Social Media Marketing – Correct Marketing Steps To Be Adopted & common Marketing Mistakes Committed

How To Use Social Media Marketing Correctly

Know common SMM mistakes to avoid

A detailed social media plan is required if you wish to utilise social media as a channel for your business. Your actions are shaped by your successes or failures. Planning in detail will make your campaign more effective. Brief is best. Goals should be attainable and measurable.

The purpose of this article is to help you create a successful social media marketing strategy while avoiding mistakes.

Concept of social media marketing.

A product or service is advertised, sold, or promoted by using social media. In social media marketing or SMM, social media is utilised for brand marketing and brand building purposes. Engaging audiences through text, image, and video updates are examples of social media marketing. Paid social media advertising is another example.

Marketing on social media is beneficial to businesses because it involves:

• Increasing brand recognition.
• Creating communities that are engaged.
• Promoting your products and services through native social commerce platforms.
• Using social listening, measure the sentiment surrounding a brand.
• Engaging in social media customer service.
• Reaching out to their target audiences with advertising.

Concept of social media strategy.

Essentially, a social media strategy describes the social media goals you need to achieve, the tactics you should use to accomplish them, and the metrics you should track to track your progress. Besides listing each of your existing social media accounts, your social media marketing strategy should also provide goals specific to each platform you maintain.

As a final point, a good social media plan should outline your team’s roles and responsibilities and outline how frequently your team will report.

Social Media, Internet Evolution, And Their Relationship:

The World Wide Web was invented by Tim Berners-Lee two decades ago. Though intended for physics researchers, Berners-Lee probably did not imagine that his work would eventually become known as the “information superhighway” and that millions of computers around the world would end up interconnected to provide vast amounts of information to individuals. Berners-Lee probably had no idea the Internet would be accessible to every household and facilitate global communication.

It has become possible for people to express themselves freely and participate in lengthy conversations at any time of day through the Internet’s “social web” in recent years. For years now, people have started using social media for entertainment as well as business purpose. Therefore, the constant change in the Internet resulted in changes in the definition of business and slowly but steadily was established Social Media Marketing.

How is “Social Media” Marketing Different?

In the 21st century, online information is more readily accessible, and it is more easily found. As generations become more digitally savvy, they are becoming more knowledgeable. Messages sent via text and web activity are becoming commonplace.

As a final point, a good social media plan should outline your team’s roles and responsibilities and outline how frequently your team will report.

1) discovery of new content is facilitated by social media marketing:

If the content is created properly, it can be exposed to hundreds of new website visitors in a very spontaneous way, from casual surfers to extreme enthusiasts. The content displayed in social media is not necessarily a result of commercial intent, unlike paid advertising. In addition to reaching thousands of new eyes quickly, content marketing does not interfere with traditional marketing campaigns.

2) Social media marketing boosts traffic:

In addition to search engines, sites like social media also drive traffic to websites. People who appreciate your contributions will likely pass relevant blog posts, videos, or articles onto their peers if they establish you as a valuable community participant.

Starting with a Plan Is Key To Social Media Marketing.

Take a moment to consider the marketing goals of your business before you launch social media campaigns. Without a social strategy in mind, starting a social media marketing campaign is like wandering in the forest without a map – you might find some fun, but you will probably get lost, too.

Identifying your social media marketing goals will require asking the following questions:

• How do you intend to achieve your goals?

• Are you targeting a particular group?

• What kind of social media does your target audience use? Where do they hang out online?

• How will you communicate your message through social media marketing?

Social media marketing: creating a strategy-

SET SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING GOALS ALIGNED WITH BUSINESS PRIORITIES:

Set up your goals:

Identifying your objectives and goals is the first step in designing a winning strategy. The Return on Investment (ROI) and success cannot be measured without goals. It is your responsibility to set goals that are:

1. Particular
2. Quantifiable
3. Achievable
4. Intriguing
5. Term-limited

It is a framework for identifying S.M.A.R.T. goals. In order to achieve business success, it will guide your actions.

Measurable metrics are important:

It is easy to track vanity metrics like the number of followers and likes, but it is difficult to demonstrate their value. You should instead focus on metrics such as engagement, click-through, and conversions. If there are different goals or uses for different networks, you may wish to track those separately.
In the case of LinkedIn, you would measure click-through if you wanted to drive people to your website. You might want to track the number of Instagram Story views if Instagram is used for brand awareness. Facebook advertisers typically use cost-per-clicks (CPC) to measure success.

Marketing goals for social media should be aligned with your overall business goals. Thus, you will be able to prove your value to your boss and ensure their buy-in. Identify at least three social media marketing goals when developing your strategy.

