This week I have been preparing for some Social Media Training that I will shortly be delivering. During this preparation, the subject that kept coming up for me time and time again was around strategy and efficient application with your effort at social media in business.

Do you feel like you are always on Twitter? Jump straight onto Facebook when you get a notification? Have you had any actual work from your Social Media efforts? Social Media is not free, it costs you time in updating it and coming up with content.

I’ll look more into the application and how you can get social media to earn it’s keep at the end of this post.

If you have never explored social media as part of your online marketing strategy to ‘promote’ products & services then you are in the right place to learn a thing or 2. Social media is not suited to every business and requires a different approach depending on your line of business.

 

  • Be very clear on your brand identity and ensure you follow it through to social media consistently.
  • Don’t hard sell your products and services, social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are for keeping your fans, VIP clients and followers informed.
  • Be prepared to interact consistently. It’s called social media for a reason!
  • Give something back; most successful companies use their social media to give exclusive discount codes, competitions and special offers for new products and services.
  • Like with all online marketing don’t forget to measure the results to give feedback and help make improvements for the future.
  • Be patient, it takes time to create online brand awareness and build lasting business relationships.

 

So how about making sure that social media earns it’s keep? To do this well you need to;

Know who you are targeting and go to where they are!

There is no point having a Facebook page if your customers are business professionals in suits as they are probably on LinkedIn. Know your demographic and head to the platforms that you are comfortable with using and that they are on too.

 

Pick your preferred Social Media platform and do that very well.

You have very limited time and not every platform requires you to be on it, just because it’s there. There is nothing worse than a business that has a profile on every platform where none of them are filled in properly or updated.

 

Set aside specific times each day to check and update your social media and then turn it off the rest of the time.

Try and devote 15 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the afternoon to Social Media otherwise you will disappear into the time-wasting black hole!

 

Try to gauge when your best times to post are and what type of posts work best for you.

Yes the algorithms will work against you, but you need to be in it to win it in most cases for social media and the more content the better in some cases.

 

Track your progress

Write down where the wins come from on the back of your social media efforts – You will be surprised to learn what connected you, got the sale or how you ended up saying yes to attending an event. This will help you to focus when you start this process all over again!

If you like what you have read, or are abit confused, or now need some tea and cake – Then get in touch! Use the Contact Me form on this website and I’ll get right back to you!