5 Questions to Ask Yourself When Writing a Social Media Strategy

We all know that we should promote our business on social media, and that the main reasons are usually that we want to build meaningful relationships with our customers, build upon brand awareness and extend our reach further.

Using social media for business is a fairly new concept, and it seems to be common place for businesses to begin their social media journey without a good, solid strategy in place. Knowing the why and how could not only save time and money in the long run, it's key in keeping existing customers happy and preventing the loss of potential new customers.

Why? 
Ask yourself why you are deciding to embark upon a social media journey. Is it purely to 'get out there', or do you wish to engage with your customers and build awareness for your business? Understanding the why, will help you to clearly define the 'how', and not only make your job a lot easier, but it will also get you to your business goals that little bit faster.

Which Platforms? 
Finding the right platforms for you business is key; what works for one industry may not work for your own, and spending valuable time nurturing a network that does not attract your target market is pointless. Take a look at what other businesses in your industry are doing. What platforms are they on? Is it working for them? Research is key, so do a lot of it. It may take some time in the beginning, but it will save you both time and money in the future.

What information? 
It may go against everything that you believe to know about 'making the sale', but keeping the information that you post, tweet, blog etc. informative and beneficial to the reader, will greatly help in ensuring your businesses online success. This means no hard sale! Fight it. Your business may be fantastic and have some cracking offers on, but your readers do not want to hear about these every time you reach out to them. Discover the questions that your customers are asking and be the one to answer them.

Who? 
Knowing your audience is one of the most important questions that you will need to ask yourself. What sort or people buy your product or service? How do they live? What do they do for fun? How old are they? Building a customer profile or profile groups, enable you to precisely know what to say, how to say it and the best place to say it.

Am I being social? 
It's called social media for that very reason; the main objective is to be social. Automating everything and not checking in to reply and answer questions from people who have taken the time to interact with your business, by definition, isn't social. More importantly, being social is about having fun! So fun with it!

What questions do you ask yourself when developing a social media strategy?