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As a business owner, we all use social media in one form or another to build our business and help spread the word. This could be about what we can offer, our products or services for sale, or our upcoming events. But isn’t it annoying to see other business owners breaking the unspoken rules of social media in the hope it gives them some advantage.
14 Things you should not be doing on Social Media
1. Posting just for the sake of it.
There’s nothing worse than seeing a post on social media that has obviously been written just for the sake of it, to put something out there. Most of the time it is not related to the business, it’s poorly written and there’s no useful content included.
2. Not engaging with the audience
This is something that happens all the time. The post gets written and is posted but is then just left out there and forgotten about. Instead, to make a real impact for your business, you need to follow up and engage with the comments left by your followers who have taken the time to reply back to you.
3. Not double checking the post
One of my pet hates are posts with grammatical errors or just don’t make sense. As a business owner it’s important to look professional no matter what and that includes taking the time to spell your posts correctly and write them in a way that’s easy to understand.
4. Using irrelevant hashtags
Using unnecessary hashtags in your posts to attract a wider audience may work in the short term, but why bother attracting the wrong target audience anyway? It’s a waste of your time!
5. Don’t post the same thing on every social media platform you use.
Just because you use 5 different social media platforms doesn’t mean you should put the same post on each one. Your posts need to be tailored to each platform individually.
6. Not posting at the right time.
If you are just posting at random times whenever it suits you, it could be a complete waste of time. Instead try looking at your social medias analytics to see the most optimal times your followers are online. These times may vary from one platform to another, so check them all and try using a social media management app such at Hootsuite.com, Buffer.com or Later.com to schedule your posts at the right time.
7. Not sharing other people’s content.
Using social media should be a 2-way street. If you post relevant, interesting or funny posts and want your followers to share it with their friends, you should be prepared to do the same for others. Try making it a daily habit to share someone else’s post with your readers that they might also find useful, informative or just plain funny.
8. Buying likes or followers
Buying likes or followers just to boost your numbers and look better than you are is actually a complete waste of time. They won’t engage with you, read and comment on your content so it’s basically pointless.
9. Removing negative reviews
Every business gets a bad review every now and then. But trying to delete it from your social media isn’t the way to go. Although you might be tempted to get rid of them to make your business look great, you are in effect deceiving your customers. It’s much better to deal with the bad review by trying to sort out the problem and make the customer happy again.
10. Keeping your social media profiles private
If you are using social media as a business owner and grow a large following, you are making a mistake by keeping your profile private. People are less likely to follow you if they don’t know who you are and what you are all about. If you do get an influx of followers, you will also have to approve or deny each individual follower which can waste a lot of valuable time.
11. Not keeping track of your growth
When you don’t keep track of your growth, you can’t see how fast you are growing or if you are doing something wrong. Using your analytics you can set targets to reach and see what things are working and what needs to be changed.
12. Boring posts
Everyone has that friend who still posts photos of their dinner, their dog and last years holiday snaps. But as a business owner you should choose your posts wisely to keep your followers entertained. It’s always a great idea to show some aspects of the working day from behind the scenes, and see the real people of the business, but no one needs to see what you’re having in your sandwiches!
13. Auto DMs on Twitter
I’ve never seen the point of automated direct messages on Twitter and like most people I find them annoying. A private message to someone should be personal and individual to each person. The only exception to this rule would be to explain you are on holiday etc and will be unable to reply back until a certain date. This way the person expecting a reply doesn't think you have ignored them.
14. Not leaving a genuine comment
When you share someone else’s post, try to leave a genuine comment that shows you have read it. Shared posts that have a lot of comments usually indicate it’s popular and worth reading. If more people commented on your posts, how many more people would get to see them?
Be sure to sign up to leave your comments below. What’s your number one pet hate when it’s comes to social media?