When I present to an audience interested in using social media as part of their marketing strategy, I find that they realize what they see on their faces about halfway through the presentation. That’s the part where I talk about the variety of strategies businesses that don’t include Facebook can adopt!

People have definite opinions about social media marketing and the tools used to execute a social media strategy. I started writing some of them so that I could, like now, address them in an article to debunk some of the myths or preconceived ideas about social media in general. Enjoy!

To be successful you have to be in the top four apps

This usually means Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and a blog. The tools you use to engage your audience vary greatly depending on the business you are involved in. There are times when I would recommend to a client that they make more use of Foursquare and article syndication on Wiki than on Facebook. What I would say, in all cases, is that the social networking application starts with a blog. All other tools used are dependent on that center and ideally none of them are independent. Just like traditional marketing, social media tools need support – even Twitter!

Social media costs nothing

All costs of media activity. Whether in terms of time, resources, people, or actual media costs, the user makes an investment. Yes, many of the apps can be accessed for free, that is, it just costs your time, however, if you don’t know how to use them properly, they will cost you more than time in the end. I advise clients with small budgets to learn how to use each app (which can be done in hours), but it’s very difficult for anyone with little to no marketing experience to understand each app in the big marketing picture and that’s when mistakes are made.

You wouldn’t try to develop your own campaign in traditional media, would you? Typically, you would hire a marketing consultant or advertising agency to ensure you get the most for your investment. While few people can claim to be social media experts, there is a clear advantage to using a social media consultant with good writing skills and a background in advertising and marketing.

If you really want to use social media tools yourself, you need to be trained to make the most of them on a daily basis, to see the big picture, and you need to make sure you have the time to use them.

writing articles is easy

I always laugh when I hear a client say that they will be writing their own articles for online distribution. Not because you doubt your writing ability, but because online writing differs from regular writing on paper. A different shade is used and the design has to be like that. Keyword density comes into play, as do main headings and subheadings. The angle taken to promote a business because you can’t blatantly promote whether you want publishers to use your article, how niche your topic is, embed links and resources, is getting pretty technical.

Then there is how to use your article online. It won’t work if online publishers don’t distribute it for online use!

Setting Goals for Your Social Media Campaign

It’s not just about signing up with all the social media tools and waiting for your sales to skyrocket. Social media tools are used as part of a marketing campaign, whether online or offline, and the goals to measure it are important. Every business has its own goals, but sometimes it’s hard to apply those goals to social media activity as the tools can’t always be measured. A good social media consultant will help you set realistic goals and achieve them.

All campaigns start with Facebook

You are welcome! Facebook is a great social media tool and it also allows you to have a business page, but it’s not the mainstay of a social media campaign, it’s a blog. If you are going to use Facebook as a marketing tool and you are going to start a business/fan page, you must have a reason for doing so. Like all sm tools, it’s not good to start on Facebook if you’re going to leave it after a few weeks.

However, if you have a need to build a community in the consumer market, then Facebook would be one of the tools I would recommend.

It doesn’t work for business-to-business organizations.

I hear this a lot as everyone thinks in terms of consumerism and Facebook. Social media marketing works just as well for B2B as it does for B2C. You just need to use the right tools. LinkedIn offers many variations between contacts and allows you to leverage contacts through your own community.

YouTube is great for B2B in terms of offering how-to videos, visual product tests, and recommendations. There are many ways each tool can be tailored to meet business needs, just like in traditional media marketing.

you have to have a trick

Yes, a ‘wave’ works wonders but it’s not necessary. There are ways to get noticed with the tools on offer without having to be the best deal on the block. You just need to think outside the box.

Everything is automated, so why do I need a content manager?

While some of the tools can be linked for ease of use, you cannot automate your entire campaign. The goal is to engage with your own community, one that you built (by you I mean your business/brand/product etc) and for that to work successfully your community or audience needs to believe that you are the person/business what they are talking about. to. Sure, we all need to save time, but people are more responsive to personal communication. They want to be considered as that number one customer.

Commissioning posts and articles is fine, but for goodness sake make sure it’s relevant content and well written. Google is penalizing bad content now and that won’t help your marketing efforts. Plus reading a poorly written article or post that barely makes sense because the author doesn’t speak their language correctly or is informed to get a certain keyword density will only serve to put people off.

Content managers are constantly listening, interacting, and advising on how you can best use social media to enhance your marketing efforts.

Why use traditional advertising if I’m using Social Networks?

Yes, there is growing resistance to traditional forms of advertising and sales, for example telesales and billboards, however, in most cases, social media works best when supported by traditional advertising techniques such as radio or print advertising. It all depends on what you are trying to achieve and who your audience is. Mixing the two often increases results.

ROI cannot be measured

Of course you can, but first you need to outline your goals for measuring activity and spending against. The criteria for measurement will be more about the number of people/businesses you have reached and how many of them you are engaging with rather than concrete sales numbers, but they are measurable goals. Even articles can be crawled and analyzed for content and response. Google Analytics can be successfully applied to your blog and PPC ads. Increased sales can be measured based on performance without using social media tools. Just be more inventive!

A powerful tool for today’s businesses

In short, social media offers all businesses a powerful tool to use in today’s harsh climate, but to use it correctly you need to learn more about it and adapt it to successfully achieve your goals.