Are you worried about getting your social media presence and campaigns wrong? It is clear that the likes of Facebook and Twitter are now vitally important to many businesses. You might have heard one of the common, and potentially damaging myths about social media that are circulating the Internet guised as fact. If you have then your social strategies might be skewed by your conceptualization of this marketing avenue. Read on to have some perceptions debunked, and to learn some new ideas.

My Customers Don’t Use Social Media

Depending upon the industry you are in you might think that your customers aren’t very likely to be using social media in any way. The truth is that these days the majority of people are users of these sites, with many of them logging on once a day or more. Recent statistics suggest that over 72% of the adults in the US use social media. That is the vast majority of the 85% who go online. In fact, even older people are starting to get hooked on social sites, with 43% of US adults over the age of 65 years old now getting in on the act. Even if your target market isn’t yet classed among the heaviest uses of social media you can fairly safely expect more and more of them to sign up over time.

Rather than discounting your prospects as non-social you should try and profile them. What are they interested in? Which social sites will they be most drawn to? Do they watch videos found on social sites? By understanding them you can find them. When you have found them you can listen to them in social media. Having listened you can answer in your social campaigns.

I Won’t Be Able to Track My Success Rate

Most business owners love nothing more than to be able to clearly track what they are doing well and their exact ROI. The problem that they sometimes see with social media is that it appears to be a scattergun type of approach, which doesn’t allow for success rate to be tracked. The truth is that social media is very easy to measure once you know how to do it.

There is no magic box that pops up on the screen to tell you how much money you have made from Facebook, but you can work how well you are doing at attracting visitors to your site and maintaining conversations with customers. Google Analytics is one tool where you can see the impact your social media work is having, and there are other options for you to consider as well.

Social Media is Solely for Attracting New Customers

One of the social media myths you might have previously come across is that it is only really useful for attracting new customers. While it can be an excellent medium to help you bring in new clients, the majority of businesses use it to communicate with their existing customer base. This means that one of the main focal points of your social strategy can be to retain customers and build your brand loyalty. People who like what you do and want to listen to more from you are those who are most likely to tune in to your social offerings. It might be that as part of this you get some negative comments. Instead of looking at this as something to be afraid of, or to ignore, you should take it as a chance to show how much you care.

You existing customers are your best route to new customers. By engaging them you will gain access to their networks, through likes, tweets, Pins etc. If you can build brand loyal customers it will be like having social ambassadors on the networks advertising your products and services for free.

Do you love or hate using social media for your business? Let me know in the comments below!

Much success,

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