Social Marketing Labyrinth
(What to Do When You Are Not an Expert)
(What to Do When You Are Not an Expert)
Is it better to have a website, or is a presence on social networks enough for good marketing?
Website vs. Social
VS is wrong; website AND social is more correct, as they are two completely different things.
A website is a site on the web. It is your site. It is the collection of information you want to share with your visitors. The information will be presented as you wish. It is your shop, your window on the road, on the net, your property, your business.
Social networks are like bars. People talk and meet, host parties, share happiness, or fight, and a few may even get banned. In these social spaces, they introduce more friends, chat, look for someone, ask for suggestions, and seek recommendations. Then they forget, ask someone else, and get different answers, opinions, and reviews.
The bar is full of gossip, both positive and negative. You can host a friend reunion or even find love. Everything is fluid, in movement. What is true today might be a lie tomorrow. What is good now might not be good tomorrow. Voices tell you the right price of a car, the best brand of a computer, or even how to love someone. Some deals can also be closed in a bar.
In a real bar, there is no moderator; on social networks, there is. In a bar, there are few rules; on social networks, there are many more.
A shop is a shop, a factory is a factory. A bar is all things together and nothing at all. In a shop/factory/business place, there are experts (or supposed experts), salespeople, products, and prices. The same things you see today you will probably see again tomorrow. Of course, things change, but not at the speed of the chat in a bar. The atmosphere is professional and calmer. You look, ask, choose, talk, and maybe buy. Much better, you cannot compare a business place with a bar.
BUT… if everybody talks badly about your business in the bar… nobody will visit your shop. If nobody talks at all about your shop in the bar, they will never find your business if you are in a quiet street, or they will just find you by coincidence.
So, if you have no other advertising means, you do need the chatter of a bar. A presence on social media.
At the same time, you also need an official presence in your control (a website).
Personally, I could stay without social media but not without a website. But we are not all the same. Some people say that a website is more expensive and difficult to set up/manage/update and if you delegate to a professional, it becomes costly. “On social, just post something sometimes.”
"Just post something sometimes" is the biggest mistake: social media MUST be constantly updated. Your post will disappear in minutes under the inexorable force of fingers in action on a smartphone. To float on social media, you need much more effort than maintaining a website.
Of course, combining both is the best approach, but an outdated social media presence is useless and even counterproductive. A visitor who finds your Facebook page, for example, and sees that it looks abandoned will stop searching for you. If they don’t find your Facebook presence, they will continue looking for your business's website.
However, there are advertising companies specialized in maintaining a company's presence on Facebook and other social platforms, and their services are not cheap. There are also professional graphic designers specializing in images for social media. An image stays under the eyes of a social network user for less than a second while scrolling, so it must be really catchy.
If you have lots of time and passion, you can dedicate yourself to social media.
Suggestion: Don’t disperse your energy across multiple social platforms. Focus on one well-done social presence (unless you have expert staff) and maintain a website. If you don’t have this skill, just stick to a website.
You can find the right person to help with your social media presence and rely on us for your website. We can suggest that person, but most of the time, that person is you or one of your close collaborators. There is no need for special technical skills or programming knowledge. You just need time and patience.
One of the most important things in marketing: don’t make the mistake of neglecting human relations because you put all your time into social networks!
Comparison Chart:
| Feature | Website | Social Media |
|---|---|---|
| Control | Full control over content | Limited control (platform rules) |
| Longevity | Long-term presence | Short-lived posts |
| Professionalism | High | Varies (depends on usage) |
| Maintenance | Regular updates needed | Constant interaction needed |
| Cost | Can be high (setup & maintenance) | Often lower but requires time |
| Engagement | Lower interaction | High interaction |
| Example Uses | E-commerce, detailed information | Customer engagement, quick updates |
Quiz: Do I Need a Website, Social Media, or Both?
Quiz: Do I Need a Website, Social Media, or Both?
Question 1: What is your primary goal?
Question 2: How do you prefer to communicate with your audience?
Question 3: What is your budget for online marketing?
