Marketing Wheel Series: Spoke #1 in the Marketing Wheel: Social Media

Marketing is much like a wheel, in the sense that, you have a hub: which is your website, and all of the other forms of advertising/marketing point in to that hub as “spokes”. The first spoke in the marketing wheel we are going to discuss is social media.

For so long now, social media has been thought of as a way to market your new business or service for free. The problem with this idea is you generally get what you pay for in marketing, and “free” monetarily will generally involve expenses paid in other forms, such as time investments. “Free” social media marketing is usually for those with tremendous patience, who have time to see a slower growth in likes/pins/reposts, and who don’t mind taking time out of their day to build this column of the advertising structure up to a point where it becomes a revenue producer. A far better approach is to build some sort of a budget for social media, and to adhere strictly to the following three social media posting guidelines:

1. If you don’t have time to follow a plan, be consistent, and follow through on what you say you are going to do, DO NOT start advertising through social media, or at least consider hiring someone with the time to be able to do it for you the RIGHT way. Social media is often the first opportunity you will have to build trust with prospective customers, and NOT following through on what you say you will do, will NEVER be a point for your business in the customer’s “trust” column.

2. Don’t be a “jack of all” social media’s if you don’t have the time to invest. It’s better to do a few social media’s really well, than to do dozens poorly.

3. EVERY post should include: some type of visual aid (picture, graph, cartoon), and a contact point (website, phone number, email, etc.) EVERY post should NOT contain a hard sell. People want to have information, and to be able to make decisions on their own to purchase a good/service. While it isn’t bad to provide information that proves the worth of your product, and how it can save them time/money/troubles, if every post you make is an “order now!” post, they will either block you, ignore you, or worst yet…delete you.

In the end, your social media should point back to your website and encourage those reading your social media information about why you are the best choice for them to invest their hard earned money in. If you aren’t pointing back to your site, and you aren’t gaining new customers or at least connections that can lead to increased sales, then social media isn’t a business tool for you, it’s a hobby.