4 Social Media Marketing Mistakes to Avoid in 2016

It’s no surprise that businesses will continue to invest more in social media marketing in 2016. However, there are several social media managers with a wealth of experience behind them who continue to blindly automate this critical marketing practice. They keep posting the same mundane marketing-related content, hoping they their brand can momentum with organic reach. And when things don’t go as well as planned, they blame Facebook for updating its algorithms.

It’s time for social media managers to buckle up. Here are some of the critical social media marketing mistakes to avoid in 2016.

Social Media Marketing Mistakes to Avoid in 2016

1. Relying Solely on Organic Reach

Unless you’ve lived in a cave for the past few months, you’ve probably realized that it’s tough to reach your entire audience on Facebook just by regularly posting content. If you’ve actually spent time in creating quality content for your brand, you may as well spend some money on advertising.

Even if your content is engaging and fun, chances are it won’t reach 5% of the people who like your page. Spending as little as $5 per post can fetch great results as long as your targeting is spot-on. If targeting scares you, you can always use the customer audience feature.

Here’s another tip – Don’t boost your posts. Instead, use the Facebook advertising feature for the content you’re posting on your page. Results have shown that this way of posting is more effective than boosting your posts.

2. Not Interacting with Your Fans

Ignoring questions by customers and prospects can be detrimental for your online reputation. In the same way, not responding to a positive feedback by not acknowledging it can affect the way people perceive your brand. This is one of the hygiene factors that some brands are still not paying attention to. If you have a social  media presence, you have to spend some time monitoring conversations on your page.

Twitter is a great customer service platform. People often talk about their experience with the products that they use. Monitor these conversations closely and respond to people with complaints about your product. Get their feedback and use that feedback to make improvements to your offering.

3. Underutilizing Instagram

Instagram is not just for selfies and food pictures anymore. As you are well aware, Instagram now allows ads. So when you’re creating ads for Facebook, there is an option to include Instagram in order to increase your target audience.

If you’re reluctant to spend on ads, then you can count on Instagram’s organic reach as long as you’re using the right hashtags associated with your business. Use Hashtagify.me to identify the trending hashtags in your niche.

Instagram is also a great platform to showcase your work culture. Encourage your employees to come up interesting content for Instagram.

For more tips on how to increase engagement and get more followers on Instagram, check out this post.

4. Posting Too Many Marketing Messages

Let’s get one thing straight! Social media is not a place where you can just advertise your products and expect people to buy them.

If you bombard your fans with marketing messages, your organic reach will drop further.

Instead, follow the 80:20 rule of content marketing. 80% of your content should focus on educating your fans and only 20% should be aimed towards marketing your product. So if you’re posting 5 posts/week, 4 of them should provide value to the readers and 1 post to promote your offering.

If your fans like the content you post, your organic reach will increase gradually and fans will tune into your page to find content that’s resourceful for them.

Conclusion

Investment in social media will continue to grow in 2016. Let your brand’s persona really shine through by posting remarkable content, responding to queries and concerns of your fans on a regular basis, and leveraging new social media platforms to increase reach and engagement.