Strategy Matters delivers news, tips and strategies for effective communications through traditional and social media. 

An important point about strategy is that, whether we're playing a chess game or creating a marketing plan, while we can surmise the reactions that our plans might generate, we can never be 100% sure. 

Yet, while most would concede that it is impossible to accurately predict the actual impact of doing something, we continue in our attempts to "do the right thing." This often results in our failure to do anything at all!

Of course, the failure to act is an action! Even when we do nothing we are, in truth, doing something that is going to have some impact. Ponder that idea for a while!

Consider a company that is making a decision about whether to embrace social media in a big way (whatever that might mean for that business). While they're pondering that decision the world continues to move, and change, around them:

• Competitors may be aggressively moving forward with social media and getting a head start. 
• New communication technologies may be emerging. 
• New business models may be threatening your very existence.

Bottom line: don't spend so much time engaged in "paralysis by analysis" and the fear of failure that your inaction results in the failure you feared!!

The best we can hope for is to create the best plan we can given our assessment of the situation and solid, appropriate, research. 

So, don't worry so much about "getting it right." Worry more about taking no action at all.

Top Social Media Missteps

Are You Making These Mistakes?

1) Choosing the "wrong" platform -- a platform that is not widely, highly or regularly used by your target audiences. For instance, some businesses (e.g. manufacturing) may be challenged to gain traction with their desired audiences via Facebook -- yet LinkedIn might be a great platform. Conversely, a boutique owner hoping to connect with potential customers would be challenged to do this via LinkedIn, yet Facebook -- or, increasingly, Pinterest -- would likely work very well. Solution: do some research to determine the demographics and psychographics of those using the platforms you're considering.

2) Not having a narrow enough focus. The key to successful engagement via social media is the ability to share relevant and meaningful information with an audience. This means that the audience should be narrowly enough defined that your messages can be targeted appropriately. Be too general in your messaging and you will lose your audience (Note: it may be appropriate to have more than one platform to connect with different audience segments). Spend time considering the audience, or audiences, that are most important for your business to engage with online. 

Want to learn more? We have a wide range of blog posts on social media strategies and best practices.