Welcome to this week’s episode of the online marketing series for beginners! Now that we’ve covered the importance of having a website (our online business headquarter) and how to attract visitors to it thanks to content marketing and other onsite and offsite SEO techniques, let’s talk about social media marketing!

Remember how we’ve been using a bakery as an example for our online vs. offline world comparison? You may recall that we compared having a website to that bakery storefront window, as it is the first impression that walk-by visitors get from your business. Well, following up with this yummy metaphor, social media marketing would be similar to the flyers you’d be handing out on the street or in mailboxes. It is as simple as sharing your content on those social media networks where your potential customers spend their time.

4 Common Errors to Avoid About Social Media Marketing

As most of us use social media on a daily basis, one might think that social media marketing can’t be that hard. Just a little bit of Instagramming, a little bit of answering to post comments on Facebook – and that would be all. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work as simply as that. If you don’t follow a set strategy, you could get overwhelmed much faster than you’d think. Let’s see the most common errors to avoid when working with social media marketing: 

Error #1. Sharing on all social media platforms. We said before that social media marketing is all about sharing content on those platforms where your potential customers spend their time. And that’s the thing: You don’t need to waste any energy or time on social networks that aren’t relevant to your target market. In fact, one of the most intelligent things you can do is start out with only ONE social network. And then, once you’ve figured it out, go ahead to the next one.

Error #2. Sharing on social media without knowing why. Whichever social media platform you wanna use, you should be clear about your goal. Why are you using Instagram? Is it to attract more visitors to a specific website? To strengthen your brand? To start a conversation with your potential customers?

Error #3. Chasing for followers and likes. These so-called “vanity metrics” don’t mean anything if they don’t follow a strategy. You don’t want followers on Instagram or TikTok – You want to attract those people to your website, remember? The reason is that you don’t want to depend on other companies’ changing algorithms! Instead, you want to create trust, start a conversation, to make your brand get known, and you want only potential buyers to visit your website. Once there, other factors like your website usability and your valuable content can work wonders.

Error #4. Getting overwhelmed with social media. This is the most common, most logical but also the easiest-to-avoid error. We all know that you have to be there, that you don’t only have to start a conversation, but also follow up that conversation. However, that doesn’t mean that you have to check on your social media every time a notification pops up on your smartphone. In fact, here are a couple of tricks to forget about your smartphone and focus on your actual work.

How can I be present on social media without getting overwhelmed?

Now, you may be wondering how you are going to keep up with your social media marketing if you aren’t supposed to be checking on them every single minute, right? Well, batching your work, of course! Whether you batch your social media activities on one day in the week or if you take an hour a day – that’s up to you. But set a rule for yourself, and follow it! It’s way too easy to get stuck on Instagram – But you know that already, don’t you! So keep distractions as far away as possible! Otherwise, you won’t be able to get your actual work done. That is unless your work is community management! Check out this blog post about social media and overwhelm. I hope it helps!

Recap – How to start a social media marketing strategy

• Research where your potential customers spend their time online.
• Set a goal for your presence on social media. You can have a different goal for each social platform.
• Don’t care for vanity metrics.
• Attract your social media followers to your website.
• Plan how and when you’re going to be working on social media. Don’t spend more time checking if your post has got any reaction on Instagram than being focused on your actual work.
• Create valuable content, and share, share share!

Stay tuned for the next chapter, where we’ll talk about email marketing, and that’s a biggie!! If you have any questions or comments, go ahead and let me know! I’ll be happy to help 🙂