The prospect of using social media for business can be daunting. However, having a social media presence is something that today’s consumers expect from brands, which means that a lack of it usually rings alarm bells.
But simply having a social media presence is not enough; you need to know how to use it properly and stay on top of best practices if you want it to impress your customers and yield a strong ROI. When used and managed properly, social media can help boost brand awareness for your business, drive traffic to your website, grow your customer base and even increase revenue.
With these attractive prospects in mind, we have compiled a list of the top 6 social media dos and don’ts to help you avoid common mistakes and get the most out of your social media business profile.
1 – DO set clear goals and objectives
If you’re looking to achieve a strong ROI from your business social media activities then you need to start by setting clear objectives. These should reflect and complement your overall business goals, and can be anything from driving conversions to building brand awareness and improving customer experience. Setting numerical values and deadlines can also help keep you focused – for example, you could set an objective to increase landing page traffic by 20% by the end of the next business quarter.
Without setting clear goals to measure against, you will never truly know if your social media activity is having any tangible effects and, even if it is, you won’t be able to prove it.
2 – DO analyse and track activity
As you’ve set goals and objectives for your social media performance, it follows that you should also have an established system for analysing and tracking your activity and results. There are many different tools and social media management platforms to help you do this, including Hootsuite, Sprout Social, Socialbakers, Google Analytics and, of course, the built-in analytics tools on each social media platform. With these tools you can track everything from engagement (clicks, likes, shares, comments) to referral traffic, assisted conversions and revenue, plus a whole lot more.
Measurement is potentially the most crucial ‘DO’ in using social media for business. It can help you prove your successes, guide future campaigns and pinpoint any failures so you can learn and quickly change direction if necessary.
3 – DO make good use of social media advertising and promoted content
There are two ways to use social media for business: organic (which is free to use and publish) and paid. Paid social media is an extremely cost-effective method of promoting your business, costing a fraction of the price of traditional advertising methods. Paying just a few pounds can significantly boost the reach of your social media posts and content, ensuring it is seen by more of the right people at the right times and in the right places. Assuming the posts you’re promoting contain useful content with clear calls to action, this additional exposure can help drive more conversions and revenue for your business than if you relied on organic social media posts alone.
THAT’S ALL FOR THE DOS, NOW LET’S MOVE ON TO THE DON’TS…
4 – DON’T overdo it
Posting too often on your business social profiles can be just as harmful as not posting often enough. According to research by Sprout Social, 46% of social media users will unfollow a brand for posting too many promotional messages on their profiles, which means you need to restrict your output or risk losing customers.
5 – DON’T use all social media platforms for the sake of it
Not all platforms are necessarily going to complement or suit your business type, ethos or objectives. You should avoid setting up profiles across all channels just for the sake of having a presence there, as this can dilute your brand and do more harm than good. Know your audience and choose carefully.
6 – DON’T get hung up on numbers
And finally, you should never get too fixated on numbers when it comes to your business social media profiles. This is where quality over quantity really comes into play. Often the real value is found in the amount of engagement you’re receiving, and the type of people you’re receiving it from. These are the things that can make you the real money, so pay more attention to these instead.
