Does Your Social Media Advertising Work?
Are you aware whether your social media advertising is working or not? You’ve likely spent a lot of time planning the strategy and setting goals.
But it takes a strong person to admit their marketing isn’t working. Having said that, it’s better to admit that everything isn’t working as it should rather than to keep using ineffective, harmful and outdated strategies. As a business owner, you probably have various social media accounts to boost your brand awareness online. But does having these accounts and gaining a few “likes and shares” here and there get you the results you want?
Here are 5 signs that it’s time to take your social media advertising to the next level.
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1. You Get Few Likes or Comments
We’re talking about individual post likes, not page likes. When people engage with your posts,
it’s an indicator they like what you’re publishing. And the reverse means your posts have little impact. So “follower count” is not a be-all-end-all metric. You can have a million followers but if they don’t like, share or comment on your posts, it doesn’t matter.
Look at the number of engagements generated by your average posts, including likes, shares, comments, and retweets.
2. Your Advertising Strategy Is on the Back Burner
Take a few minutes and think about your marketing strategy. Do you have long-term goals? Do you have short-term goals? Is there a reason you’re using a certain social media marketing platform? How are you planning to get more engagement?
If you don’t have solid answers to these questions, your marketing strategy is an afterthought or you don’t have a marketing strategy at all. You’re just floating by, hoping for the best. Write down what you want to achieve. Craft a list of many long-term goals and a few short-term goals. Find out which is the best platform for your brand and business. Have an outline of what you want to post before time and how you want those posts to improve engagement.
3. Most of Your Posts Are Self-Promotional
If you browse through your brand’s new feeds, what posts do you see? Are they entertaining, informative, or conversational posts? Or do most of them feature the products or services from your brand?
If most of your posts feature your products or services, then you’re losing your audience. People don’t like being advertised to all the time. Instead, take your social media marketing to the next level by being personal and connecting with your audience.
4. You Haven’t Checked Your Analytics in Months
Advertising on social media sites is data driven. What has worked in the past? What hasn’t? Don’t repeat the same mistakes. Always check your social media analytics at least once a week.
When marketing with social media, if you try to reach everyone then it’s hard to reach anybody. And vague and generic messages will not resonate with audiences, so it’s essential to use specific and direct communication. Creating a small and focused campaign that targets a specific audience helps you to speak directly to your audience.
5. Can You Remember the Last Time You Had a Conversation with a Follower?
Conversations will keep people coming to your page. It’s not enough to post a link to a blog and be done with it. If someone asks you a question, be there to answer it. And if they comment, you need to acknowledge them. The acknowledgments and engagements will make your followers feel valued and appreciated. If you can’t remember the last time you had a conversation with a fan, you need to scale and improve your marketing strategy.
Why Fine Tune Your Social Media Marketing Strategies?
Social media is a crucial element of digital communication strategies. It gives measurable results in branding, leads, and sales. It provides marketers with great ROI as it enables them to reach large audiences at low cost.
If you aren’t taking advantage of social media, you’re missing out on an effective, fast, and inexpensive way to reach about half of the world’s population. If you use social media advertising properly, you can increase your brand awareness and establish your brand as a thought leader in your industry.
Free Checklist: How To Run Successful Facebook Ads
Competition has led to a considerable increase in advertising costs and Facebook remains a powerful advertising tool. Although everything about Facebook isn’t perfect, the truth is that with more than two billion users per month, Facebook advertising strategies still work.
Yes, they do make changes to their Facebook advertising guidelines without notice which can be frustrating. But if you remain diligent and watch your ad spend and results carefully, you’ll get a good return on your investment.
For more social media marketing tips, download my free checklist How To Run Successful Facebook Ads and make the best use of your social media advertising on Facebook