Do I Need A Social Media Strategy?

As I've mentioned before in the memorable "Chips for tea" item, simply pushing your immediate thoughts through your business social media accounts may not be such a great idea.

While many people find it interesting and amusing to post and browse in Facebook, Twitter or the like - particularly if you're a cat lover, in the context of your business a little more consideration and care is needed. For one thing, done properly, the use of social media for business is time-consuming and non-ending. If you decide that a Facebook page is your best hope for increasing sales you'd better make sure you've got the time and inclination to keep it going no matter what.

So why would I need a strategy? Surely I just post stuff and people will find it interesting? Well, maybe. But I'd suggest you need to take a step back first. Exactly what is your social media activity for? Is it to increase sales? Or awareness? Or to educate your customers?

And who is it that you want to talk to? How will they find you? And why should they be interested? How will you keep them coming back? What will turn their interest in to sales?

If you can answer all of these questions - and more - then you're at least on the first few steps of having a social media strategy. And if you've got that far then you'll have a much better idea of what to write, and when, and how to respond to any feedback.

There's much more to developing a strategy, but this is a good start. Another - very important - part is to work out how you're going to know that you're on the right lines and achieving your objectives. How will you measure your social media performance?

Your social media strategy - even if it's just in your head - will give you a framework to work by, making the whole thing at least a bit easier.