Social Media Marketing Strategy
In the midst of your social media marketing strategy, I have to ask – is your blog at the heart of your marketing?
I know that probably sounds strange to ask – you know me for my love of social media, especially when it comes to using social media for your SEO.
But I have to tell you this – your social media should be an extension of your marketing strategy. Your social media isn't the focus of your strategy. It shouldn't be your primary strategy.
Sure, scheduling your updates and responding to your customers and prospects takes time. But your site is your virtual storefront. It is the one thing online that represents you and your brand to your customers, and it's the place online where you share your story with your customers.
For this and so many other reasons, your website is at the heart of your online marketing and must be respected accordingly.
The 3 Reasons Your Website Must be at the Heart of your Social Media Marketing Strategy
1.Your website is your property. Your social profiles are not
How many times have social networks had security issues? How many times have social media platforms come…and gone? When you don't own your content because you're not paying for a service, you are at someone else's mercy. You have no recourse if there are technical glitches, you have no recourse if you inadvertently violate the rules and get shut down, and you have no recourse if one day they go out of business without warning.
When you make your self hosted website the core of your marketing strategy, you have control over all of these issues. Additionally, you have control over your ability to use appropriate SEO strategies to increase your traffic.
I've recently been working with some partners to create some content marketing and social media marketing services for a number of dental offices, and in looking at their prior websites, we've been so surprised that those sites haven't been treated like the lynchpin of marketing that they are! They have content that can't be customized and the way they're hosted, if the dental office ends their contract, they don't own their files at all! I don't know about you, but that doesn't sound like a good arrangement to me at all!
2.Your website doesn't have content or app restrictions
If you want to run a contest on your website, go for it. If you want to have a header with more than 20% text, it's you're right to do so. When your website is created to be the core of your marketing strategy, it's all up to you.
3.Your website appears infinitely more professional to your customers
This is huge. When you only use other people's resources to host your content such as on free social media platforms, it is clear to your customers that you aren't investing financially into your own business. This makes you look unprofessional and unsuccessful. If you aren't successful enough to invest in your own business, it definitely doesn't inspire your customers to trust you with their business either.
Your website is the core of your online presence, no matter how many other satellite locations you have online on different social platforms.
How are you ensuring your website remains your most important online property? Do you keep it up to date? Are you making sure people can even find it? Tell me how you keep your blog bringing people back?
