Social (f@cking) Media

scotty

Ultimate Member
How do you guys feel about managing your social media?

I've always kind of avoided it in a way, especially on Facebook as it involves asking my friends to like my page which crosses my two worlds (personal & work) and it's always made me feel a bit dirty in a way.

Thing is, I've just updated my web-site and I've given in and made my business Facebook page, sent "like my page" invites out today along with an apology for doing so.
Many of my real FB friends probably don't even know what I do for a living.

I know it's how it all works and I've had to jump on the Twitter and Instagram thing too but for some reason, I'm not feeling very good about it.

Please tell me I'm just a stupid, old dinosaur. :(

PS. Do I now need big eyebrows and to take selfies in the mirror? ;)
 
I'm with you Scotty, I've given up with Twitter etc and I try and keep my Facebook business page separate from my personal page - I hardly know half of my 'friends' on there,
and most of the likes I get on the business page seem to be from all corners of the globe!
 
You don't any social media account. Likes are pointless.

If people find you via referrals, emails, advertising and other marketing tools you don't need a facetwit page.
 
I'm with you Scotty, I've given up with Twitter etc and I try and keep my Facebook business page separate from my personal page - I hardly know half of my 'friends' on there,
and most of the likes I get on the business page seem to be from all corners of the globe!

I must admit that it leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

I've been looking at at how to play the game recently and everything doesn't sit with me very well.

You either sit in a dark corner of social media or do the LOOK AT ME thing.
Slightly of topic but last night our lass was watching some new X-Factor thing and they were all like social media clones and influencer wannabe's.
I burped a bit of sick up. :sick:

I don't want to be that!
 
You don't any social media account. Likes are pointless.

If people find you via referrals, emails, advertising and other marketing tools you don't need a facetwit page.

I'm beginning to think so. :(

Thing is... Is ignoring it to our peril?
I've always worked on referrals and stuff but there's a part of me that doesn't want to be left behind.
Generating new work and clients has changed SO much.

I was back on Behance when it first started for example and I didn't and never have spammed for likes or anything.
Before they opened the doors to everyone to was great and you get good honest feedback and follows for the right reasons.
Now that seems to have gone on the whole social media trip with people having a million likes and very poor work.

I dunno?
Probably just an old guy having a moan. :(
 
Having them is a good way of promoting your business without much work
This site here is great for producing your images for all https://sproutsocial.com/landscape

In terms of the usefulness of social media - I couldn't care less about social media - but it's good for business presence.
What about a Business LinkedIn account?

I find Linkedin to be a very much a professional version of Twitter. It works virtually the same way.


Anyway - it's easy to post multiply to social media accounts - takes a few seconds - and gets your name out there.
 
Anyway - it's easy to post multiply to social media accounts - takes a few seconds - and gets your name out there.
But does it achieve anything?

There a millions of peeps out there all dong the same thing. The chances of anyone ever seeing your posts and tweets are virtually zero.

I knew somebody who managed a social media accoint for a famous author. They had 3million+ followers. One day they shut down the account. It made zero differewnce to anything. Everyone who was going to buy his books did so anyway, they didn't need to read abut it on facebook. Whey they did do was dicsuss hos books on their own fan pages - these had a much bigger impart on sales.

With SM, it not about what you say, it's what other people say about you.
 
But does it achieve anything?

There a millions of peeps out there all dong the same thing. The chances of anyone ever seeing your posts and tweets are virtually zero.

I knew somebody who managed a social media accoint for a famous author. They had 3million+ followers. One day they shut down the account. It made zero differewnce to anything. Everyone who was going to buy his books did so anyway, they didn't need to read abut it on facebook. Whey they did do was dicsuss hos books on their own fan pages - these had a much bigger impart on sales.

With SM, it not about what you say, it's what other people say about you.

Well of course - if you have no followers then you don't get seen. You need to build up followers.
The trick really is to get your customers that have millions of followers to resend your social media.

There's a guy that rents a desk in our office and he does nothing but influencer advertising - he pays a person instagram to promote his courses. And he gets bookings - hundreds of them.

If you're just going to shout out on social media and not direct it - then you might as well get a megaphone, head into the desert and shout into it at the night sky - because that's as good as it will get for you.
 
Love it or hate it, it's a big deal and here to stay and will only get bigger and more complicated.

