5 Critical Mistakes Companies Make When Using Social Media

Social media is an important part of a company’s marketing strategy. Through social media you can develop deeper relationships with customers and make connections with people all around the world.  If your company is still not participating in social media such blogging, Facebook, or Twitter, then you’re missing out on so many opportunities to attract new customers and interact with your current customers.

Although there are many companies using social media nowadays, many of them are making these five costly mistakes:

Mistake #1: "Build it and they will come" mentality. It’s not enough to just set up a Facebook page or Twitter account and think that you will automatically have new customers and sales will skyrocket. You still have to promote these pages and provide valuable content in order to inspire people to follow or like your page.

Mistake #2: Not monitoring conversations about their business. What are other bloggers saying about you? Are people tweeting about your business? One reason why you would want to monitor social media is that you can interact with people who have done business with you. Whether they are raving about your service or telling other people how unsatisfied they are with your service, you want to be able to respond with a “Thanks for your feedback.” This is especially for people who post negative feedback about your business because this gives you an opportunity to find out what happened and hopefully change that experience into a more positive one.

Mistake #3: Using social media just for promotion. If you’re constantly promoting your latest "sale", "promotion", or "deal", then you’re going to turn people off and lose followers and fans very fast. It’s ok to do it once in awhile, but not every status update.

Mistake #4: Not monitoring their profiles. If you outsource your social media activities, it’s important to check in at least once a week to see what’s being posted and whether or not it is in alignment with your brand’s image and message.

Mistake #5: Not engaging with other people, especially customers. That’s what social media is about - being social. You want to engage and interact with people so that they can get to know more about you and your business. Remember that in this day and age, people do business with companies they like.

Out of the five social media mistakes offered here, which ones are you making? What will you do today to change that?

Photo Credit: FindYourSearch on Flickr