There seems to be a collective anxiety in the world of marketing as business owners and managers ask themselves…
1. Do I need to be involved in social media?
2. If so, how do I do that?
Or, in the case of the second question, of the numerous social media platforms around, which ones do I need to use?
Underlying some of this anxiety is what we might call…
“Social Media FOMO”
…the fear of missing out!
(As an aside, that in itself is a powerful marketing lesson to note. Most people hate to feel that there is some sort of party going on that they are not part of!)
Three recent items taking a look at this issue.
First from Malcolm Auld…
“Happy birthday Twitter, but still no consumer brands in top 200 accounts #brandfail?”
Yes, Twitter recently celebrated it’s 9th birthday, but there’s little evidence that it has proved to be of much use for business purposes.
Malcolm points out that there are no consumer brands in the Top 200 Twitter accounts and that there are more inactive accounts than active ones!
Also…
- Total monthly active accounts – that is, the user accesses their account just once per month – 288 million
- Total number of accounts with no followers – 391 million
- 5 countries account for 50% of tweets – USA, Japan, Indonesia, UK and Brazil
- Number of fake Twitter accounts – 20 million
- Percentage of internet users that don’t use Twitter – 90.4%
- Average number of followers per account – 208. But given the Top 200 accounts each have more than 7 million followers and around 391 million accounts have none, what does 208 even mean?
Next…
…In the March 2015 “No B.S. INFO-Marketing Letter”, Dan Kennedy kicks off with…
“I’m fascinated by the mess ‘o media that marketers are adding to their businesses and having to attend to. A side to side banner of media places you can go to now appears across top or bottom of ads, web sites, TV screens – follow us on Facebook, at Twitter, on YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn etc, etc. I’d sure like to see all this “More” producing more real results.”
Dan goes on to make the point that despite the explosion of new media, businesses in general, and INFO-marketers in particular, are not seeing a corresponding growth in sales. New media is NOT making it easier and cheaper to grow a business. And the reason…
“Money is unlimited. Time and other resources used to attract and obtain it are not – including, notably attention from consumers.”
“Recently in another newsletter I wrote about “dilution”. It explains why ‘More’ isn’t equaling ‘More Money’. Instead more headaches. DILUTION explains why all this ‘More’ is making it harder, not easier. The ability to give anyone or anything any significant of Attention is handicapped. Attention has been so diluted, it flirts with impossibility to gather a crowd, hold a crowd, monetize a crowd.”
Hmm.
The answer to this? Well, Dan has a number of suggestions but number one…
“The biggest thing, the most difficult thing, for you and with your business is to refuse to attend to, be seen in or at, ‘use’ some or many things, media outlets, places, low value customers. To focus and to exclude and ignore, especially when the noise insists ‘everybody else IS doing it and you MUST too’. Opting out of something ‘everybody’ is racing into is very difficult, but vital.”
In other words, be very selective about where you use your attention and resources.
Finally, the March 2015 GKIC Gold Call interview was with internet marketing pioneer Ken McCarthy and here’s what he had to say when asked if a business owner needs to have a Facebook page…
“Facebook seems to be important, but whether it generates sales or not is a whole other issue. I would say have a page. It’s not a big deal. Have all your information that you can put on there, phone number and any free offers you have or any introductory offers or any free reports. Make sure all of that is crystal clear. Make sure there’s an opt-in so if somebody wants to be on your email list they can get on your email list.”
Ken then went on to point out a BIG problem with Facebook and other social media…you need to have useful, good, interesting things to say on an ongoing basis.
I would add as well that if you decide to actually engage with people on social media, be prepared for a HUGE commitment of time. You may be able to delegate this role to some extent but if you are a solo entrepreneur and the public face of the business, that may be difficult.
The conclusion from Ken about Facebook…
“…unless you’re working Facebook as your core strategy…the best way to use Facebook is to have an active Facebook page with a lot of direct response elements built into it and then use Facebook paid advertising to drive lots and lots of people to your Facebook page.”
Interesting comments from someone who is “at the coalface” and speaks from real experience.
My “2 cents” on all this…
…there’s no right or wrong way, you need to find what works for your business and circumstances. It’s helpful to keep in mind….
1. Social media is not a “magic” answer to all your marketing problems. A successful social media channel provides a potential source of traffic that you may be able to tap in to.
2. You need to be able to measure the results from your marketing activities to decide if the return is worthwhile for you.
Most of all…
…BEWARE of the “FOMO”! Getting involved with a multitude of social media channels simply because they exist and it’s the fashionable thing to do can be very costly in terms of your time and resources. Make sure you choose…wisely. You don’t want this to happen…