Are You Sabotaging Your Social Media ROI by doing this?

(The seldom spoke of story about content vs context)

If your answer is that “it does not cost us anything anyway” …or

…”it takes no time to throw something up” …or worse yet

…” someone does a blanket social media post for us for free”

…those are the wrong answers.

The great marketer, David Ogilvy, once said something to the effect of “a bad add can work like business repellent.”

This I believe is ever truer given that we are so inundated with marketing noise that keeps getting louder.

People have learned to auto-tune marketing messages out…which can eventually lead to an auto-tune of said business.

Here’s the deal.

A lot of people’s approach to marketing is content driven- just throw some stuff up and hope it sticks, without ever given any nod to context.

If content is king…context is the queen who we all know runs the show anyway.

In regards to social media, content is the “stuff” that you put out there- where context is “the way” that you present it, which directs and enhances the meaning behind your content.

Without context…content has no direction, content get the attention, engage, convert, and build the solid relationships that marketing is intended to do.

Where this is not a “how to do social media” it is a message to hopefully incite you to take the time to understand that effective social media market takes time and care- and it is NOT a throw it up and hope it sticks- which can actually be dangerous to your business.

Let’s take a look at how you can approach your social media properties and what context they might represent to further enhance your relationship building with your market.

And remember, there are no absolutes- a lot of this will take some experimenting, but heck, we are scientists, it’ what we do- so why not in the way we build our businesses.

Below I will list different social properties- some subtle differences on their ecosystems hopefully providing you some ways to ‘act’ while there.

Facebook- the biggest platform which exists and the place – often times if you wanted to go for one social media site- this is it. A good place for people to stay up to date with your world- also offers targeted ad runs, etc

Youtube/similar video sharing/periscope, etc- consider a daily vlog- allows you to be you- don’t worry about professional production- can do a morning “coffee with doc” etc where you can answer questions, talk about recent news. These shows can highlight specials, sales, etc without seeming to pitchy if mostly you are delivering value

Twitter- while its had its down- days with declining numbers- twitter, once you get the hang of it is a great spot to share thoughts, idea’s, ‘retweet’ other influencers, and hashtag # to get connected with others in your industry. The vibe is a bit more witty on twitter.

Instagram- More hastags, short, sweet and pretty. A great place to download pics and link to relevant tags- you can easily cross over to your personal life, family pets, etc. Using quotes and linking the relevant hashtags also very useful.

Podcast- why not? Its actually quite easy. Allow your market to listen to you on the way to work- share tidbits of your talks, rants, and more.

Linked In- the professional side of things…make sure you put up a quality business profile- I recommend hiring someone who does this for a living- check out fiverr- that’s where I got mine done.

Pinterest- highly underutilized in our market- do you do dietary coaching? If you are writing blogs you can create a cross visual that can then be pinned- you would be amazed at the touch you can make in your local market and beyond.

There ya go…certainly not all of them, we could go on forever. Heck I would love to see you hook your spotify account up- set your own playlist that you play in your store, share with followers- you can even host your podcast here.

What I hope this did is get the brain flowing- helping you realize that all properties are different- and SO SHOULD YOUR MESSAGE AND STYLE- depending on the property.