In these modern times, social media platforms hold a sizeable space in the eCommerce industry. Social media channels are now widely used as a marketing tool for many businesses. In this article, we will talk about 10 social media best practices that you can employ on your marketing strategy and 10 social media mistakes you must really avoid.
10 Social Media Marketing Mistakes
They say that even bad publicity is still publicity. Nevertheless, in today's highly-technological times, it can really be hard to change your brand image once it has been tarnished. Here are 10 social media mistakes that can do that and that you must avoid.
1. Going In Without A Plan
Because social media is fairly easy to use, it is one of the most social media marketing mistakes to go in without a proper plan. Businesses often fall into the trap of just making an account, then posting randomly. This is a mistake that you can make on any of the social media platforms. It is a mistake because the ease that comes with using these social media channels as a marketing tool does not change the fact that it still has corresponding algorithms and systems that you have to learn about. If you just post randomly, this marketing strategy of yours won’t work as well as you expect it to.
2. Making It All About You Only
One of the most common social media mistakes that you can make is to focus solely on your business and your products. While marketing and promotions revolve around promoting you, you have to be mindful of the fact that social media platforms are meant for socializing. Thus, if you cannot consider your audience or anyone else for that matter, then you will post a lot of social media marketing mistakes.
3. Being Too Stiff and Formal
Social media channels are usually frequented by friends and family. While it is not always with positive interactions between everyone, it serves the purpose of being a communication channel for everyone. You will fill your account with social media mistakes if you do not know how to relax and be carefree. Try to remember that you are on these social media platforms to market and communicate. No one would want to listen and interact with you if you’re posting statements that can be mistaken to come from robots or AI.
4. Having No Target Audience
As they say, “You can’t please everyone.” This is especially true regarding business and marketing. And if you keep attempting to prove this to be wrong, then you would just get exhausted trying to please everyone, only to fail in the end. In addition, wanting to please everyone and not having a target audience are both social media mistakes that you would want to avoid. They both often just lead to wasted efforts and frustrated exhaustion. However, having no target audience can be much worse because it means that you don’t have a specific path in mind. A target audience defines how you would do your business and tailor your marketing strategy so it truly is one of the worst social media marketing mistakes you don’t want to make.
5. Posting One Content Across Social Media Platforms
While it may seem like the most practical way to go, it just isn’t as helpful as you might think it is. Posting one content in all sites is one of the most common social mistakes that businesses make. What they fail to realize is that when they do this, then they only tailor their content to one type of algorithm and one type of audience. They fail to consider that all social media channels are run differently and are frequented by different types of users. In the end, their marketing attempts just turn into social media marketing mistakes.
6. Overposting/Spam
As a social media user and a business owner, you’d want to be constantly active. It is truly important to be active in these social media channels. However, an overload of posts is just social media mistakes piled up. Too much of anything won’t do much good and it can even be significantly harmful when we’re talking about social media marketing mistakes. If you post too much, and it is similar to each other, then it might irritate your followers and cause them to unfollow and dislike your account/page.
7. Not Engaging With Your Audience
Remember that creating the image that you are not engaging with your audience is one of the gravest social media mistakes you’d want to avoid making. Don’t just post and post and story repeatedly. Invest some time and effort into forging genuine connections with your audience. Converse and interact with them as much as you can. Social media channels were created to bring people together.
8. Hiding/Deleting Bad Comments
We understand that bad comments are disappointing and saddening to read. And it can look even worse in a marketing aspect. However, hiding and deleting bad comments are surely social media mistakes and you don’t want to do them, no matter how tempting it sounds. What you can do instead is to respond kindly and patiently to these comments. If word spreads that you have ignored and deleted a comment, then you could be sent towards a web of lies and excuses, which would ultimately lead to more social media marketing mistakes.
9. Ignoring Influencers
Not everyone appreciates and recognizes the amount of success that influencers are earning. All the people, especially those that are business owners, that belong in that category don’t know it yet, but they are making social media mistakes. Social media platforms are usually where these influencers thrive and it would surely be a mistake to not take advantage of them. Don’t be one of those people that don’t even attempt to partner with influencers because they would realize that they are making social media marketing mistakes as they let a day pass without partnering with an influencer to promote their business.
