Social media is a powerful tool if you want your brand to improve its reach, leads, and traffic over time. However, misuse it, and it can hurt your brand’s reputation.
The truth is, social media has so much to offer; that’s why you must be proficient enough to know how you can make the most out of it.
In this post, we’ll tackle the seven mistakes that could be ruining your brand’s social media presence.
Pushy sales strategies
Don’t think of social media purely as an advertising medium. No matter what you’re offering consumers, whether it’s neverending sales pitches or excessive hype on your products and services, this could just annoy your customers over time and will send them elsewhere.
Keep in mind that users follow you so that they can learn more about the products and services that you give. But you also have to give them a reason to stay and keep coming back for more. After all, social media is all about being social.
Failing to realize the kind of relationships that you form with people around your brand will cause your followers to drift away.
If you were in their shoes, wouldn’t you be annoyed if the brand you’re following keeps on bragging, forcing you to buy, and bombarding you with annoying messages?
No social media activity at all
In the same way, the moment that you take part in the entire social media game, you must be consistent with your posts. Always updating your existing fan base through different platforms is a great way to connect with your followers at a more personal level.
When fans sense that you’re inconsistent with managing your social media content, they’ll easily pick this up and label you as a brand that’s incapable of managing a social media account.
For instance, if it’s been weeks and weeks of inactivity on your brand’s Facebook page, a lot of your followers will choose to unfollow you, casting a bad light on your brand. So, as much as you can, you need to avoid these instances from happening.
Your social media pages should be updated regularly with interesting, informative, and engaging content. Reply with the fans’ and followers’ messages and comments. Be consistent, and your audience will surely appreciate it.
Posting too much
Although sharing your content and status regularly on social media is a must-do, don’t try to overdo it. Because eventually, people will get tired of you flooding their feed.
Don’t go on blasting your content on social media channels. In fact, posting too much is a horrible mistake. People are more likely to unfollow you or overlook the posts that you share.
That’s why you should make good use of scheduling tools like Buffer, Hootsuite, and SocialPilot so that you can make the right time frame between your tweets and your posts. When it comes to dealing with Facebook, refer to your page’s Insights so that you’ll know when your fans are more likely online.
Make a social calendar so that you can publish the right amount of posts and tweets that are evenly spaced and are based on on-peak hours of the day. Ensure that you keep testing the timing of your posts, as well as the total number of updates that you’ve posted.
Also, make your content varied. Use images, videos, blogs, podcasts, and so on.
Removing or ignoring negative feedback
Negative feedback is a common occurrence, and you should never ignore it. Why? It’s a great opportunity to get to know your followers better. Not to mention that how you respond says a lot about you as a brand!
Some brands think that it’s easy to get rid of negative comments. While others have the mindset of completely ignoring them is the way to go. But instead of avoiding them, you should think of these negative comments as opportunities.
Learn from these negative comments and respond to all legit feedback as much as you can. Utilize them as a way to show your commitment to give them the best customer service.
If not correctly dealt with, it can be one of the biggest social media mistakes which will cost your brand greatly in the long run.
The solution? Pay attention to negative feedback.
Although those positive comments will make you feel great, you shouldn’t ignore those negative comments as well. Focus on the things that people want to change about your brand, and ask yourself whether that change can make your brand improve in the long run.
Bashing and humiliating your competitors
It’s not exactly a great idea to bash and humiliate your competitors on social media. Why? Because you’re showing an undesirable trait of company elitism that turns off most of your audience.
Moreover, you alienate entirely and even anger the fans of your competitors ‒ something you want to avoid completely.
For instance, Microsoft once tried to upstage its rival Android on Twitter with the hashtag #DroidRage. Microsoft’s goal was to let Twitter users tweet their negative experiences with Android OS. But the sad part is, their plan backfired, and instead caused outrage to their company.
Lack of customer service
Commenting on Facebook and pinning on Pinterest is important, but those efforts are hardly appreciated in your audiences’ minds. Meanwhile, if a customer tries to reach you online, and you don’t respond, then you’re in big trouble.
Having this kind of behavior will make people feed ignored and devalued, and they’ll eventually abandon you in the long run. Not only that, they might feel dissatisfied in what you have to offer that they’ll write a bad review on your profile.
Social media is a great opportunity to offer excellent customer service, so always try to be responsive, sympathetic, and helpful to others.
Answer their inquiries and help them resolve their issues as much as possible. When customers feel that they matter to you, they’ll be more compelled to get involved and even recommend you to others.
Taking your followers for granted
Aside from bad customer service, don’t ignore or take your followers for granted. Always respond to whatever comments, suggestions, and other types of feedback. Remember that communication should always be a two-way street. If you’re not actively engaging with your followers, then they will soon be gone!
Social media is a way to communicate with your audience, so always try to keep that communication with them alive.
Over to You
By avoiding these social media mistakes will help you create relationships, engage your audience, and promote your brand in a positive light. Once you stay away from these mistakes, you will expect improvement in your brand’s social media presence.
