5 Most Common Social Marketing Questions – Answered

5 Most Common Social Marketing Questions – Answered

While working with clients, we get quite a few common questions about what social marketing is, how it works and how brands can benefit from it. Instead of keeping these answers to ourselves, we’re going to share them with you right now. If you’ve been thinking about going social, you’ve come to the right place.

1. How many social media platforms should we be on?

It’s important to first recognize that social marketing is not about racing to be present on all of the social media platforms. Being visible on the most platforms is not an effective strategy and it might even hinder your efforts.

Spreading yourself too thin can be detrimental to a social marketing strategy. That is, spreading your brand across too many platforms can become difficult to manage successfully. Instead, you should focus on two or three platforms that match your goals best.

Next, you must understand that different platforms are ideal for different purposes. For example, if you want to rock SEO, you should turn to Flickr or StumbleUpon. If you want to kill it with engagement, go with Twitter or Tumblr.

2. Can’t one of our interns just do this stuff?

Sure! Anyone can sit on a Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn account all day. They can respond to inquiries and maybe even start a few conversations. The difference between the results you’ll get from your intern and the results you’ll get from a social marketing company, however, are huge!

Social marketing specialists know how to develop the perfect strategy for your brand and then execute it flawlessly. There is no substitute for years of knowledge, passion and experience.

3. How many fans and followers should we have?

Social marketing is not about how many fans and followers you accumulate. While a large fan base is awesome, those aren’t the metrics you should be most concerned with. Instead of measuring your success by these very linear metrics, consider your online influence, the influence of your fan base, the loyalty of your fan base, etc.

Remember, plenty of companies have a massive following on social media and, yet, can’t convert those people into real customers.

4. Why should we choose to invest in social marketing over traditional marketing?

The choice between social marketing and traditional marketing doesn’t have to be so black and white. Today, brands are finding innovative ways to combine traditional marketing and social marketing. An extremely basic example is the number of brands who advertise their Facebook and Twitter presence in television ads.

If you want to consider it social vs. traditional, social is a more modern and authentic form of marketing. First of all, statistics show that people are skeptical of advertisements, but trust peer recommendations almost implicitly. Social marketing is the act of capitalizing on those types of interactions.

Second, social marketing is like hanging out with thousands of your customers every single day. Imagine how valuable that would be to your brand’s development. Imagine how many great relationships you could forge. Now, imagine how many of your new friends are going to tell their friends about you! That’s the power of social marketing.

5. At what time of day should we do social media stuff?

Social media is always on. There is no “perfect window” for tweeting and posting. Instead, you must be prepared to be “always on”. How will you connect with your customers in different time zones if you only interact in the morning? How will you improve your customer service if you’re not available at 11 p.m. on a Tuesday?

Studies have shown, however, that Wednesday at 3:03 p.m. is the single best time to interact on social media.

What other social marketing questions are common? Did these answers clear up misconceptions for you?

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