4 Excuses Businesses Should Stop Using When it Comes to Social Media

As the owner of a business, one of your number one tasks is to grow your business. Simply put, without the revenue new contacts bring in, you’ll likely grow stagnant. While word of mouth is great, there is a limit to how many people you can meet. You have to market, advertise, and promote your services to reach a wider audience. In terms of reach, social media can provide access to a nearly unlimited source of leads. 

Yet, many businesses don’t see the value that social media brings to their business. In fact, they have a plethora of reasons why they won’t invest in social media. Here are four excuses businesses give for not investing in social media (and why they aren’t accurate).

Excuse #1 - I Don’t Know Anyone Using Social Media

Facebook has 2.37 billion active users. Twitter has 126 million daily users, LinkedIn, 500 million members. Now consider the other platforms, like Instagram and YouTube (and more!) with their millions of users and tell us again you don’t know anyone on social media. The number of users, companies, organizations on social media, makes it statistically impossible not to know somebody.

So, what you really mean to say is that you’re out of step with current avenues of marketing and customer communication. Hey, we get it. It’s pretty easy to feel burnt out or annoyed at Facebook, especially with how the platform has been run the last few years. It’s totally fine for you, as a person, to not see the draw of social media. You, as the business owner of an MSP, however, need to see it differently.

Not having an active presence on social media means you are willingly missing out on an untold number of leads. Your audience is there, in at least some form or fashion. 

Marketing campaigns require you to ‘touch’ potential clients more than just one time in order for your message to reach them and for it to be successful. In fact, what makes social media so valuable as a marketing tool is that you can connect with hundreds, thousands, even millions of potential customers instantly and repeatedly. It doesn’t happen overnight, but as you cultivate it, it becomes more valuable. This leads us to our next excuse:

Excuse #2 - I Tried Social Media (Once) And It Didn’t Work

When an MSP says they tried social media and it didn’t work, it usually means they made a random post or two, and since they weren’t inundated with calls the next day, social media doesn’t work. Okay, it’s not always that extreme. Sometimes a business might buckle down really hard on social media for a month or two, and not see results. There are a lot of variables that could lead to poor performance though (more on that later).

Social media (like all marketing) can take time to gain traction. 

Part of this is because you are not only competing against other businesses, but also against the news of the day, celebrities, and funny cat videos for your audience’s attention. Most social networks are notoriously good at burying the content businesses share in favor of, well, everything else. That means you need to be very engaging, consistent, and use other marketing tactics alongside social media to show up. Paying for boosting and promoting posts can go a long way too.

This means the one, two, or even a dozen posts you’ve made will quickly get lost in the noise. The remedy for this is not to stop posting, but to keep posting, to keep engaging, and to keep providing content worth paying attention to.

Excuse #3 - I’m Putting My Marketing Dollars In Other Places Instead

Tough love time: Your job is to generate and nurture leads; without leads, there is no money and without an income, you will be unable to keep your business open. Unless you promote your services, how will you attract customers? Word of mouth? An ad in the newspaper?  A billboard on the highway? Don’t get us wrong, those methods of communication have value, but the truth is, the public expects a higher level of engagement and that means social media.

Let’s say you are allocating your marketing budget to some really good campaigns - sending letters, postcards, case studies, and doing follow up calls to everyone you touch. That’s great! If your content is good, those touches can be really valuable! But, what if someone received your mailings, and then started seeing more of your content on Facebook? That additional touch is yet another little reminder that you are there, ready to help them with their next issue or needs.

A social media follow is kind of like getting a prospect to bookmark you, but instead of just showing up in their bookmarks, you can continuously give them little tips and tidbits of information to help them choose you when they need your services.

When you refuse to use social media as part of your marketing toolbox, you are effectively limiting your ability to show up to your audience.

Excuse #4 - I Don’t Have Time to Post on Social Media

While there is no hard and fast rule about how often to post, most social media experts believe that a business should at a minimum aim for 3 posts a week, so let’s stick to that as an achievable goal to start with.

Don’t have the time to post three times a week? You may be surprised to learn you do. With a smartphone in hand, your team becomes content producers at the touch of a button.
For example, let’s consider how a manufacturing business might put their social media to use to give their customers a peek behind the curtain:

1. Monday - Post one: A picture of one of their designers could be posted, carefully designing something in their CAD software. As for the caption, it may say something like:

   “Our team is hard at work on a new project. Stay tuned for a peek at some of the processes that go into each and every item we produce. Here, we see one of our engineers carefully designing a prototype… what do you think it could be?”

2. Wednesday - Post two: The manufacturer might be using a 3D printer to create a prototype, and so they may decide to share a quick video of the printer in action. This video could have a similar caption, encouraging the viewer to come back and find out what it was being produced.
3. Friday - Post three: Finally, the manufacturer unveils the finished work with a final photo, along with others taken as progress was made. As a surprise, it may be their own logo. In the caption, they encourage anyone with any questions about their process to ask them.

Then repeat for other projects, or post questions and answers about common concerns. Post about your interests. Give your local audience a reason to follow you, but most importantly, to consider you an expert in your industry.  

It’s Time Use Social Media To Market Your Business  

Social media is the language of today and by not speaking it, you’re smothering your business' marketing potential. The goal of marketing is to generate enough quality leads to keep your business healthy, so why would you deliberately reduce your sales funnel by ignoring social media?

In today’s business environment, getting noticed, starting conversations, educating your audience, and providing quality content are critical parts of lead generation. Social media is one of the few tools which does all these. The truth is if your competition and customers are on social media and you’re not, you can’t compete. Sooner or later, your word of mouth marketing will run out of mouths.

If you’re ready to get in front of your customers and ahead of your competition, but need some assistance, we can help. We offer a variety of social media services including our Ultimate Social Media Rig and our Social Media Graphics Refresh. Call us at 607.433.2200 today!