5 Tips To Avoid With Social Media Marketing in 2013

5 Tips To Avoid With Social Media Marketing in 2013 

Connect with me on Google Plus at +Graham Ware

 

With the expansion of Search Engine scalability comes the wave of Social Media Ranking influences and while Facebook arguably have over 1 billion active users, with great popularity comes those few bad apples or shall I say “Expert Social Media Marketing Specialists that attempt to abuse the Facebook users that often result in adverse effects subsequently hurting your business, reputation or even your Pages social ranking.  Here are 5 Universal Rules that should be followed when conducting online Social Media Marketing:

1)     Don’t be LAZY

We understand that major search engines have in essence and indirectly declared war on RSS feeds going into the later part of 2013.  Maybe not altogether, but rest assured there is a scale that will be used to measure uniqueness of your Social Media pages, including updates, posts, interactions and more.  Social Media aims to offer engagement and interaction, if you have a follower base that reads your Tweets, Facebook posts and Blogs that is a valuable asset that gives you further reach to help promote your business and or products.  However, if every time a post is made, its sent across all of your social media pages simultaneously (really for YOUR convenience), why would your audience continue to follow you on all of those very valuable and different social media verticals?   There will be a fine balance between RSS Feeding and unique posting.  It is this professional’s opinion, that the frequency of posts will also play into this scale.  Not unlike “Key-word stuffing tactics, you do not want to over-kill with posts. 

2)   Excessive Tagging

Your the 5th million person tagged

Maybe you have found yourself victim to this.  You log into your Facebook only to see that your updates are cluttered with massive photos (typically promotional items) that then transfers over to your wall being muddied with items that you are tagged in that advertises some business or products (typically night clubs).  This is a form of SPAMASSMENT or harassing you with SPAM.  Not only is this a tacky way and poorly reflective of whoever is in charge of "marketing" that particular business, but shows disparity.  People are fighting back, screen capping these, and writing poor reviews directly on the very pages of the businesses for all to see.  Be sure any marketing company you are utilizing is not engaged in this practice because the idea of tagging as many people in a photo or item in order to try and get as many “”’’’’”likes as possible will result in the highly likelihood of negative reactions.  Those that are offended by tagging them can go to the page or post and write negative posts for all those others to see, as well as report it to Facebook.  If enough complaints are received, that page can be closed.  Use tagging only where appropriate and welcome.  

3)   Adding People to Groups

It’s never fun when you log into your Facebook only to see your news feed covered in updates from groups you didn’t directly join.  Avoid forcing someone to join your group and do not just add them.  The proper etiquette to this is similar to walking down a mall.  You don’t have stores grabbing you by the arm and dragging you into their retail shop, maybe they advertise in windows to draw your attention, so follow the same principal.  Perhaps post a link on your wall for your friends or followers to see asking them to check it out.  Let them decide for themselves whether to join your group. 

4)   Like Like Like Like Like Like = DISLIKE

I often get a small chuckle when someone posts "Like this simply because I want you to Like it"  For gosh sake, at least give a sense of urgency or value as to why I should "Like" something. If you find that website content, blog or other marketing deployments are covered in “"Like" buttons its simple people like myself get overwhelmed.  Do you want me to "Like" your page or look at the products on it - assuming I can find them through the many social icons.  

5)   Sending Random Invites & Promotions to Random People

If you have a marketing person tasked with growing your Facebook group or wanting to get people to attend your event, buy a product or see your website, the last thing this person should be doing is going into the Facebook Search Bar typing in for example "Allison" and then blasting all of them with 5-10 differently written messages promoting your business.  This is not only in violation of Facebooks User Guidelines but will again do nothing more than increase those blocking you and filing complaints.  Ensure your marketing person is not doing this. 

There is tremendous value in Social Media Marketing and Social Media Ranking and you will want to be sure you are confident, educated and up to date with your strategy, even if its utilizing experts in the industry.  Make sure you are aware of what they are specifically doing to help your Social Media!   By Graham Ware

About the Author: Graham Ware is a recognized #SEO expert with over 5 years of digital marketing experience. Naturally this article is connected to Grahams Google+ profile. It also links to Twitter but that has nothing to do with authorship.