Social media, social networking sites, various photo-sharing platforms, all have become more than just a means to socialize and find out what's new in the lives of friends and acquaintances. They have now become more of a place to make yourself known, to promote an image, a brand, a product, or a service. For companies that want to advertise, this is a good thing. It is more difficult for ordinary people, who are slowly being bombarded with ads and announcements they do not want and sometimes cannot escape from.
This is often due to companies, big or small, trying to gain audience for their site at any cost, annoying the public with ads and unsolicited messages.
We have talked before on this blog about social networks and what can be done with their help. Today we want to clarify a few aspects that some marketers in the market have misunderstood.
1. It is good to be active on social networks, but being too active is not good either! The audience should not be bombarded, even if they liked our page, with many posts and information. These should be dosed at certain key moments of the day, so that those interested can easily reach your content, but not waste time searching through all previous posts. Moreover, if they consider it already too much, they will simply unlike the page and solve the problem.
2. The second thing to avoid on social networks is posting long and plain text without images or illustrations of what you want to convey. Studies show that people tend to click faster on an image than on a long and boring description. So, focus on representative images, not just filler.
3. Although it appears in this position, I think the next mistake should be placed first: not all social networks are the same, so they should not be treated the same! For example, the B2B audience is much more present on LinkedIn, while B2C buyers are usually found on Facebook. Therefore, you need to observe where your business fits best and pay more attention to that channel. I’m not saying you shouldn’t be active on all – that would indeed be a serious mistake – I’m just saying to observe the network that best suits your business and adapt to the audience’s habits there. The other networks bring brand awareness and visitors to the site, which is very good!
4. Many of those who post on Facebook, for example, forget that they are in front of people and that they need to speak to them, not to a virtual entity. That is why, even on social networks, we must speak to people properly, as from person to person, putting their needs and desires first, and not just the company and its products. Moreover, it is very important to respond to people when approached, whether we are asked questions, praised, or criticized.
5. To ease everyone’s work and to achieve greater reader engagement, ongoing events in all areas of social and political life must be taken into account. This applies to any type of advertising; the wrong association of the brand through posts or ads with an event or personality can bring major disadvantages, just as taking advantage of major positive events to attract attention to ourselves is recommended. For example, how would it be to loudly advertise an airline company when everywhere people are talking about recent aviation incidents (as was the case this year).
It is not easy to be active on the internet, on all social networks at the same time, and still have personalized content for each of them. That is why many companies either delegate a person to do just that or turn to professional services that have experience, expertise, and can add value to online campaigns.
