, so it can do its job.
- Poor Quality of Content - If your social media content, on blogs, networking sites, and other social media outlets is of poor quality, that directly affects the results. There are a number of social media companies who want to sign you up for a contract that will supply content. Did you know that their writers are being paid just a few cents per word? Their writers are not professional writers and often produce content that is incorrect or is poorly written and full of errors.
- Lack of Continuity - Using a typical social media content provider almost always means that every posting produced is written by a different person, and edited very little. What that means is that your social media content doesn't speak with a consistent voice and lacks continuity from posting to posting.
- Poor SEO Efforts - Effective Search Engine Optimization is crucial to the success of any social media campaign. Since the entire point of social media is to attract and drive people to your website, effective SEO in your social media content is absolutely essential. Sadly, SEO efforts from most social media providers are limited and ineffective.
Effective Social Media is Customized Social Media
Social media content, created by a professional writer specifically for your type of business and targeted directly to your potential customers is social media that works. A campaign by such a professional will eliminate all of the issues listed above, and your professional social media provider will understand your business and your goals.
If your current social media campaign doesn't seem to be paying it's way, Email Me for a free, no-obligation review of your current social media efforts. After getting some information from you, I'll review all of your social media outlets and report back to you, with suggestions. See the links in the left column for examples of my website and blog content work. Let me show you how your social media efforts can do the job you expect them to do.
