5 Reasons Why Your Social Media Isn’t Working (And How to Fix It)

Social media is like any other element of your business; if you neglect it, it will stop working for you. That’s why so many digital marketers preach about consistency. But it’s not just about posting every day on your social media. There are things you can do that don’t take too much time that will improve your visibility and get your marketing working for you.

Let’s take a look at the 5 biggest reasons why your social media marketing isn’t working for you.

Lack of strategy.

As I talked about in my last blog (read it here), strategy is important when it comes to everything in business. If you don’t set yourself a goal, a target, something to aim at, you can’t know if you are heading in the right direction.

It would be like getting into your car, not knowing where you’re going and hitting the accelerator and wondering why you’re doing doughnuts… it just doesn’t make sense to not even know where you want to be heading.

Posting without purpose is the result you get, and it means that your audience doesn’t fully understand who you are and what your business is about.

Take some time to think about what you want to achieve and how you are going to achieve it. Remember to make it manageable within the timeframe you set yourself (not everyone can go viral by next Tuesday).

Wrong platforms.

How many times have you been told that you need to be on such-and-such a platform? I get really frustrated when I hear people say “you need to be on X/YouTube/LinkedIn/BlueSky/Lemon8” etc., etc., etc.

Stop.

Stop the madness that is trying to be everywhere at once to everyone. It’s not sustainable. It will lead you to burnout and exhaustion within a matter of days, and the first thing we do when faced with overwhelm is we run away.

That makes our consistency tank, and we end up worse off than where we started.

Start with one platform. The one you feel comfortable with. The one you are familiar with and feel confident in using. It’s the easiest way to get started.

Once you’re into a good rhythm of creating content on that platform, start to explore others that are similar to it but will attract your target audience.

Build slowly and remember who you want to talk to. Post on the platforms your target market is on.

Poor engagement.

Social media platforms like us to be just that: social. If you want the platforms to reward the time and effort you put into creating your content, you need to show them that you are using the platform.

Before you post your content, and just after you have posted it, make sure that you are active on the platform and engaging with other people’s content. It’s no secret that the algorithms reward people who stay and play on the platform.

If someone takes the time to comment on your post, take the time to respond back to them and continue the conversation. You’ll find that people are more willing to comment if they know that their comment will be noticed by the author.

You’ll be surprised at how much you will notice your reach increasing when you do this, and as a direct result, you will have more people engaging with your post.

Don’t forget to ask questions and start the conversation when it comes to creating your content. The platforms love this, too!

Inconsistent posting.

I’ve often explained that posting on social media is like turning the lights on and opening the door to your shop front. If you don’t switch the sign around to say “open”, the chances are, people will walk right by your shop and go to a competitor.

When the pandemic hit, and businesses had to move online, a lot of businesses sank or swam based on their consistent social media posting.

The same is true for today.

People increasingly turn to social media to see if a business is still trading. No posts = business closed.

Notice how I haven’t once said, posting every day? Because I don’t advocate for it. Post consistently.

If your schedule only allows you to consistently post once a week, then post once a week. If you can consistently post every day, then you will outperform someone posting once a week, sure. But, it’s better to post once a week for 3 years than to post every day for 2 weeks and then disappear for 6 months.

Also, you need to keep the branding and style consistent. It will make your brand and your business recognisable and do the hard work for you. A consistent brand and message build trust.

Not tracking results

This one baffles me. How can you know whether your social media marketing is working for you if you’re not tracking the results? The simple answer is, you can’t.

Think about implementing a process to ask your audience where they heard about you, what made them come to you, and how they knew yours was the business for them. You’ll be surprised by how many have been following you and your progress for a long time on social media.

They may have met you at a networking event, but you built the trust with them online.

Keep an eye on your analytics within the social media platforms. Each of them has their own way of finding the data, but this should help you to see what is working and what needs to be improved.

The social media platforms will show a variety of information regarding your content. Make sure that you know what your goals are before you start looking at your analytics, as you can fall into the trap of looking at vanity metrics. For more information on analytics and goal setting, read my strategy blog.

If you are serious about improving your social media content and getting it working for you, follow these steps, and you will notice a marked improvement in your content’s performance.

These are just some of the common mistakes I see people making with their marketing content. If you feel confident that you aren’t falling for any of these pitfalls, but your content still isn’t converting, book a call with me and let’s discuss more things you can do to improve your content and get more clients through social media.