10. Not Staying Updated
Contrary to popular belief, there are a lot of factors that go into social media marketing. And so, there are also so many social media mistakes that you can make along the way. One of which is not staying up to date with the current trends. If you do not keep up with what’s “in” for your audience in the various social media platforms, then any of your marketing strategies will not really work effectively because it is not up to date. It won’t get noticed as much as you want it to.
10 Social Media Tips That Can Help Your Business
1. Feature Behind The Scenes Action
If you like posting videos and photos or even snapping a shot or short clips to post on your story regularly, then it might be a good idea for you to feature behind-the-scenes videos or photos of what you post every day. However, posting them on social media channels immediately after you post the real one or after a long period can both be social media mistakes because they will not be appreciated anymore. Behind the scenes, action, or even bloopers will be entertaining and worth watching if posted at the right time and on the right social media channels.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
2. Celebrate Your Customer’s Success
One of the social media best practices that are under-used and underappreciated is businesses celebrating their customers’ successes. While it would be one of the most offensive social media mistakes to intrude on a customer’s personal life, it’s a whole different story if they purposely share with you their success. It might be in the form of “thank you” because your business helped them reach their success. No matter what, you can do well in hyping them up to your other followers and congratulating them on your social media channels.
3. Cross-promote Your Content
Posting one content on all social media platforms was mentioned as one of the social media mistakes. In contrast to that, what you can do is to cross-promote your content across social media channels. This means that you promote a part of the content of your website on your social media platforms or vice versa. This would allow you not to repeat your posts and diversify your feed.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
4. Keep Up With the Trends
The last of the social media mistakes we mentioned above is to not be updated. Thus, it is only right that one of our social media tips is to keep up with the trends. This means staying up to date with what is currently trending across all social media platforms and joining the trend for the promotion of your products.
5. Be Inclusive and Friendly
Inclusivity is a vital part of your image in any social media channels. While having exclusive content is usually a part of your marketing strategy, being inclusive in the sense that you find ways to accommodate everyone with your products and services is one of the social media best practices. This means that you acknowledge that everyone’s equal and that no matter where they come from or what they look like, you value them just the same.
6. Be Proactive About Social Issues
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
The social media best practices of today have to include standing up for social issues. It means that because you have a voice in all of these social media platforms, you are seen by the netizens to have the responsibility to speak up, take a stand, and even to take action. Doing nothing can be one of the social media mistakes that you can make because you would then be seen as indifferent and people will also lose interest in following you any longer.
7. Interact With Your Customers
Contrary to one of the social media mistakes listed above, this is one of the most basic social media best practices. Interacting and conversing with your customers is a basic necessity you have to fulfill whenever you are on any of the social media platforms. And if you don’t want your social media marketing activities to not become social media mistakes. You can even bring your live messenger chat on your website.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
8. Take Advantage of Live Videos
Going live can be one of the social media best practices you will ever engage in if you can do it naturally and joyfully. But if you would just be awkward and if you would just force things to happen for you to go live on your social media platforms, then it may just turn into just another one of your social media mistakes. Videos customers watch really tend to make an impact on them.
9. Include a Social Feed On Your Website
Having a website for your business and integrating social media into your website may just be a couple of the social media best practices you can use for your business. You can not only put social media icons that would lead your customers to your social media channels, you can also add a social media feed on your website. This would display on your website the latest posts you have on your social media feed.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
10. Remember That Each Post Matters
Social media is a place where just one post can lead to a domino effect of never-ending social media mistakes. People can easily screenshot any of your posts and share them again using their accounts. This could discourage people from following you anymore or, in modern-day slang, lead you to be "canceled".
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
Using social media for your business can be a good marketing strategy but it can also really harm you if not done correctly. We hope that this list of social media mistakes we have given you would lead you to be more aware of your activities on any of the social media platforms. On the other hand, Strikingly is a website builder that can help you with a lot of the items in our list of social media tips. Sign up now and conquer the world of eCommerce and social media.
