Even the most informed website owners commit a large number of mistakes on social media. Social media grows every day and with it, the requirements for a successful marketing strategy for your product changes. Mistakes you do along the way can cost you, your customers & fans, and decrease your reach. But, being aware of those mistakes and knowing how to make things right can do the exact opposite, and help you sell your product more than you ever planned for.
Social media marketing is done all around and by many. This gives you access to all kinds of information to learn from, so why not take this into an advantage. The best way to learn what not to do is to learn what others did and failed by doing it. Thankfully, so many people use social media and make mistakes on it!
Speaking of mistakes, there are several common ones done by the majority of sellers on social media. If you want to boost instead of sink the product on the most popular social media channels, here is what you should NOT do.
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1. Avoiding Negative Feedback
The number of brands online who make this mistake is huge, and the effects are often detrimental for their success. When you see a negative comment on one of your social media channels, do you avoid it or respond to it?
The right answer is the second. Negative feedback can indeed spoil your product’s reputation, but this does not mean that you should avoid or delete it. On the opposite, a good brand will look at such comments as an opportunity to improve and communicate with their customers. That’s one of the many pros of social media – allowing you to know what your customers need and want from your business by receiving their feedback.
2. Not Tracking Analytics
If you want your social media marketing strategy to succeed, you must track analytics! Without insights into how your strategy is progressing or declining, you cannot aim it in the right direction. The success of your marketing and SEO campaigns can be easily measured with the help of analytics software.
This is something that makes your job easier, not harder. Stop looking at tools like Google Analytics as another thing to spend your limited time on. Instead, look at it as your secret tool for a more successful strategy. With analytics, you can boost both sales and leads.
3. Focusing on Quantity
This is very, very wrong. Your goal as a successful business owner or manager must be quality, not quantity. When it comes to social media activity, the right idea is to be active as much as possible. However, this is often misinterpreted at posting content all the time, which often results in poor quality.
When it comes to posting things on social media, yes, you should be active to keep your audience and attract new followers and buyers. However, focusing on quantity over quality can have the opposite effect.
4. Posting on Every Social Media Platform
Being active on social media is a necessity for businesses nowadays, but not if it costs you your reputation. This mistake is closely related to the previous mistake. When you aim to post on every social media platform, you lose focus and can lose customers in the process.
Fewer social media channels mean more focus and better quality. Remember – not every piece of content or multimedia belongs to every channel, meaning that you must have different social media strategies for different social media platforms. Instead of publishing the same on all, it is better to post on chosen social media platforms.
Every platform you choose to post on will mean extra time spent on planning the posts, answering messages and feedback, and communicating with customers. If you have the time, you should definitely do this. If you don’t, follow the previously mentioned tip – quality over quantity. Meaning? It means that you should choose the most promising platforms and post only there.
5. Posting Low-Quality Content
In the hurry to post more and attract more audience, do you post stolen or low-quality content? If the answer is yes, stop doing this! All content on your social media channels should be user-generated, original, and relevant. Posting any kind of content won’t help you grow an audience and can do the very opposite – chase your current audience away.
By curating content your target audience would be interested in reading, you are boosting your chances of selling the product. Focus on the target audience when planning to post on social media. This is the only way to be truly noticed.
6. Not Using Multimedia
Content is king, but it simply won’t suffice if you want your strategy to work. Every popular platform allows you to post videos, infographics, and photos in addition to content, so why not do this for your product?
In fact, a research has shown that native videos on Facebook get ten times more shares than those on YouTube. Make your social media platforms different from others. Combine content and multimedia for the best results, and you will be noticed much faster and more often than before.
7. Not Targeting Your Audience
Aiming to get as much audience as possible is a fine idea, but aiming to get any followers is very wrong. Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of targeting any audience at all, believing that this will increase their sales and revenue more than focusing on a targeted audience.
A too general audience won’t share the interest in your product as a targeted audience would. After all, you are aiming to get your product sold, so who better to aim your strategy toward than those who need it?
Instead of just posting content and multimedia with the goal to make sales, find the target audience and create a strategy that would reach exactly that group of people.
8. Boosting the Wrong Posts
Your top-performing posts should be on the top of your list when you consider which posts to boost on social media. You can’t just go boosting posts based on your gut. If a post did well by your audience, this is what you should make your priority.
Don’t forget about old posts, too. Some of your followers might have missed your popular posts, so make sure to re-post whenever possible. Don’t exaggerate, but also don’t let those be forgotten.
9. Avoiding Your Followers
This may come as surprise, but most brands ignore the people who send them messages through social media. What’s the result?
According to the same research, 70% of your followers are more likely to get your product if you respond to their questions. It is only natural – the reason why you entered the world of social media is to promote your product. That being said, you should never ignore the questions or communication attempts by interested buyers.
You may also like: Tips to Incorporate Great Content in Your Social Media Marketing Strategy.
Final Words
Have you done these mistakes in your social media strategy? If you answered yes to at least one, it is time to change! Avoid these mistakes to be able to sell your product and don’t let silly errors be the reason for your marketing strategy to fail.
This article is written by Susan Saurel. She is a passionate writer from Texas. Also, she is in love with traveling. Teacher of higher category, a writer for EssayWritingLand, PM in an IT company in the past, lovely mom. Susan wants to share her experience and knowledge with readers and she has something to say, for sure.
