Because the majority of consumers are on social media now, and will be there in the future.
The key word though is: EFFECTIVE
effective adjective: successful or achieving the results that you want
And to create an effective social media strategy; you need to take note of the second key word: SOCIAL
social adjective: related to meeting and spending time with other people for pleasure
There are so many social media “gurus” out there in the magical world of online marketing. Unfortunately most of them are full of piss and vinegar. How can you tell if your self-professed social media guru is full of shite? They use the word “Algorithm” a lot. They sprinkle “algorithm” into their explanations like candy falling from a Pinata. Which is an apt simile as at times you may want to hit them with a blunt object.
The majority of over-priced social media “gurus” will confuse rather than explain simply. In the words of Albert Einstein: If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.
And now, without further ado, I will explain simply and effectively how social media and search engines actually work…
I will use Google for my example, as it is the most widely quoted algorithm that creates profit for unscrupulous operators. Google’s sole purpose is to supply what the user is searching for. If you Google “purple monkey dishwasher” Google needs to give you the specific thing you are interested in. If you go to the website that Google suggests, and you jump straight off the website because it wasn’t interesting based on your search; Google will move that website down the rankings. When you, and thousands of other people do this, Google can start to get an idea of which websites are what people are looking for based on those search terms and the interests of the people.
Social media works in a similar way. Your newsfeed is like a search engine. When you scroll through Facebook for instance, you may engage with content, hover over content, click through to long form content, or scroll past content that doesn’t interest you. The social media platform then starts to design your feed based on your personal interactions and what interests you.
Do you see a word starting to repeat in the explanation? Interest.
That’s a solid hint. Interesting content keeps people on your page and profile. If you are an expert on purple monkey dishwashers, all you need to do to succeed is be interesting. That’s it.
All the algorithms in the online world are simply geared towards giving the end user an experience that interests them. Once you know this, you can really have fun with your social media and online strategy. If you love what you do, and can share that in an interesting way, you can win the game of social media and online marketing.
