So many people make up their mind that they are going to jump into social media but do not have a plan. Like any part of your business, you should design the foundation of what you want to accomplish and how are you going to accomplish them.
Here are some steps you should take to design your social media plan.
- You need to make a commitment. You can not throw up a Facebook Page and leave it. You need to invest time, energy and resources to build your engagement.
- Set goals. You need to engage your users as well as building your following. Work on building "You Inc." This is a great way to brand yourself.
- Find your best fit. It may be Facebook, Youtube, Pinterest or Twitter. See if you already have a fan base out there. Do some research. Post videos to Youtube, post tweets or post educational content to Facebook to establish a presence. Make sure you give your followers great content before you push your products or services on them.
- Stay engaged with your audience. If questions are being asked or a discussion has started relating to one of your posts, make sure you join the conversation, don't leave them hanging.
- Schedule Engagement. After you have done some research and know where your presence is, you need to plan a way and how frequent in which you will engage your users. On Facebook you can schedule your posts right on your page but you can also use this free software called Hootsuite. If you do not engage with your followers, your social media will fail.
- Design a Content Plan. Do not bombard your followers with messages. If your are building "You Inc," what do you want to teach them. I am known as The Social Media State Trooper and my posts are about different social media platforms.
- Start conversations with your users. On Facebook, I use questionnaires and promote them. The one I just ran had over 2,213 responses. This is the most I have ever received. I am in the process of developing a social media membership site, and I was inquiring which platform they had the most trouble with. Even though the membership is going to cover a few of the platforms, now I know I will start with the Facebook training. The difference between Twitter and Facebook is that Twitter moves so fast that a tweet will be irrelevant within an hour where Facebook posts have a few hours of staying power.
- Create Expert Content. People are looking for great content and leadership. Talk about your customers and their industry 80 to 90% of the time and then discuss your own business. Here are some tips: start a blog, explore trends, release case studies and create infographics.
- Run promotions and Contest. These are great ways to get your business in front of more people. Experts say run a contest every couple of months but you do not want to over do it. They do say that your prizes need to be exciting. People who are selling products, promotions are great, especially around the holidays.
- Broaden your horizon. Commit yourself for the long haul. If you stay focused on content and interaction, you will do well.
- Delegate Tasks. Don't get overwhelmed. The bigger your business grows the danger that you are going to fall behind. You can outsource tasks or hire additional team members. A talented team can give you a more robust presence.
Let me know if this article helped you in any way but posting a comment in the boxes below.
To Your Success,
Anita Levesque
207-694-0314
http://facebook.com/anitawaltonlevesque
These are all wonderful Social Media tips! I could not of said it better myself.
Thank you Eleanor. I think it is very important to have a plan then to through one together. Anita
Great article. I am new to the social media world and blogging. I am always looing for ways to increase traffic and views of my page and my articles. Love the idea of coming up with questionaires as I believe people LOVE to give their opinion! Thanks for the advice!
Engagement and creating great content is the key. Getting feedback on what your audience wants is a good way of creating content and doing how to articles to help them solve a problem. Thanks for the comment. Anita
Such great ideas you share here! I think my next step is to run a promotion or contest…or promote a contest I design. I am just getting back into the swing after being “down” with melanoma, so I am thrilled now to get that social media ball rolling once again!
Sorry to hear about being down and out. If you need help, let me know. Thanks for the comment. Anita
Great Tips! I put social media time on my schedule and try my hardest to stick to it.
It does take time to build but is worth it. Thanks for the Erica. Anita