This is an article by Ashley Andrews. She is an entrepreneur and blogger.  She now lives in San Diego, CA and is happily self employed.  She enjoys writing about anything that catches her interest, especially business and entrepreneurship.

Avoid Making Common Social Media Marketing Mistakes

There’s no doubt about it: technology has opened the door for small businesses to run a successful marketing campaign without the need for a lot of capital. Today many businesses are creating a higher level of traffic due to their advertisements on social media sites. Before heading over to Facebook, Twitter, FourSquare, CircleMe and Pinterest and placing an ad it’s important to have a plan in place so that you benefit from it, rather than having people lose interest quickly.

Engaging content from the start

While many of the popular social media sites like Facebook give you multiple pages for advertising, they only allow you up to 25 characters for the headline. This means you’ve got to grab the reader’s attention quickly in order to get them onto your website. If you are skilled in catch phrases, take your time and run a few by your staff, as well as family members and friends to see their reaction. If you have no idea how to achieve this with only 25 characters available, it’s best to hire a professional social media company. This will save you not only time and energy, but it will also help you get to the next level in your business.

Limit your appearance to one or two social media sites

It’s ok to get excited about bringing your business onto a social media site and finally getting exposure beyond your loyal customers. What will not work in your favor is appearing on too many sites and not having the resources to maintain a showing on each. You must be able to attend to your potential customers and respond to their comments. If you have a small business with only a few employees, it can become difficult to get onto each site daily and respond. By starting out slow and only placing an ad on one or two of the social media sites with higher volumes you’ll stay in touch with your potential clients and gain a presence as active.

Set yourself apart

In order to attract visitors, who ultimately can turn into sales, you’ll need to develop your own personality. Keep your voice consistent and your content unique and set yourself apart from other similar brands on social media. Give your projected fan base a reason to check your daily posts whether it’s a one-day sale, special weekly promotions or newly added merchandise. It’s important from the start to enter as much information about your company as possible. Many readers are very interested in what a company’s beginning and long-term goals are and what they offer to their customers such as free shipping, excellent customer service and loyalty points. A catchy tune sticks into your head. Try and write unique and engaging content for your website that attracts viewers from the start.

Develop a winning strategy

Instead of going in blind, get the most out of using social media and run a smart campaign. You need to understand your target audience and have ads appear while they are online. If it’s an older crowd, have your company’s ad appear during the morning and afternoon hours. If you’re targeting a younger crowd that checks their posts later in the day have your ads appear during their peak hours. It will give your business daily exposure that has the ability to gain sales. It’s also important to post multiple times a day to social media. This ensures that your targeted audience gets a chance to view your content.

Conclusion

When it comes to growing your business quickly, social media can definitely get you the exposure you want. Just remember that quality still matters. Make sure before you launch your page that you use the right site, have an engaging headline and interesting content that makes a reader post a “like” that then appears on their wall and then their friend’s wall and on.