When it comes to maintaining a presence on social media, businesses have very little wiggle room. If you aren’t running your social media profiles with a solid level of efficiency, you run the risk of losing your audience and making your business look incompetent. If you can’t run your social media profiles correctly, how can you be trusted to proficiently deliver the services that you provide?
While your social media presence likely has no bearing on your ability to run a business, your potential customers might see otherwise. What you do on social media is, after all, the online representation of what your business is, and looking professional – at least in terms of execution – is of the utmost importance. Here is a list of 5 bad social media habits that your business needs to break to ensure you maintain a positive online presence!
Auto Posting the Exact Same Content to All of Your Social Channels:
Auto posting is an integral element of social media marketing for many businesses simply because it saves a lot of time. However, it’s extremely important to avoid posting the exact same thing on each social media profile. Not all social media sites are created equal, so the content you share on Twitter should be formatted and worded differently from the way you share it on Facebook and/or Google+. Each social media site has a specific way that posts should be formatted, especially on Google+, so take a few extra minutes to tailor your content correctly to each site.
Not Double Checking Grammar and Spelling As Well As Not Making Sure What You’re Saying Actually Makes Sense:
It’s easy to make a mistake, so be sure to go back and double check all of your social media posts before they go out to the world. Bad grammar and spelling can make you look unprofessional, so take the time to go over everything a second and even third time. Also, make sure that what you are saying actually makes sense. Pay close attention to sentence structure, and try not to over explain things.
Inconsistent or Infrequent Posting:
If you aren’t consistent, your audience will forget about you and find great content somewhere else, which could result in them taking their business somewhere else as well. Stay in your customers’ and potential customers’ minds by posting great content on a regular basis. If you aren’t using one, create a social media calendar and plan out when you want to send out your content. Then, use an automated service such as Hootsuite to set your content up to go out at the opportune times.
Alienating People With Your Personal Opinions or Beliefs:
“Could I be offending anyone?” If the thought even crosses your mind that what you are about to post may be seen as offensive, DO NOT POST IT! A social media business page is not the place to share your beliefs or politics, it’s a place to share your products and services. It’s not worth alienating people for the sake of expressing an opinion. Unless maybe you don’t care, in which case you will have to come to terms with the fact that your business’s growth may suffer for it.
Abusing and Misusing of Hashtags:
#Hashtags, #Hashtags, #HASHTAGS! We all LOVE to use hashtags. Unfortunately, there are many businesses (and people in general) who overuse and/or completely misuse them. First of all, hashtags should always be relevant to the content you are sharing. Don’t try to ride the coattails of a trending hashtag to generate some cheap clicks. Doing so would be completely misdirecting your audience. Also, be aware of how many are too many. This scientific guide to hashtags really covers all you need to know about how many you should be using, if any, on each social media profile.
In the end, you put a lot of work into your business, and for all the work you have put into it, you deserve nothing more than to have a social media presence that truly represents your company for what it is. If you have any questions or need any further guidance with your social media marketing, please do not hesitate to leave a comment or contact me via phone or email.