Your Social Strategy: Time-Suck to Profitable Posting in 6 Steps

Is your business struggling to master social media marketing? if it is, you're not alone. Back in the early 2000s, when social media came on the scene, it was being heralded as a new, free, solution to all of our marking woes. But for those of us who got on board, it didn't prove to be the superhighway to profits that we expected.

And yet we've charged on, trying to find the perfect formula for getting social media to work well for us.

Times have changed since many of the original social platforms were introduced, much for the better. Back in 2004, in the early days of Facebook, I worked hard to get my employer's business the attention it needed from our local community. It actually wasn't that hard. What was hard, however, was getting those engaged fans to become paying customers.

These days, as I work with my consulting clients to help them master Facebook marketing to build their own business's sales, things have become a lot easier.

But, of course, there's a strategy required to get there. Behind that strategy are my six steps to building your own social marketing plan:

Step 1 – Know your audience
You can't be all things to all people. For your business to survive and thrive, you need to be able to identify and really understand your ideal customer. Don't underestimate the importance of this step.

Step 2 – Connect with them
Once you know who your customers are, it makes it so much easier to find them and invite them into your social circles. On Facebook, in particular, you can easily target just the people you want through an incredibly sophisticated ads platform, and get your message right into their news feed.

Step 3 – Create your content around them, not around you
When your at a party, do you like to hear some stranger drone on and on about themselves, or do you prefer to talk about yourself? I think you know the answer. Think about your content the same way. Focus on your audience's needs, wants, struggles, and desires. Don't waste your content talking about how great you are. They won't care (yet).

Step 4 – Get them to love you
This is really the secret sauce to marketing on social media. Because the more your audience loves you, the more they share and promote you to others. And this step is simpler than you think… give, share, teach, and celebrate your way to being loved.

Step 5 – Help them identify the right buying opportunities to address their needs
Once they are in your camp, and the relationship has become solidified, that's when it's time to leverage the authority you've established, and help them become buyers of the solutions they need. Maybe it's your product or service. Maybe it's something you are referring them to. But this is the point where you hard work will have paid off, and the wallets start opening up.

Now that may sound like a lot of work, but you need to consider the return on investment for the time and energy put into it.

And while that may be all well and good, it's very possible that you might still lack the time, an understanding of the intricacies of the process, or the funds to hire a full-service agency to manage all of it for you.

Ultimately, like me, you probably just want customers to come through the door and pay you.

So here's your bonus step:

Step 6 – Outsource the process to an expert
Don't think for a moment that, if you can't do it yourself, it can't be done right. If you're on board with these steps, but need an extra little helping hand to put it into place, take the next logical step and call in an expert.

The right social media management expert can help put all your ducks in a row, and simplify a customized process to achieve just the outcome you are after.