When operating any type of Facebook page or social-based advertising campaign in order to build your brand and to attract new customers, there are always going to be dozens of positive tweaks you can make in order to boost your business. On the other edge of that sword, however, equally sharp, there are a slew of bad moves you can make which could cripple your branding.
For every “do” you can find in social media advertising, there’s a “don’t” waiting right behind it. More often than not, this “don’t” will be an innocuous step taken, which, over time, will have an accumulative effect on your campaign. And sometimes you’ll find that a simple lack of attention to detail can cost you in the long run.
To ensure success in your social media campaigns, read over this list of social advertising dos and don’ts to ensure you’re on the right path.
The Top 7 Dos and Don’ts of Social Advertising
What you Should Do:
Do: Always be consistent with what your brand stands for. Stick with what represents you as a brand instead of simply following trends or attempting to appeal to more of an audience.
Do: Make sure you’re updating very frequently. When marketing on sites like Facebook, you can’t rely on people checking your Timeline for your material; you have to post it out there so that it lands in their News Feeds.
Do: Focus on high-quality content. If you’re going to post, that post needs to be something worthy of sharing or engaging with in another way. It’s important to emphasize quality here.
Do: Attempt to be more engaging with every passing day. Sharing, commenting, tagging, and other possible actions – this is what social media advertising is all about. If your audience isn’t engaging with you, you won’t be successful.
Do: Try out a variety of media in your material. Entertaining video clips and funny memes can stand out as more attractive to a social-media user than just a simple text-based post. However, you may have a brad that you don’t want to associate with “funny clips”, then that’s obviously not the way forward, but perhaps you can produce infographics, instructional videos or other brands of media
Do: Interact with people when they engage with you. Not only does this allow you to weed out the serious intent from the no intent, but it also boosts your brand’s image in the public eye.
What you Shouldn’t Do:
Don’t: Avoiding people is a big no-no. Engagement works both ways. If you’re expecting people to engage with your brand, your brand has to engage right back.
Don’t: Never, ever mislead people about your brand, about a product, about the business, etc. This type of thing will come back to bite you in a big way. And while you might think that some exaggeration here and there is harmless, it will compound and bring you down.
Don’t: Be careful when attempting to tell too much of a story. Your Timeline as a whole can speak volumes about your brand. You don’t have to write up a business history in a post. Give people a reason to engage to find out about you.
Don’t: You need to avoid being negative here. Even if you’re trolled and someone delivers a crushing blow of negativity, you can simply delete it if it’s that bad. Responding in kind puts you on that level – the level of unprofessionalism.
Don’t: Never share something that’s too personal. Your real name might be okay in some instances, especially if you have a personal FB account that you wish to tie in to show people a personal side. But there’s a thin line here you should be cognizant of.
Don’t: Stay out of politics, religion, sports rivalries, etc. Some brands have thought it funny to create memes, apps and other materials dealing with politics or sporting franchises. While it seems “cool” on the surface, an anti-Republican ad shuts out Republicans, while a pro-Arsenal ad shuts out everyone but Arsenal. Understand?
Don’t: Never ignore programs like Word. Proper spelling and grammar are your best friends. Just because it’s social-speak to confuse “you’re” and “your,” “there” and “they’re,” and to have horrific grammar, throwing commas, periods and the semicolon under the bus completely, your brand has to rise above that.
Search long enough and you can probably find over 70 dos and don’ts pertaining to social media. It’s an encompassing subject with a lot that can go right or wrong within it. The article above focused on the top 7 dos and don’ts out there, but, please, keep studying social media advertising to learn more about what you should and shouldn’t be doing.
Post written by : Craig Robinson. He’s an editor for a facebook ad management tool – Qwaya. He writes about different topics for social media and loves to engage in some social media communities, forums and most of all he’s a social media fanatic.
