Not for your car though!  Well…maybe your car?  I’m talking about your web identity, social identity, business connections, and your entire image.  How many of you have let your website, social profiles and business connection efforts go into autopilot?  It’s time to stay more engaged with your customers, and your audience.  It’s time to revamp your social profiles and make sure that your information is fresh and relevant for your audiences.  Likes, Followers and the general equivalents across all platforms are certainly nice, but how much do they actually mean for you and your business. 

In recent days, I have noticed Facebook Likes appearing on bad news, good news, indifferent news, and old news. Also, since Facebook has changed their News Feed algorithms around, sometimes you will get day old updates as if they are new updates.  If it is time sensitive information, that isn’t really helping anyone.  To me, sharing is one of the best things you can do on Facebook.  Sharing helps spread word, and it helps show that you support or want to engage others with a message that you felt passionate about.

It’s time to get engaged with your audience.  Ask more of them.  Ask for shares, ask for comments, and most importantly, ask for their business.  The objective has moved on from simply getting likes on posts, and likes on pages. You can buy those, and some people don’t even realize what they are ‘liking’ sometimes.  Targeted demographic likes on Facebook will boost your like count, but some people will simply like an entity based on a name or logo.  It’s also time to synchronize your efforts.  If you post something on Twitter, you should post it on Facebook also.  It’s ok to keep content different, but there should be some efforts that show you are keeping your message and efforts consistent.  If you post something on Pinterest, or Snapchat..make sure it is relevant content that ties back into everything you are about.  It’s ok to experiment with these platforms, but if your team is not prepared to handle all aspects of each social avenue, it should likely be left out of your marketing equation–for now.  I have seen it countless times where posts are ignored, and users try to interact with the company, and then nothing happens. The initial effort is not supported enough by the necessary follow up effort.

Tuning up your website, and social profiles, and making sure that all of your content is relevant is going to be very important in 2015 and beyond.  People can access information immediately, and do almost everything on their phones and tablets now.  If you have a business, it is also important to take strong consideration into how your personal profiles look, in relation to your business profiles.  If people can find your business, they can also find you–in a personal sense. If they don’t like what they see on your personal pages, they may disagree with your business efforts altogether.  It’s also important to keep in mind that even with privacy settings in place, some things live forever in the realms of Google and basic web searches.  Post wisely, and consider everything.  Too many people make their pages, and put them into the hands of someone inexperienced, or just post when it works for them, and then they don’t take the time to interact with those that gone through the effort of trying to engage them.

Keep in mind, for someone to post or inquire about your content is essentially an effort to drum up a conversation–or more.  Even if the post is negative, they generally cared enough to want to get something from you, even if it is an expected improvement in process, or more engagement that they desire.  I have seen great success coming to companies that are very active in showing their interactions with customers and addressing concerns on all platforms. If your products involve anything to do with lifestyle improvement, ask for interactions from your customers.  I have seen workout/fitness supplement companies that have generated millions of dollars in very short periods of time, and it isn’t because of a revolutionary new product.  It is because they interact with their fans, ask for progress photos, and get people excited enough to feel like they belong to something great, and something large.  We are all in this together, and if people start to sense a solution oriented family approach with your company, they will likely get much more excited about your product, and the product will end up selling itself.  If people have no idea how they are stacking up in relation to anticipated progress, they will likely fall short of their goals and then stop buying your product.  If they see others enjoying progress, then they are bound to keep repeating their orders and stay on course with their objectives, which generates more business for you.  This isn’t just true for fitness companies–it is true for all companies.

In the meantime, if your business is in need of some good, honest, and valuable leads–our services at Prospectr Marketing have done wonders for many of our clients.  Having good leads is half the battle.  Staying engaged with those leads is even better, and will surely help you exceed the plateaus of success that you may have been experiencing. 2015 is going to be a good year.  Are you ready for it?

 

Bo Cole

Prospectr Marketing

www.prospectrmarketing.com/blog

 

 

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