This might sound odd coming from someone who specializes in social media, but you have got to stop freaking out about your social media strategy. Seriously. Take a deep, cleansing breath and calm down. Everything is going to be fine. Here’s why you need to take a chill pill and stop worrying about your social media strategy.
It’s not about how many “likes” you have
Social media is important to your marketing strategy, but it’s not the whole marketing strategy. Constantly worrying about why you aren’t seeing any interaction or engagement on Facebook, or why you don’t have any new followers on Twitter or Pinterest can and will drive you crazy. Don’t get caught up in the nitty-gritty of being popular on social media. Focus on interacting with the fans you have and building relationships with them. It’s not about who has the most followers and likes, it’s about which business is putting out great content and using social media as a way to listen to their customers.
Scheduling in advance will reduce your workload
Another concern small business owners express is the time it takes to manage all of these accounts when they are also running a business. Let me just say I hear you loud and clear. Keeping up with your social media strategy can feel incredibly daunting. What do we do when something feels overwhelming? Usually we give up and toss the project aside. Don’t do that with your social media strategy.
Lucky for you, almost every social media network has a way for you to schedule content. This allows you to get a week’s worth of blog posts, Facebook updates and tweets scheduled in a few hours so you don’t have to worry about it for the rest of the week. Hootsuite and Tweetdeck are great (free) tools to use to schedule tweets in advance. Facebook has a built-in scheduling option in the same box you create your posts. And Pinterest, well to be honest if you stick to pinning three or four new things to your boards every day, which takes about five minutes, you’ll be in great shape. That’s all it takes! You still need to jump on to respond to comments or add real time content, but the majority of the work can be done ahead of time.
It’s all about learning from your mistakes
What about measuring the success of your social media strategy? Reviewing your strategy and measuring the results is often the most stressful part. What happens if nothing is working? More often than not you are going to be much harder on yourself than you should be. I should know, I’m the queen of beating myself down and only seeing the negatives. But when you start looking at your results and learning what worked, what didn’t work and why, it helps you better shape your plan. Learning from trial and error is the best way to discover the right social media strategy for you. Because let’s face it, no one gets it 100 percent right the first time.
Look for the small clues. Even if you didn’t get hundreds of likes, which post got one or two comments. Who can you count on to routinely like and share your content. Be proactive. Reach out and respond to people who are acknowledging you. And write a follow up post to something which generated a little activity.
Your social media strategy is a small piece of the large puzzle that is your marketing strategy. Don’t get me wrong, it’s an important piece of the puzzle, but don’t let it drive you crazy. Use these tips to help make your social media strategy more streamlined and less stressful.
Want a deeper dive into what you need for your new social strategy? Check out our free social media planning guide:
