Spruce Up Your Social Media
Social media has become an integral part of a company’s marketing efforts, with 93% of marketers using social media for business. It is a quick and casual way for a brand to interact with its customers. A brief Facebook post or tweet keeps the company at the top of the news feed and on the customers mind. (1)
Social media posts are also a great way to gauge how customers are reacting to what a company is sharing. While it may just be a silly post or tweet to the customers, it is a goldmine of information to the marketer when putting together the next social media message. Did the last post get a lot of likes, shares, views, comments, favorites, retweets? What about compared to other posts? Maybe it reached new potential customers that liked or followed the account, rather than just the post. Those account likes are particularly important, and often celebrated when hitting a certain milestone. “We are celebrating 5,000 followers with a giveaway!” A high number of followers or page likes is associated with a trusted company, and each post or tweet is a step towards that “XXX amount of followers” goal.
However, numbers can be misleading. Many companies discovered this harsh reality earlier this year when Facebook did some spring cleaning and removed inactive account likes and comments. It also got rid of possible fake likes that companies purchased to boost their public image. Facebook claims this removal of inactive and fake accounts will benefit businesses by providing a better understanding of its following. (2)
“Businesses use Page audience data to understand what their followers care about. To make audience data even more meaningful for businesses, we’re updating the way Page likes are counted by removing memorialized and voluntarily deactivated accounts from Pages’ like counts. This change ensures that data on Facebook is consistent and up-to-date.” (3)
This may seem like a blow to the corporate Facebook world, but it is actually a good thing. Now that the audience data is up to date, it will be easier for companies to target new customers (that will actually interact) based on the current audience.
It is also a good thing for customers too. The inflation of fake accounts has been ‘deflated’, so customers have a more accurate audience to judge when deciding to trust a brand or not.
Spring Cleaning Time
Now that Facebook has started the clean sweep, it is a good idea to clean out other social media accounts too. How many of your Twitter followers actually matter? If their profile pictures is the generic egg, they can probably go. There are so many companies that offer “10,000 followers for $5.00”, but do any of those followers actually care about your company? Probably not. It is more important to have 500 followers that care about what you have to say, rather than 10,000 follower that will never interact with your tweets. Tweepi is a great tool for managing Twitter. It is a tool that lets you easily flush the unfollowers and find accounts worth following.
Pinterest can also require some spring cleaning. It is easy to get added to boards and lists without knowing you have been added, and those boards show up on your company’s profile.
The only way to get a true understanding of your company’s social media impact is to keep the audience up to date. A high number of account likes or followers may look good, but the interaction on each post is the true measure of social media success.
Article 1: Cold, Hard Content Marketing Facts
Article 2: Facebook Spring Cleaning, Removing Inactive Account Likes and Comments
Article 3: Making Page Likes More Meaningful
By Stephanie Ganzer