You’re Doing it Wrong! 5 Mistakes Companies Make on Social Media

It is not your fault. There’s a lot to do when planning a healthy social media diet for your brand. Social media has grown up over the years, and if you do it well, you’re either lucky, have lots of money to spend, or an experienced social strategist. Many people think they are looking out for their brand, but are still making these mistakes:

1) Intern-Controlled Feeds

I get it. You think it’s 2009, and you can ask an entry level person — or even worse — an intern to control one of your social accounts. Like I said, social media has grown up since then: It’s a tangible form of advertising. Your brand is being seen by consumers on social media probably the first time. That first point of contact should never be managed solely by someone making little to no money — at least without supervision. It’s as if the U.S. military sent toddlers to do the job of a platoon of marines. Sure it’s cute, but at what cost?

2) Diverse Social Handles

A recruiter friend of mine asked why I only put my @mollystarkdean Twitter handle on my business card without any of my other social media properties. I told her that’s because it’s my username everywhere. Having the same username on all social media platforms strengthens the consistency of your brand messaging and makes it easier for your followers to find you on their preferred social channels. Cross-platform social is hard enough without having to tell people all of your different social account names. When looking for names options, make sure it is available on the bigger platforms (Twitter and Facebook) first before trying to create them elsewhere. There are a few sites that will help do this for you.

3) Over Self-splaining

We get it. You are excited about how awesome your brand is, but that should not be all you talk about. Brands that talk a lot about themselves, which is what they are supposed to do in both traditional and social media advertising. Paid social is all about promotion or self-splaining; however, organic social should not be about advertising. Yes, you should be posting updates about your brand, but it should not be 100% of your posts. Also: never use your own handle within those updates. Think about it this way: What if you went to a cocktail party and only talked about yourself and in the third person? That’s how you are presenting your brand if you don’t talk about other things going on in your industry.

4) Thinking Like=Follow

You just achieved an exciting milestone on your social media account: congrats. A large number of social drones clicked on a picture of a thumb. This does not mean that you have a strong following. Legitimate followers that turn into conversions and will engage with your brand is all about community management. If you followed rule number one, your social media manager will engage with your followers and support their needs. Whether it be customer service or positive feedback, your following craves engagement. Proper community management involves both a skilled manager and a tool to help them weed through all the traffic.

5) Ignoring Paid Social

You are competing with huge brands social media. These brands have money and aren’t shy about spending it. Have you ever heard the phrase, “you get what pay for”? Now that social media has grown up, like most grown-up people, the expenses grow up too. I’m not telling you how to spend your money, but I am warning you that it will cost money. These funds can be spent on social media managers, social tools, the platforms themselves, or certain percentages of all three. A 100% organic social media strategy is like taking a stick to a firefight: you will lose. Find the budget to prevent further damage to your brand.

This post might seem overly negative, but I keep on seeing the same mistakes. My advice is for brands to stop doing these things to help strengthen their following to get the conversions they are either spending way too much or — more likely — not enough money on. It’s your money. Spent it on social media wisely or it could harm your brand.