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE AS WELL AS YOU CAN:

Create audience personas:

A key aspect of social media marketing is knowing your audience and what they want. Having this kind of content will enable you to produce content your audience will like, comment on, and share. Using social media effectively also helps you convert your followers into customers. When it comes to knowing your target customer, it is important to consider things such as:

1. Average age

2. Area of residence

3. Income Level

4. Typical occupation

5. Hobbies

Creating audience/buyer personas is easy if you follow this guide: 

In order to effectively engage and target your fans, followers, and customers, get to know them as real people.

KNOWING YOUR COMPETITORS IS ESSENTIAL.

Most likely, your competitors are already using social media, so you should take an active interest in how they are using it.

An analysis of the competition:

Completing a competitive analysis will help you understand the competition better. Having a sense of what your industry is like will help you prepare. Setting social media goals will help you achieve them.

You can also spot new opportunities using it. A competitor might be extremely popular on Facebook but has little to no engagement on Twitter or Instagram, for example. It might be easier to gain followers from a powerful company if you target networks with underserved audiences.

Follow social media to keep an eye on your competitors.

Monitoring your competitors via social media is another way to stay on top of their activities.

Perform a search of the competitor’s company name and account handle on social media, as well as any relevant keywords. People can share their experiences and what their clients think about them on this site.

Create listening streams for relevant keywords and accounts using a social media management application.

Channel use may change as you track. Alternatively, you may notice a particular post or campaign that performs well or fails miserably. Your social media marketing strategy can be informed by this kind of intel.

AUDIT YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA EFFORTS:

Taking stock of your efforts so far is essential for anyone using social media. Here are some questions to ask yourself:

• What works? What doesn’t?

• What kind of engagement are you receiving?

• What are the networks your target audience uses?

• What kind of social media presence do you have compared to your competitors?

Once you have collected the data, you can start trying to improve your performance. Auditing your accounts will give you a clearer idea of what they are for. Think about whether it is worthwhile to keep an account if its purpose is not clear.

Consider the following questions to help you decide:

• Are there any audience members here?

• Does this platform make a difference to them?

• Are you able to help me to achieve my goals with this account?

• KEEPING YOUR STRATEGY FOCUSED REQUIRES ASKING THESE DIFFICULT QUESTIONS.

Check for fake accounts during the audit:

Faked accounts using your business or product names may be discovered during an audit. You might not even know that these imposters are capturing followers that are meant for you. Inform the authorities. To ensure that your fans are dealing with the real you, it may be a good idea to verify your Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts.

SET UP PROFILES AND ACCOUNTS:

Make a firm decision on the network usage-

Defining your strategy for each social network you opt to use is another aspect of choosing which network to use. The social media manager at Benefit Cosmetics, Angela Purcaro, told eMarketer that the company uses Snapchat and Instagram Stories for its makeup tutorials.  In contrast, Twitter is a platform designed to support customers.

Each network should have a mission statement. Keep focused on a specific goal with a one-sentence statement. A social media channel that is not able to define a sound mission statement may not be worth your time.

Profile creation:

The next thing you should do is to create your profile on the networks with which you intend to interact. Improving them will help you align them with your strategy.

• All fields in your profile should be filled out.

• You should include keywords that would be used when people are looking for your business.

• Consistently brand (logos, images, etc.) your social media profiles so they can be easily identified.

Images should be of high quality and fit the recommended network dimensions. We keep a cheat sheet with the most updated information about social media image sizes.

Step-by-step instructions to guide you through each of these networks:

• Create a Facebook business page

• Create an Instagram business account

• Create a Twitter business account

• Create a Snapchat account

• Create a LinkedIn Company Page

• Create a YouTube channel

TAKE INSPIRATION FROM OTHER BUSINESSES:

You can still draw examples of successfully marketed businesses that you can use for inspiration.

Success stories in social media:

Most social networks post success stories in their business section. The lessons you learn from case studies can help you create a social media plan that works.

Award-winning campaigns and accounts:

To see examples of how brands use social media to engage with their consumers, refer to The Facebook Awards or The Shorty Awards.

Engage your followers:

Social media can also be inspirational for consumers. Are you talking about anything specific online with your target audience? Are there any needs and wants that you can learn about?

In addition, you can ask your followers for their feedback through social media channels, if you already have them. It is just about following through and delivering what they need.

TAKE INSPIRATION FROM OTHER BUSINESSES:

It is important to share great content, but it is just as important to plan when to share your content for maximum impact. You should incorporate time for interactivity in your social media content calendar (although you should also give yourself some breathing room if your audience engages spontaneously).

REVIEW AND ADJUST YOUR STRATEGY:

It is crucial that your social media strategy is perfect from the start. Implementing your plan and monitoring your results will allow you to discover that some of your strategies aren’t working as well as you had anticipated, while others have worked even better than you had imagined. UTM parameters allow you to track how social visitors navigate your website, in addition to analyzing analytics within each social network. This enables you to see exactly which social posts drive traffic to your website.

