If I were to ask you to define your social media strategy, could you do it? Could you define your goals, why you (and your business) are on social media, how your posts benefit your company, and how you measure your success?

If you can, great! You are likely enjoying the successes that come with having a set understanding of what you are doing on social media and what you want to achieve. Well done.

If you’re struggling with those questions, or if you’re not seeing results from your social media, I suggest you revisit your social strategy. Many times, when there isn’t a social media strategy in place, businesses find themselves defining “success” as engagement. Companies are then chasing followers, likes, and clicks just for the sake of having higher numbers and more engagement. But really, what does that accomplish?

Engagement by itself is not an indicator of success.

Take a look at Apple’s Facebook page: they post a video or image once or twice a year. They might get 1,000 comments per post, but spread over the course of a year that doesn’t amount to very much. Yet this company’s financial success is legendary. Social media engagement does not indicate how successful a company is or will be.

Plus, engagement can be expensive. Creating content that gets noticed and gets a response takes from your team’s time and creativity resources. Then you might find you need to “boost” your content or advertise to audiences outside of your current followers. If your “strategy” centers on engagement, you’re spending hard resources for soft returns.

What you really should understand is that social media engagement is only useful when it is tied to measurable business objectives. For example:

• Lead Generation
• Product Sales
• Customer Acquisition
• Customer Service
• Product Development
• Brand Awareness in a New Market
• Donations
• You get the picture, right?

Social media isn’t a strategy. It is a tactic. It should be one of many within an overall marketing strategy built to achieve specific and measurable business goals.

So, when you’re evaluating your Social Media presence, make sure you use your business objectives and goals to drive your strategy. And if you get stuck, we can help! Scheffey can help you create a Social Media Strategy that fits your business. Give us a call.