All of us know that Social Media is one of the biggest source of traffic. Social media does not only allows you to reach your audience personally but also helps your brand build a social and better image. The fact that all the bloggers, website owners and internet marketers are nowadays optimizing their site for social traffic is enough to prove how vital this source of traffic is becoming. Internet is filled with tips and tricks on how to attract people to your website and there are even more tips on how to convert these visitors to customers. Till date, you must have been putting into action almost everything, but its time to reconsider your Social Media Strategy. Here are 3 myths about Social Media:
1) Its All In Numbers
When you hear some people say that more and more people are joining the internet and the number of people getting active on the internet is increasing, you automatically assume that all of these people are getting on one or the other social media website. The truth is, although the number of people using internet has increased by several folds in last few years, but that is not because of mere social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. It maybe due to several other reasons, like switching from pens and letters to electronic mail, e-commerce boom and so on. I am not saying that Facebook and Twitter has not gained popularity but how many of these accounts are opened daily or even weekly? Some of them are not even updated for a month. So, if your social media strategy is based on just growing number of accounts on Facebook and Reddit, time to rethink!
2) Its Simple And Free
The first look at the idea makes it look so simple and easy. I agree with it up to an extent. Its easy for big organizations who can hire managers and analysts who dedicate their time to understand social media and how people react to certain things. But what about everyday bloggers? Engaging people is not as easy as it sounds. All of us know that people love to share what interests them. They also love to share anything that brings up a certain level of curiosity in them. Isn’t it simple to understand that you need to write ‘interesting’ content? But what is ‘interesting’ content? Everyone on your page may have a different interest even when you talk about a single niche (that’s where micro-niches jump in). You need to figure out what works for you (or majority of your audience). It takes a lot of time and dedication to come up with good and valid results. It takes a whole lot of hard-work to research and create content. Doing all this is definitely not free! Apart from the time invested in creating content which is not only limited to 500+ words ‘interesting’ articles but also includes properties like videos, audios, images, infographics and everything that can engage people may require use of some paid software or may require you to hire some professional people. Either way, it takes out the free part out of the social media strategy.
3) Quantity Or Quality?
If you have been active on the social media scene, you must have met so many people who would be selling Fb Likes and Shares, Twitter Followers, G+ votes and what not. For every social media website, people have followers/friends/etc to offer. And why should not they sell these services? There are thousands of people who buy them. Most of the so called social media ‘gurus’ would advice you to invest a fiverr in twitter followers. Yes, you get like 10,000 followers for as low as 10-20$ but how many of them are really interested? Now take a look at the other scene. You spent 20 hours writing some very interesting and informative content on one definite topic. People read it and feel like they would like to hear from you again and press the follow (Twitter) button. These people are the ones that would come back to your website when you update your blog and maybe turn to customers and get you some commissions. Sometimes a bucketful of fresh water (read quality followers) is more than enough than a lake full of salt water (read quantity followers).
Its time to reconsider the social media strategy you were following for your website. Although social media is an important part of the traffic, but its a tricky number game that you need to crack and understand and then mix with your SEO efforts for optimum results. Experimentation is a part of social media and you should not hesitate to travel an extra mile for standing out of the crowd.
