The fact that you’ve found this blog tells me that you’re probably frustrated with social media and you’re not getting the results you expected.

Am I close? Before you get completely discouraged, let’s run a few simple diagnostics to get an idea of where the snags may be happening.

Do you have a social media plan?

Often I talk to business owners who don’t think social media is working for their business, but when we dig in we learn that there’s no plan, nor clarity on what success looks like. Before you jump online, your first stop should be a social media plan. Your plan should include goals that relate to your overall business objective. For example, if you’re a new business, maybe you want to increase brand awareness. Social media can help support that objective, but you’ve got to set goals. What is your baseline? What are your benchmarks? What does success look like?

How well do you know your audience?

Often times we don’t think social media is working because we look at vanity metrics ( things such as ‘likes’ on a page or follower numbers.) While these numbers may be a good temperature check, they don’t tell the full story. Instead, your focus should be on engagement such as comments and shares. A few times I’ve been asked to take a look at a business page because owners were worried that it wasn’t working. What I typically find is that they do well engaging their audience, even if their fan or follower numbers seem low. When you know your audience, you can give them what they want and expect. For example, if you’re a comedy club, your audience probably expects you to be light, funny and entertaining; so you shouldn’t be surprised if you get negative feedback from political rants or posts that have nothing do with your business.

Are you consistent? 

Part of your plan should outline the social media channels you will tackle, the types of content you will create or curate and the frequency at which you will share. This is how you will avoid ‘spray and pray’ (posting random stuff to your business sites hoping something will hit a home run and resonate with your audience.) I use a content calendar (also known as an editorial calendar) to make sure that I consistently stay on track with relevant information for my people. This information should be 70-80% purely educational (no promotions) and add value to your audience. Beyond the type of content, you need to make sure that you’re sharing consistently. Checking in every few months won’t help you nurture a community online, nor will scheduling content. Using scheduling tools is an efficient and effective way to make sure you’re consistent but you still need to check in and engage.

Are your products and services what you say they are? 

This is something we have to talk about. The online world makes us vulnerable and exposes our organizations to feedback that we may not have even been aware of.  So if your products or services are crap – this isn’t a social media problem, it’s not a marketing problem, it’s a business problem. If people aren’t following you online or they’re only engaging with you to express their disappointment in your business, your problem isn’t social media. And no matter what you do, how much effort or money you throw at it, it won’t fix anything. Look, being told that your product or service isn’t as great as you thought it was, can be difficult to hear (I’m human too – no one likes to be criticized!) But it can also be beneficial. Reviews and negative feedback can give us intelligence and insights on how to improve. (Or we can totally just ignore it and blame social media…)

Where do I go from here?

If you’ve determined that your product or service is not the problem, your first step is to put together a social media and digital marketing plan. To get started with your plan, you must consider what success looks like. Success should be aligned with your overall business objectives. What do you want to accomplish with social media? How can social media support your overall business objectives and goals? Remember that social media doesn’t stand on its own; you need an integrated approach to marketing, which includes total understanding of your brand story. If you want step-by-step guidance on putting a plan together, check out this older blog.

Critical pieces of your social media + digital marketing plan:

Goal Setting
Content
Measurement
Paid Advertisements
Key Performance Indicators
Tactics
Key Tools + Resources
Other Blogs:

Get Started With Social Media Management
What is a social media competitive analysis and why does my small business need one?
How should businesses create a plan for social media and how will they track their success?
Social media training: where to start

Do you need help with marketing? Let’s chat!