Avoid these critical mistakes with social media marketing:

Regardless of how crowded the market gets, every marketer’s goal is to get their brand out there to as many people as possible. Marketers have come to rely on social media as a powerful tool. Marketing mistakes are not uncommon in these networks in an attempt to stand out from the crowd. Your follower count will steadily decrease if you keep making the same mistakes on social media.

Every marketer should avoid the following social media marketing errors:

1. A LACK OF SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING PLANS:

   Even though it may seem obvious, many companies do not create social media marketing plans. Without a defined plan, they simply post things on social media. Marketing on social media should be treated just as seriously as other marketing efforts. Set goals that will enable you to achieve them, then develop an action plan with an easy-to-follow budget. It should explain exactly what your goals are, how you plan to measure your results, and how many resources you will need.

2. A LACK OF AUDIENCE DEFINITION:

   Social media users may not all fit your brand. You can focus your social media marketing efforts on people who are really interested in your product by defining your target audience. Even if you work hard, if you do not know who you are writing for, you will have disappointing results.

   Jay Baer, the founder of Convince & Convert, performs this function rather well because his company caters to business-to-business (B2B) markets rather than the consumer (B2C) markets. Rather than just using Facebook and Twitter share options, he makes sure all of his content has LinkedIn share buttons.

3. INABILITY TO ENGAGE IN CONVERSATION:

   If no one comments or shares your social media posts, then it is all a waste of time. It is for this reason that you should focus on creating content that people want to engage with – content that inspires debate.

   If your social media marketing updates receive no responses, you may have to rethink your approach. Whenever your audience reacts to your updates, engage them back. Both parties need to take part in a conversation. Respond to all comments, regardless of how negative they are. Maintain a cool head and be polite.

   Additionally, you must ensure that your social media engagements are positive and do not encourage negativity. You will only damage your brand’s reputation by having negative conversations.

4. OVERRELIANCE ON AUTOMATION:

   Automating your procedures will save you both time and energy. By helping brands grow organically on Instagram, and Instagram tool like Social Growr helps them succeed. Automation simplifies some aspects of a brand’s life, but at the expense of losing its human touch.

   As the New England Patriots’ automated bot-tweeted a racial slur using the team’s official Twitter handle back in November 2014, the team found itself in trouble. As a way of celebrating reaching a million followers on Twitter, the team sent out an automated tweet that featured fans’ Twitter handles along with an image of the team’s jersey. As a result, someone used this opportunity to send racial slurs via the robot, essentially exploiting the situation for the New England Patriots.

   In the end, over 2,000 people re-tweeted the tweet before the team realised their mistake and took it down. The team offered apologies. There was too much reliance on automation. By relying on automation too much, you lose the human touch and can make your brand look unprofessional. The problem is particularly prominent when you use traditional rule-based automation tools.

   A brand can engage customers based on their behavior when using advanced automation tools. They use a trigger. Social media users are able to use micro-moments to engage with brands in this way.

5. UNNECESSARY PROMOTION OF YOURSELF:

   You must be social on social media to stand out. In promoting your content exclusively on social media, many users will lose interest in your brand. You will see your following dwindle instead of increasing. Your brand should be promoted but in a subtle way.

6. KEEPING NO TRACK OF ANALYTICS:

   The strategy book should be kept up to date. Continually improving it is necessary. Before you can accomplish this, you must understand your past actions. Making plans for the future can be influenced by your past experiences. Analyse your performance with the right analytics tool.

   Analysing your analytics will help you develop targeted marketing strategies that will enhance your brand following. Pay attention to social media influence, customer engagement, conversions, and buying trends.

7. IGNORING THE UNIQUENESS OF EACH SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM:

   Social media platforms each have their own unique characteristics. Learning the language of each platform will allow you to communicate with your users effectively. You have to speak the same language as the social networking site users if you want your brand to grow on these sites. Understanding how social media platforms operate will allow you to make the most of them.

   You will discover brand new ways to leverage social media platforms to grow your business or increase its exposure when you begin to see each platform as an entity on its own, with unique opportunities.

Conlusion:

It is fast-paced in social media. There are new networks emerging and others changing demographically. Change is inevitable for any business. It is important to review and adjust your social media marketing strategy as required. Continually update it to reflect new goals, tools, or plans, but do not be afraid to make changes. If you make changes to your social strategy, make sure you share the information with your team. Your business is then able to maximise your accounts by allowing them to work together.

In case you have made the same social media marketing mistakes as some of the examples in this article, you can correct them. What should we do first? Whenever you are considering utilizing social media marketing, you should sit down and write down your goals, plans, and target audience.

The time has come why you should work with an SMM expert if you do not know how to do this. Doing this can prevent you from making such mistakes in social media marketing, which might result in negative press.
For more useful resources, you can contact CrackleCode or browse our blog and keep an eye on our Medium page (coming soon).