Is your social media your go-to strategy for attracting new leads to your company?
Are you overwhelmed thinking you need to be updating your status on Twitter every waking moment? Do you feel stressed thinking about all the posts you should be making on Instagram? Have you lost hours of sleep contemplating whether you should actually check your Facebook analytics?
It’s not uncommon to feel stressed about social media — but, thankfully, there is an easier way to market your business.
Social media is an incredibly powerful tool, and I use it a lot when connecting and engaging with the OGAL Web Design audience.
But, solely relying on social media is actually bad for business. Putting social media as the focal point of your marketing strategy can not only be stressful, but it can also be a huge mistake and today, I’m going to tell you why.
By the end of this article, you’ll know exactly what to do with your marketing going forward to keep your online presence up and running without driving yourself crazy trying to keep up with 100 different social platforms!
Why shouldn’t you use social media as your main marketing tool?
So many businesses make social media their go-to strategy for attracting new clients to their website, which is understandable. Social media is a mighty force and with 4.48 billion people using social media worldwide, who wouldn’t want to use it in their marketing?
But focusing on social media alone is a big mistake. Especially for small businesses like yours.
Why?
Because when you’re on social media, you’re living in a space that isn’t your own. You’re the star of the show sure, but you’re not the one directing it. You don’t technically own what you’re posting about, and it can be taken away in a flash.
If you focus all your energy on building up an unbelievable social media presence without any backup at all, you’re going to run the risk of ending up with nothing. This is simply because social media platforms can ban, restrict, and penalize your company at any time and they don’t even need a reason to do it.
I know what you’re thinking – this rarely happens to small businesses. Right?
Unfortunately not.
The rules and regulations surrounding what you can and can’t post on social media are always changing. You don’t even have to be saying anything controversial these days to get yourself on the chopping block. Sometimes, people get banned or restricted for simply being in a niche that doesn’t vibe with the social media platform’s look.
Social media platforms like Facebook will also accidentally ban or flag posts just because their AI gets a little confused.
So, with this in mind, do you still think it’s a good idea to build your company’s marketing on somebody else’s show? Do you still want to rely on social media alone to market your small business?
Even the big shots like Nike and Adidas have long since realized this and have stopped posting on the borrowed property altogether. They still have their social media ads sure but some of these big companies haven’t touched their social media since 2018!
Now, we wouldn’t recommend leaving your social media there to simply gather dust but it is food for thought. If the big companies don’t want anything to do with a platform that isn’t theirs then why should you?
Not convinced yet?
Well, here’s another reason why relying on social alone can be bad for business.
Social media posts are easily forgotten about – don’t become yesterday’s news!
Posts on social media that are liked and engaged with the day you post them are usually forgotten the day after. They’ll be completely irrelevant a week down the line too.
Only a very few social media posts actually continue to get you engagement over a long time. Most will be forgotten and sit at the bottom of your page, gathering a whole load of dust.
However, blog posts and articles can and will continuously bring traffic to your website for years to come.
A lot of our old blog posts still bring in hundreds of views every month and high-value leads. Some of the things that we post on social media will get a click or two on the day, but they’re forgotten a short while later, and we rarely get a lead from them.
This is why we invest our time in and encourage our clients to create high-quality website content that will bring them high-quality leads as well as stand the test of time.
Should you invest your time into creating blog posts for your website?
Absolutely!
Now, we know what you’re thinking, blogs are for people with too much time on their hands and too many cats in their small apartment. This might be true in some circumstances, the internet is full of funny animal videos after all, but blogs aren’t just about the daily lives of your average cat lover. Blogs today are so much more than an online diary.
Having a blog on your website is a chance to give your audience proof that you’re just as good as you claim to be by providing them with valuable information. Giving your readers educational content and helpful guides will show them you really do know what you’re doing. Plus, if you can show them with a blog that you’re an expert in your field, they’ll have no problems wanting to do business with you.
Another way to look at it is if you’re not producing content on your website, you’re not giving people a reason to visit (or revisit) your site. Blog posts and articles that are full of helpful information that’s useful to your clients will get you more visitors, more engagement, and more conversions. It’s as simple as that really.
We have an amazing client, Lloyd & Hodge, who are fantastic at producing quality content full of informative and helpful tips. All their topics are focused on their target audience. This helps them continuously attract the right kinds of people to their website.
Some of the blogs they post include Tax-Friendly Ways To Build Your Child’s College Fund and The Most Common Bookkeeping Mistakes That Can Spell Disaster For Your Business. These articles provide helpful solutions to problems their audience is going through. More people end up being interested in this content because it hits all the right pain points. Plus, it also gets their audience interested in the services they provide to help solve these problems.
What we recommend to do, and what Lloyd & Hodge do, is create social media posts and email marketing out of your fantastic blogs.
You’ve already written the content for your blog post, so use it for your social media too!
This way, you’ll always have a backup. If your social media account gets taken down, you’ll still have the original article that will continue to give you high-quality leads!
Articles can aid your sales process & provide support
Not only are blog posts great for leads, but having them on your website can also help you avoid long conversations with confused clients.
We often use some of our old blog posts to explain topics to our clients. Instead of spending hours educating our clients on a particular subject, we link them to one of our explanatory blogs and let it do the talking for us.
Linking to social media posts doesn’t have the same effect. With blog posts and articles, you can clearly outline every aspect of a topic. This will help you clearly educate your client and provide them with the information they need to understand your services, and how your services will help their business. It’s also really difficult (and completely pointless!) to update outdated social media content. With an article, you can easily edit it and add in any new or relevant information that you discovered on the topic.
We don’t want to see everything you’ve worked on for the last few years go up in flames. So take our advice and avoid spending all your time relying on social media marketing.
Don’t make the mistake of spending all your time writing a bunch of social media posts only to accidentally get your account banned, restricted, or deleted without warning. Start writing informative blogging or hire a copywriter to help you out.
Good copy sells and investing your time into a decent content strategy will help your small business thrive online.
If you want some help figuring out how to create the perfect digital marketing campaign with brilliant content writing then get in contact with us today. We’d love to help!
