Even before launching a Facebook page or Twitter account for your business, you need to take the time to develop a social media strategy that will help you accomplish the specific goals you have for creating a presence on social media.
Too often businesses rush into creating accounts or pages on social media sites without really having a plan. In order get the most out of social media, you need to put some time and energy into coming up with a strategy that will work for you and your business.
In order to make your social media strategy more effective, follow these five simple tips:
1. Be Consistent. This tip goes hand-in-hand with developing a strategy before launching your social media accounts/pages. In order to have an effective and successful presence on social media, you need to allocate the time and energy it takes to be consistent. This means having a plan for how much time you’re willing to spend managing your social media sites, when you plan on updating your sites, and figuring out what kind of updates you want to share with your community. Once you create a place for people to go to learn more about you and interact with each other, you want to make sure your community isn’t disappointed with the lack of updates you share with them. In order to boost the effectiveness of your social media efforts, your time and engagement on social media should always be consistent.
2. Have Variety. Nothing is worse on social media than seeing the same type of updates or shared content over and over again. If you want to see success with your social media efforts, you need to make it your goal to post about a variety of topics in a variety of ways. Instead of just sending out Facebook or Twitter updates that consist only of text, and are aimed only at selling one of your products, try to publish updates that your followers will find interesting. Publish an update about some recent news in your industry. Ask your followers a question that will spark discussion. Post a relevant YouTube video that you recently watched. The key is to keep your social media pages and profiles looking interesting for the people who are visiting them.
3. Listen. Make sure you have worked enough ‘listening’ time into your social media strategy. You want to make sure that you are taking the time to listen and read what your followers are saying to you on the social media sites you have created pages or profiles on. In some cases what you read will be positive, and in other cases the comments you read might seem more negative. Both cases deserve your attention. It’s essential that you understand that part of having a presence on social media means actually making the efforts to listen to what others have to say about your company or your industry.
4. Respond. Just as you need to make sure you have worked enough ‘listening’ time into your social media efforts, you also need to make sure that you have worked enough ‘responding’ time into your overall social media strategy. Making the effort to respond to what your followers are saying about you or your business on social media will be crucial to the overall success of your presence on social media sites. Whether the comments or questions your followers post on your Facebook page or send to you on Twitter are positive or negative, you should still take time to respond. Your genuine, timely responses will not only help you reach your long-term social media goals, but will also help you improve your online reputation among social media users.
5. Have Fun. If you make the decision to dive into the world of social media for yourself and your business, you have to be able to have fun. Social media exists as a way for the followers/supporters/prospects of businesses and brands to interact with them in a fun and informal way. If you allow yourself to have a little fun when it comes to social media, you’ll notice the changes in the effectiveness of your social media strategies. More people will want to visit your pages, interact with you, send others to your pages, and maybe even buy your product.
I hope you can take all (or parts) of these tips and use them as a way to help make your social media strategy more effective.
Do you have questions or comments about this topic? Do you have any other tips you would like to add? Please leave your questions or comments in the Facebook Comments section below. Thank you!
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