Sign up for the 2 Sigma Newsletter

Mirasee's best resources, ideas and advice – curated and delivered to your inbox!

The Three Things Expert Social Media Advice Can’t Tell You

  • Sophie BujoldSophie Bujold

There is simply no shortage of social media experts giving advice on what platforms to use, specific tips and tools, and providing updates on the latest developments. However, expert advice, while valuable and incredibly helpful, can only get us so far.

In a rush to join the latest platform, optimize our images or figure out Facebook’s latest changes, most of us tend to get caught up in the “how” of social media when the real focus should be on the “why”.

Without understanding your “why” for social media, you can easily become disconnected from the true foundation of your social media strategy.

Here are the three things expert social media advice can’t tell you.

Why Are You Using Social Media?

Effective social media strategy starts with one simple question: why?

As you dig into figuring out your “why,” you may find that it is more complicated than you realized.  Simply being on Twitter or Facebook or Google+ because you should be is not good enough.

To get clear on your why, tie it back to your business goals.  How can social media play a role in supporting every aspect of your business, from generating more sales to extending your customer service reach to connecting with key influencers in your market?

With a clear goal in mind, you can pick the right platform and activities for your business, with a focus on setting objectives that are SMART – specific, measurable, assignable, realistic and time-related.

Instead of getting stuck on numbers, like the number of followers you have on Facebook, look at the big picture. Does having a set number of followers help you meet your business goals?

Focusing in on SMART goals that are related to things such as your sales or growing your email list will have a greater impact on your business than worrying about how to get your Facebook page to 10,000 followers.

Possible goals could include:

  • I will boost my prospect list by adding 500 subscribers to my mailing list over the next 3 months.
  • I will book three new clients each month by connecting with my community on a daily basis.
  • I will generate 30 new leads over the next six months by using X social media platform.

Travel expert Carl Henderson from Tahiti by Carl is a great example of social media goal setting in action.  He started with a focus on building his following on Facebook, but his goal was not to hit a certain number of followers. Instead, he wanted to create connections that would result in people booking vacations.

His campaign to grow his page and connect with fans has resulted in new leads coming in from the platform, and stronger connections with key suppliers in Tahiti.

What Are the Needs of Your Ideal Customer?

At some point in your business, you likely went through an exercise of figuring out the needs, desires and pain points of your ideal customer. For your social media, you want to build on this profile so you can decide how to best meet your goals.

Start by figuring out how your ideal customer consumes information and in what format.

For example, if you are targeting busy moms, they likely don’t have time for long blog posts as they are reading on their phone between carpool, soccer practice and staying on top of work emails.

You want to dive into where your ideal customer may hang out in the social media world. Research the demographic and psychographic information of each social platform.

Start by using Google to see what information you can find on each network. You may also want to checkout Pew Internet, Statistic Brain and Statista for usage information and metrics for each platform.

For example, if your target audience is busy moms who are 30-45 years old, you’ll quickly find out they are most active on Facebook and Pinterest and you’ll be able to focus your efforts accordingly. There’s no point in being on Vine if your ideal customer doesn’t know what a Vine even is.

If you aren’t sure where to go, stop and evaluate your current social media presence. Here are a few ways you can easily do that:

  • Follow the Numbers: Where do you get the most engagement or meet with the most success? Use tools such as Facebook Insights to see where your posts may be succeeding or missing the mark.  Where do you get the most opt-ins to your list or comments, shares or likes? Tracking these numbers can help give you clues about what’s working and where you may need to fine tune.
  • Survey Your Community: Survey your current list or social media followers to find out where they like to hang out, what platforms they enjoy and how they use them. The more intelligence you have, the better! You can use a tool such as SurveyMonkey or Google Forms to gather this information quickly.

With this information, you can start making clear decisions about where your customers are congregating online. These platforms should be your focus.  And you can start building a plan to best serve your clients on each one with the most appropriate content and engagement strategies.

What Social Networks Do You Enjoy Using?

One of the most commonly held pieces of social media advice is to “be everywhere,” so we sign up for many platforms. The reality is that we are bound by time, so trying to be on every platform and do a good job is just not achievable.

Instead of being on multiple platforms and doing a mediocre (or even poor) job, it is much more effective to focus on one or two networks and be a powerhouse.

