In this month’s newsletter, HMA’s Account Executive and social media expert Joyce Cowles shares her top ten tips on social media.
Social media as a whole can seem daunting and undertaking it can seem like a huge chore; but hopefully with my top 10 tips can help you create and implement your brand’s social media strategy confidently and successfully!
1. Ask the right questions before you start!
To get the most out of social media for your brand (and even individually), and optimise the time you spend on it, you need to ask yourself what is it that you actually want to achieve with social media? Who are you targeting? Is social media the right platform for your objectives?
2. Pick the right channels for your brand and marketing objectives
And making sure you’re on the right channel as your target market, you don’t have to be on all channels. My advice would be to focus on one or two to begin with if you’re just starting, as spreading yourself too thin and not maintaining a profile can send out a worse impression than if you didn’t have a presence on that channel at all.
3. Listen – then Talk
Listen to the conversations your target market are having. Look at your competitors and assess the correct tone, cadence and type of content you feel is appropriate for your brand.
4. Brand your profiles properly
This one is a no-brainer – make sure all your platforms and channels are correctly branded so that customers know instantly that they are engaging with the correct, verified brand.
5. Be Human
Auto Direct Messages – who actually reads them? No one enjoys receiving back the same automated reply when submitting a tweet to customer service. My favourite tip is to interact with customers in the way that you would like brands to interact with you!
6. Create reports worth reading
This is key, even if you’re reporting to yourself. You have set yourself goals and objectives (point 1), and are you achieving them? If no, or not as well as you anticipated, this is where you can pinpoint opportunities for a new strategy. This is also obviously important when reporting back to stakeholders – although do note that the reports you send to stakeholders may require a different emphasis to ones you send internally.
7. Use tools to optimise channel management and increasing post reach
There are hundreds of tools made for social media managers, find the ones that work best for you and your reporting requirements.
8. Little and often is key
Be current and relevant – you don’t need to be on all channels. The social media management tools (point 7) will also help ensure you’re not posting the same content across all platforms, or blowing up people’s news/twitter feeds with a lot of content all at once #annoying!
9. Don’t be afraid of negative tweets/posts
See these as an opportunity to create brand ambassadors, by turning their bad experience into a good one! For tips on this alone, I would highly recommend this article by Chris Brook (CEO of Chatterplug) http://bit.ly/ifX2qB
10. Learn from other’s mistakes and faux pas
Keep an eye on social media news all the time!
The news is rife with hackings and social media managers creating huge PR disasters; keeping an eye on the news will remind you to update your strategy and best practice rules to prevent any social media disasters.
We hope you found these top ten tips useful. For more information on developing a social media marketing campaign for your business, get in touch.
HMA Digital Marketing
Tel: 01226 209450
Twitter @hmadigital
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