One Fits All Approach Doesn’t Work for Social Media
Every day clients and colleagues alike ask me what is the best approach to get the most out of social media?
Most are surprised when I respond by saying there is no set approach that works best for every business. A one fits all social media approach doesn’t work. There are a number of strategies that must be integrated with your overall communications and marketing plan to gain the most value from social media.
Too many businesses still use a piecemeal approach at social media. They have limited planning and choose platforms that are popular instead of those that will benefit their business. They believe that social media is about them not the customer and so they worry more about their brand’s social media platforms instead of concerning themselves with what their customers are saying elsewhere.
I recently put some questions about social media to Fi Bendall of the Bendalls Group, which is an international digital business consultancy. Fi is an expert and pioneer in digital strategy and one of Australia’s most respected thought leaders in the digital space with over 20 years’ experience in the digital sector over three continents.
Fi says “social media is not just about Facebook or Twitter, it is about behaviour, commentary, reviews and recommendations. It is more about what your customers are saying about you on their social media spaces than on your brands / own social media.”
She continues, “the large networks now provide advertising product, that depending on your category and approach can work well. But it is not a standard view or approach to such an advertising channel. Test and learn, mixed with Google’s display network, as well as SEM and perhaps affiliate marketing, ensuring your organic activity SEO and SMO all works together. Then it is a process of continually optimising spend and channel but certainly is not a one size fits all approach, there is massive variability in terms of what works well for what category. Test and learn test and learn.”
The May 2014 YellowTM Social Media Report: what Australian people and businesses are doing with social media found that “relatively few small businesses had developed a strategic plan in their business for social media, with only 24% reporting they had a strategy for their social media, compared to 45% of medium businesses and 73% of large businesses.”
Some sort of strategy is essential so you have an idea about what you are actually trying to achieve. Think about who your intended audience is? What do they want and need? How can your business help with this?
It is important particularly as a smaller business with a limited budget not to bury your head in the sand and do nothing or worse still to set up social media platforms and be inconsistent with your content, interactions and monitoring. Says Fi, “creating content and blog writing regularly on your site will improve your site rankings. Updating and contributing guest content is also an important part of your content strategy. Planning in advance yet having flexibility to respond to “todays” events is an important part of a basic Social Media Plan.”
So when utilising social media for your business planning and integration are essential.
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