I used to rather like it all when it was a bit simpler and wasn't full of orange, Photoshopped children striking poses.

As a bit of an example.

I do a bit of traditional sign painting so I'm a member of a few groups.
Most of these people are old timer's but super skilled in what they do but most sort of odd jobs for local businesses.
There was a bit of a conversation about all these kids that have started doing it without the proper skills and becoming very popular and doing some pretty high profile work.

The difference is that these "kids" are all over social media and making videos and such that get shared and featured all over the web.

None of them could hold a candle to these guys so must be doing something right.
 
None of them could hold a candle to these guys so must be doing something right.

I didn't even know what a youtube star was until Logan Paul did something that everyone forgets about now...

Seriously, kids and young businesspeople (mid 20's-late 20's) are all over social media platforms. If they can get a high-profile "social media star" to promote their brand in any way it takes off.

A nephew of mine in his mid-20's watches other people play computer games on some platform called Twitch. I have also seen a 15-year-old who won some e-tournament and won $1.5m ... WTF?

The world is gone crazy - it literally has - there's this whole other world happening on the internet that we older ladies and gents are not privy to.
There are youtube stars out there earning millions with their channels, and you would never have heard of them, and probably never will.

Yes, it's here to stay. Embrace it.
 
Mate! More understand than embrace.

One of my lads was asking the other if he'd seen this KSI vs. Logan Paul fight.
I says "Who?"

They're both f@cking YouTubers!?!?!?!
 
There's a guy that rents a desk in our office and he does nothing but influencer advertising - he pays a person instagram to promote his courses. And he gets bookings - hundreds of them.
That's exactly what I said!

He doesn't post about his courses, he gets other people to do his promotion for him. That's how social media marketing works. You don't need a facebook page - you need someone to post on their facebook page about how good you are at whatever it is you do.
 
I think having a social media presence can be a good investment. I have gotten job offers through Twitter before.

For me, the key is to not let it take over. I automate most of my social sharing via https://buffer.com/. This has cut down my social media time to about an hour per month to fill the silo and then ten minutes twice a day to react to/answer any incoming messages, comments, etc. Has worked well for me for years.

However, in order for it to make sense, you need to figure out how the platform you want to be present on works, of course. I advise to not open more than one account at a time, study the ins and outs of the platform, start sharing, track your results, and make changes from there. I also mostly concentrate on providing value to my audience by sharing things that might be helpful for them. Every now and then, I will also send out some of my own stuff, or do a self-promoting thing. That's what inbound marketing is all about: delivering a lot of helpful stuff for free so people come sniffing around your site where you can turn them into paying customers.
 
I think the best thing to do is supply your target audience with content that is helpful / valuable to them.

I don't know what your niche is but I think it's best to post text/images/videos that are educational, informative or entertaining to your ideal customer. Then every few posts you can include a bit of self promotion.

It seems crazy but if you teach your audience exactly how to do what you do, it can build trust, and the chances are that they won't actually do it themselves, but they will remember you as someone who can A) Do what they need. & B) someone who ie knowledgeable, trustworthy and helpful.
 
I think the best thing to do is supply your target audience with content that is helpful / valuable to them.

I don't know what your niche is but I think it's best to post text/images/videos that are educational, informative or entertaining to your ideal customer. Then every few posts you can include a bit of self promotion.

It seems crazy but if you teach your audience exactly how to do what you do, it can build trust, and the chances are that they won't actually do it themselves, but they will remember you as someone who can A) Do what they need. & B) someone who ie knowledgeable, trustworthy and helpful.


WARNING! Epiphany moment.

You know something?

I really used to enjoy that aspect of what's now "social media" before it got so much about likes, shares, followers and engagements.

My freelance career as an Illustrator started from me making desktop wallpapers for myself to keep sane at work and then sharing them for free.
I got people downloading them which then led to people asking me to do work for them even though that wasn't my motivation.
I just felt good that people were liking what I did.
I also used to make the odd tutorial which was the biggest source of traffic to my site which then in turn ended up as work.

Just tonight I returned to a character design tut that I was working on ages ago.
I never finished or published it because it was for one of those big tutorial/learning sites and they wanted to make it premium and I wanted to make it free so I didn't let them use it even though they were going to pay me.

A light bulb then went on and I thought "Why not just do some stuff that you enjoy doing and share it with people like you used to?"

It makes sense when I think about it like that so thanks! :)
 
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