Social media has undoubtedly made it easier than ever for businesses and brands to grow and prosper. But these benefits are equal to all sorts of businesses, and competition between them is at an all-time high. As a business owner or marketer, you know that reputation is the most important thing that any business has; how you use social media to promote your business and brand can either make or break your reputation.
When managed properly, social media can propel your business to the pinnacle of success and create a powerful impact. But remember that even a small mistake in your social media management has the potential to destroy your reputation. In this post, we’ll discuss how you can use social media in the right way to build your reputation.
Posting Valuable Content
A successful social media campaign involves posting valuable content on a consistent basis to create a positive image. Your content has to be useful to your followers. That is why it’s essential to know your target audience and determine what content they like. It is a good idea to post useful content in the form of photos, videos, blogs, news alerts, infographics, announcements, and any special promotions your business is running.
All of your posts don’t have to be promotional. In fact, it is best if they aren’t because being salesy can affect your reputation in negative ways. Instead, make your content fun and entertaining to create an engagement.
Respond to Social Media Reviews
Reviews left about your business, brand, or products/services by your customers on social media are far more important than your social media followers. Remember that unhappy or disgruntled customers can affect your reputation by leaving negative reviews on social media. How you manage and respond to such customers and reviews can go a long way toward determining your reputation.
When you receive positive reviews, make sure to acknowledge and respond to them in the same spirit. Many businesses fail to reply to or mess up the handling of negative reviews. This is where online reputation management (ORM) comes to your rescue. While you can do ORM yourself, it is best to outsource it to the experts out there.
Keeping an Eye Out for Chatter
Social media has provided your customers with the opportunity to discuss your brand and business. As such, you should expect negative discussions to take place on social media profiles, pages, and groups. It is vital to look out for discussions that involve your brand and handle anything you think can affect your reputation. That’s the reason why big and small businesses are investing in reputation management.
Social media management is just one way a brand can gauge its standing in the public’s eye. Several conversations may be happening online about your brand at all times. While it may be challenging to keep track of all of these discussions, many ‘listening tools’ are available that gather data from all these mentions, hashtags, etc. It is good to use Google Alerts and relevant social media hashtags to keep track of such conversations.
You can gather and analyze the collected data and reviews to create a long-term social media reputation management strategy to improve your brand image. You can even use the data to enact useful improvements to your products, customer service, etc.
