Does Your Small Business NEED to be on Social Media?

Social media has become very prevalent in our everyday lives right now:

• When you go to a cafe or a restaurant, you can check in on Facebook or Yelp to alert your friends of where you are
• When you attend a special event, you may tweet from that event with its special hashtag
• When your friend gives birth to a baby, you find out first via Facebook as she posts photos of the baby’s first days in this world

In terms of your small business, does it make sense for you to be on social media?

Over the past years of consulting and networking with small businesses in Denver, I have heard the same complaints from small business owners about social media:

• I’m not getting ANY results with Facebook!
• We’ve hired someone to do our social media, but we’re not seeing much ROI.
• How come we only have 50 followers after being on Twitter for six months?

Now, stop and think: are your potential (and current) clients even ON social media?

If you are not sure how answer this question, perform a social media audit this week:

Get out a pen or pencil and some paper.

1. Write down ALL of the social media platforms you have business accounts on. For instance, you may have business social media accounts on Instagram and Facebook, but not on Twitter or LinkedIn.
2. Visit your social media profiles and write down how many followers you have on each account.
3. Browse through your follower list and see who exactly is following you: are they your colleagues? Friends? Family? Clients? Bots? How old are they? Are they your target audience?
4. Review what you have posted in the past month on each social media profile: how are people reacting to your social media posts? Are there likes, comments, or shares? If there’s no activity, also take note of that.
5. Reflect on what your goals and objectives are in regards to your social media profiles. If you have not set any goals and objectives for your social media, set a couple at this step.
6. Next, if you have client or prospect meetings this week, ask them, “How did you find out about my business?” and “Did you know we are on social media?” Take note of their responses.
7. If you have employees, ask them if they know of your business’s social media presence.

What does your social media audit tell you?

Look at the answers you provided for the social media audit listed above: what do your answers tell you about your social media presence? For instance, if your business serves primarily men and women who are fifty-five years and older, having a social media presence on Instagram may not be the most strategic or effective use of your time: might be better to focus your efforts on LinkedIn and Facebook. If you are not using a certain social media platform frequently enough, you may reconsider having a presence on that platform, e.g., if you have not used your Pinterest account in ages, you may decide not to use that platform anymore for your business.

Social media marketing is a big deal for businesses big or small these days, but that does not mean you necessarily have to be on ALL the social media platforms. Focus your efforts on at least two social media platforms to get the most ROI out of your social media marketing–of course, as long as the type of customers you want to attract are on those platforms.