Deciding where to focus should take into account what social networks you (or your team) enjoy using.

If you personally hate Twitter, trying to focus on building your presence there is going to be hard.  On the other hand, if you love Instagram, you are likely to be successful using it.

While you are behind the screen, your enthusiasm comes through. Don’t force networks that just don’t work for you.  You are naturally going to gravitate to some platforms and dislike others, and that’s okay. If possible, incorporate that into your social media strategy.

No Expert Can Tell You Why You’re On Social Media

Taking time to step back and look at the foundation of your social media strategy creates the type of clarity and focus for your day-to-day activities, which will help get results that impact your business in the long-term.

And no matter what the social experts say, your reasons for being on social media are yours and yours alone. From building your list to boosting your sales, having a strong connection with your own and your customer’s “why” when it comes to social media will go a long way towards your success.

What will you do to get clarity on your social media strategy and start being more usefully strategic?  Comment below to share your ideas.

16 thoughts on The Three Things Expert Social Media Advice Can’t Tell You

Ali Miners

I agree with you totally. We all suffer with overwhelm and need to find our target audience and hang out and engage with them.

Sophie Bujold

Thanks Tom! I’m glad I could inspire you 🙂

Tom Southern

“What Are the Needs of Your Ideal Customer?” This is the key question here, isn’t it? Whatever we do to find people we can serve, it must first be grounded in what they want most. What we do to reach out to them to let them know we have what they want, should be focussed around them; what they do, where they go.

Social media is no exception. Although a lot of people choose their social media focus on what experts tell them is best. Rather than what their potential readers/customers show them is best.

To get more clarity I’m going to focus more on what my readers are showing me I should be to reach them. You’ve been a great reminder to me to do this, Sophie.

Sophie Bujold

Thanks Tom! I’m glad I could inspire you 🙂

ling | business-soulwork.com

I love “No Expert Can Tell You Why You’re On Social Media”
Great post – it is so easy to get sucked in the social media rabbit hole chasing after “numbers” and the bright shiny objects without checking in to see if it’s still taking us closer to our bigger goal.
My clients always feel overwhelmed by social media – there is a new platform everyday and of course, they are told they have to “get on it.” They always let out a sigh of relief when I told them to find out where their ideal clients hang out, then start with 1, then ramp up to 2-3 … and master the platforms.

Sophie Bujold

So very true! I see it a lot with my clients as well. It’s almost as if there’s collective peer pressure to be amazing at all times and on every network. And, unfortunately, that expectation is impossible to meet for many people. Just as with many other things in life, it’s much better to focus on and master a few things than trying to be everything to everyone 🙂

John Harmer

My target market is accountants. None of whom really use social media marketing. Or not effectively. Me included Some may join LinkedIn because its business oriented. Yet they still don’t really use it effectively. Again, me included.

To me, social media is a huge time waster. I could care less what Sally wore yesterday. Or where Clive and Jenny went on their vacation. And having to do multiple tweets and status updates every day would bring me out in hives.

If I was going to use social media, I would look at outsourcing the whole thing.

Gary Greenfield

It’s really always about the “why,” isn’t it? Your comments on how to efficiently and effectively leverage social media for “your” own purposes are very helpful. Knowing “why” always leads to focus and focus can lead to well-directed momentum. And, well-defined goals are critical to that kind of momentum. Here again, though, understanding your “why” gives you the drive to achieve the goal.

Sophie Bujold

It really is! Asking why should actually be the key driver for many (every?) things we do. WIthout it, it’s hard to understand the purpose or the direction 🙂

Elke Feuer

Love what you said about not needing to be on every social media site. I encourage the authors in my writing group to check out each one first to see what works better for them and their goals, and which one they will enjoy. I also recommend they learn how to use one before going unto another and to review how much time they have to commit. I learned that lesson the hard way. I’m still learning. 🙂

I plan to review what posts get the most traffic/feedback each week on my blog and social media and regularly tweak my posts.

Sophie Bujold

Yes! It’s so very important to use the networks that fit your business and your style. The perfect example this week was of Copyblogger taking down their Facebook page because it just wasn’t working for them (for many reasons). It was a bold move for a page with 30,000+ fans but I think it goes to show that they keep a really keen eye on their community and where it likes to interact the most.

Comments are closed.