7 Lies To Why You Don't Need Social Media For your Business

Social Media conjures up many different lines of thought, and with good reason. People's Social Media experiences vary greatly from favorable to all out detest of the media. Yet many businesses need social media as much as they need a website and email and my aim at this moment is to dispel some of the more common ideas of social media.

I don’t need to use Social Media A common reason why businesses don’t have social media, is the thought that there is no need for them to have any social media accounts. Either their clients and customers are too old or just don’t care about what their company has available on social media. This could be because you have experienced a company over selling through a channel, or doing something that is annoying in a general fashion.

Anything can be done wrong, and this goes for social media. We all have come across that person who, in our minds, over sales has the same post come up over and over again. You have probably come across that person WHO YELLS ALL THE TIME IN THEIR POSTS TO GIVE THE IMPRESSION THAT IT IS URGENT! Even the business that posts information that is irrelevant to their business to appear hip or cool or whatever the millennials call it these days. There are often times misconceptions that you use regular media tactics and these different strategies work for New Media. Often times they only cause irritation.

There is no Value in Social Media

“You can’t make money off of social media, so I am not going to spend money on an avenue that will not bring in money.” Well, I personally can’t argue with that. If I do not get an ROI back then I wouldn’t be interested in something either. Yet, I would ask what do you think social media is for? Do you believe that it is just an advertising avenue? Are you just buying a spot on the radio or an ad in a newspaper? IF so then you are missing the key work in social media. That word is Social. Yep social media is a relationship building tool.

What happens when you sell to a customer? You are hoping that person will trust your word enough to go and buy your product or service, or in another way of phrasing it. You are wanting to build a relationship. Thinking that a particular way of saying something will cause your potential customer to relate to what is being said and trust that you will be able to scratch the itch they are suffering with.

So is there value in social media? That depends on you. Is it valuable to have your customer know, like, and trust you? If so then yes it is valuable. If only because it builds a deeper connection to your customer base. Allows for you to fully understand the issue and help fix the problem at hand in not only a physical sense but also an emotional sense.

And that I believe is the best type of Return on Investment

I don’t have time for Social Media

If you are the head of a company, department, family, or some other organization, I can relate. This is just one more item piled on top of the ever-increasing mound of straw on the back of that proverbial camel. Time is one of the most valuable commodities because you cannot store it in Tupperware or stash it in a safe. The moment you have is now.

Social Media is such a time suck that you just on just to see how your aunt Gladys is doing and next thing you know is it is time for lunch and you just watched a video of a goat ramming a cow for the 17th time. Social Media has to be kept at a minimum and you don’t want your company to be viewed as a time suck channel so you are not going to waste your clients time nor yours, and just not be involved.

This is one way to fix the problem. There is also a way of dealing with traffic by not having a car. You can still do everything you need, just you have less convenience, and at times more cost when you have to hail a taxi. You have a vehicle for a reason. You don’t actually have to have it but it does serve a purpose. So, instead of cutting off your nose to spite your face. Have a plan and goals for how your social media strategy will be executed.

People don’t care what I have had for dinner last night.

Really? How many times have you heard the phrase, “Hey, you eat yet?” Sounds like someone is wanting to know what you ate for supper. So, yes there are people who care what you ate and are interested in what exactly that is.

The Key is personality. Your customers want to know that your company has a human element. Yeah, they know that there are people at your company but, what is your culture? Do you like to have fun or it is just a bunch of stuffy people who don’t care who their customer is as long as they are giving you money.

You can let them use their imagination and try to guess what your companies personality is, but often is will not be quite as favorable as you would hope. So, control that image. Share, your company’s philosophy, vision statement, and culture. Allow your clients to get involved. Show that you are human behind all that brick and mortar.

Change the phrase to it is not business it’s personal

Oh I have it covered with Facebook 

The saying doesn't put all your eggs in one basket. While it is true that there are almost as many people on Facebook as there are in China, many people are finding out that Facebook in not the end all to be all in the world of social media. There are around 974 million people throwing up 140 character tweets on twitter and several of them don’t use Facebook. Google plus as other advantages that are business and the web specific while also sporting audio/visual aspects that overlooked. Then there is LinkedIN, Pinterest, Instagram, MeerKat, Periscope, YouTube, and all the other social media sites that sport their own specific advantage that Facebook only scratches.

Though there is the majority of your loyal and potential customers are on Facebook there is a lot of money being left on the table. More money than I am comfortable with.

I am a B2B there is no customer base I need to build.

Often businesses don’t “friend” each other on social media. Though I feel they should. I can understand why. An organization is complex and lots of moving parts you can’t hire somebody just to look at what who you are following just to see if you are getting a good deal on office paper. I wouldn’t expect for a good size company to hunt for a Xerox machine on the Xerox fan page.

But as it was just mentioned there are a lot of people in your company and they do use these social media sites, and they know the copy machine repair man, the coffee guy and he just mentioned that he just picked up your personally favorite flavor of coffee. Allow the people of your B2B customer to follow you celebrate their anniversaries and weddings. Again make it personal.

Social media is too easy to mess up and so it is better to not do it.

Can social media be messed up? Oh, you bet. Just look on the news. Back in 2014, US Airways had a very inappropriate picture show up in their Twitter feed. Also, an example of bad social media is, restaurants having meltdowns because of a choice they made. Thus showing how a situation is handled, tells a lot of that company’s culture. Take US Airways they apologized for the image corrected the problem and handled it professionally. There are also examples of companies that handles the Social media wrong and other times very wrong and a good clue is if there is a societal event like Newtown don’t add a promotional hashtag. You want to respond to those events that are good just don’t try to sell, or give the impression of selling.

The experience your customer has on social media is important and they are looking for your business’ personal side on Facebook, and quick little bits of information on Twitter, Where you are found on Google, Where their friends are at on Foursquare/Swarm. Each different platform on online totals up to who you and your companies brand. People like to follow people and learn bits of wisdom from you and how they can become rabid fans of your brand.