DON’T be too busy with social: It will drain your energy, and once a customer contacts you, you will barely have the capacity to answer the phone (it is a metaphor, but it is a true concept).
So, what will the person who takes care of your social strategy do? First, they will intelligently find hot pages in your niche—pages with a high number of fans and engagement. Second, they will start liking, replying, and commenting on the most popular posts on these hot pages. Third, they will create one or more pages for your social presence, and with every comment they make, they will add a link to your pages.
Lastly, real people will notice these actions and naturally like and follow your pages. But then you have to continue posting interesting content.
On the other hand, if continuous writing and posting get you confused and tired, you can increase visits to your website through some SEO actions. Although SEO is a huge field (read our home page), you can simply update your content often. If you are blocked creatively, write a sort of daily diary every day or two. Not a chronological diary, but little things you noted in the company—improvements from a technician, advice from a conversation with a customer, just write it on the website. This will keep your website content fresh. Also, note down any questions or problems that arise from your daily work and create a FAQ page (Frequently Asked Questions). In no time, you will have a huge list of questions with answers that will be very useful for your visitors. It will also be a precious help for your company to train your staff and find flaws in your organization.
And remember, what can you offer that nobody else is offering?
Selling is very difficult. People are suggestible but not dunce. Yes, there are some “smart” salespeople out there for whom selling means lying and using shortcuts, but it is much better to find a way to guide customers to something they need instead of tricking them just to reach your momentary target sale budget.
A recurring customer is something long term. A recurring customer doesn’t go away to save a few bucks; they are looking for something reliable, and if you can deliver it, you will have their loyalty, with or without social networks.
So, what do I need?
If you can’t do all the above by yourself or with your close collaborators, then you need a marketing figure.
A marketing expert, especially in social marketing, is usually a solo career person who will take care of many aspects of your social promotional activities, from the logo to the illustration of the website. Of course, they will delegate some tasks to outsourced designers or other specialists. Finally, they will create the coveted magical posts on social media.
From that moment, you will start receiving calls from new customers and even close some deals.
But there are some important considerations before engaging with a marketing expert.
First of all, a professional marketing figure is really able to impress customers. From the way they talk, dress, the ideas they present, even their business card will positively affect you. So they are really able to sell, and the first and most important thing they will sell will be themselves! Yes, themselves, not your products!
Of course, they will manage to prepare a new nice logo and place some posts on social media with astonishing illustrations, but don't be caught under that shiny spell. Talk with them and make clear, with concrete numbers, the sales expectations from their actions. Try to get them to work on a generous commission on the newly acquired customers instead of a substantial fixed fee. You will note that many elegant "experts" will disappear if you would like to bind their payment to solid outcomes.
If you can set up by yourself or with more affordable help a simple Adwords or Facebook campaign, try to do it. It may not be optimized as a campaign created by a professional marketing expert, but after you try and get some "maybe good, maybe scarce" results, you can better negotiate with marketing experts.
Here is a concrete (fictional) example:
You invest for one month 20,000 THB (or 650 USD) in a mix of GoogleAds and Facebook and get some new customers that barely cover your advertising expenses, but it is a start.
If the marketing specialist points out that they can optimize your campaigns and freshen some details to increase your advertisement returns by 30%, ask about their fee. If you spent 20,000 THB, you can increase your results simply by spending 26,000 THB (20,000 + 6,000, which is 30%). So, if the fee is 10,000 THB...
Usually, the marketing specialist is useful in a bigger investment program where the fee will be much lower compared to the advertising investment, where even a few percent points represent thousands of bucks.
A more challenging task for you is to create a buyer persona and start from there for other advertising investments or even small changes in your logo or company appearances.
The buyer persona is a very detailed description of your potential customer: what they like, what they think, how much they can spend, and so on. Once you can figure out your pool of purchasers, it will be easier to create profitable campaigns.
Read, or even better, study here about the buyer persona.
And even more:
A checklist for Facebook: Facebook presence
A tip for Instagram: How Long Should Instagram Stories Be?
Check this video about Do I Need a Website?
And download this Webmaster checklist Google guide.
Most famous social networks:
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