Twitter Facebook LinkedIn Flipboard 1 Some people will read the title of this article and scoff. “Burn out on social media?” they’ll say, “Nonsense! That’s impossible!” But it isn’t impossible. It’s a very real phenomenon wherein social media marketing loses its efficacy, because you’re in the wrong places at the wrong times or in all the places all the time. This isn’t about whether or not you’ll get tired of posting to social media, as a person or as a company. No one gets tired of talking about themselves. It’s about whether or not you’re over-saturating your avenues of social media with your advertising. A comprehensive social media marketing strategy requires serious work to keep from going stale or sour. Below are a handful of tactics to help you avoid social media burnout and, ultimately, improve your social media marketing. Diversify Your Social Media Portfolio If you’re expending 80% of your social media effort on Twitter and not seeing the results you hoped, you probably need to find a new platform or two. It’s likely that your target market may not have a strong presence on Twitter. There are so many social media platforms at your disposal and they all have slightly different user bases and advantages. The mainstays for any business are Twitter and Facebook, of course, but you could also try the following. Addressing the praise or criticisms reviewers share on Yelp and Foursquare. Dipping your toes into the waters of Vine if you’re feeling creative. Instagram is another place you can release snippets of marketing or ask your fans/ customers to submit content with a prize for the best entries. YouTube is a great platform for demonstrations and Pinterest is a good place to put tutorials featuring your products. Connect with professionals in your field and see if you can’t build some relationships via LinkedIn. Be Selective About Where You Post Now that I’ve laid out a veritable banquet of social media platforms for you to consider, let me warn not to tackle all of them. If you do, you’ll end up spending all of your time thinking about social media and becoming a mere shadow of the person you were before (like me), because not all of these platforms will be right for you. Choose social media outlets that are relevant to your business — that is, the social media outlets your target market uses. A major concern is making sure that you’re able to stay consistent across your social media outlets both in terms of posting frequency and conveying your intended message. Maintaining a coherent branding message grows more difficult each time you add a new marketing channel, so a good general rule is: having a strong presence on a few social networks is better than having a weak or moderate presence on many social networks. Reassess What You’re Posting To reassert, relevance is key — not just in platform, but in content. I mean, that’s a really good looking sandwich you’re about to post to the company Instagram account, but is it really necessary? Does it convey anything meaningful about the brand? Does it bring anything to the table for your customers? Being entertaining for its own sake can be rewarding when done in moderation and, if you play your cards just right, it can even become part of your brand personality to make random, playful observations in social media. But people likely followed your company, because they’re interested in what value you can bring to their lives — don’t inundate them with petty posts that have nothing to do with your industry. Be useful! Sidebar: A quick word on scheduled social media updates: Be very, very careful. You don’t want a tweet to end up in the worst context imaginable, because you used the “set it and forget it” mentality. Social media is all about real-time responsiveness and sharing of-the-cuff personality. Scheduled updates, while arguably a necessity for building a strong social presence, are the anti-thesis of “being real”, so do everything in your power to ensure even your scheduled updates appear to be real-time. Check Your Post Time and Frequency Striking the right balance between over and under posting is important. How often should you post on Facebook if you want to maximize engagement? What time of day will get you the most retweets? The rules aren’t all that different for businesses than they are for individual people, but the stakes are usually higher. Visibility of posts can change your sales levels and how much you interact with your customers, though I’m sure you crave attention for personal fulfillment, as well. No one’s judging you. Of course, at the heart of social media burnout is the question: are you posting too often? Even if you’re staying relevant, even if you’re on the right platforms, even if you’re posting stuff that really is interesting, no one will read every single post you send out. Instead of having a mass of posts flooding feeds, limit your post rate so that only the best of the best updates get through. I don’t care how hilarious or insightful your industry-relevant thoughts are — I’m no more likely to read 50 of them every day than I am to watch the same Ron Burgundy Dodge commercial 50 times every day (okay, I might, because Will Ferrell…but you get the point). Conclusion To wrap up the topic, a consistent and effective social media marketing strategy: Spans across multiple social platforms, but only those likely to reach your target market. Stays relevant to its purpose while peppering in some pithy comments. Is calculated enough to scale engagement, but personable and human enough to give off an air of real-time. If you can effectively establish these principles at the base of your social media strategy, you’ll drastically reduce the likelihood of getting burned out or annoying social media users, and, most importantly, you’ll have a more dominant social media presence. That’s a win-win for everyone. Twitter Tweet Facebook Share Email This article originally appeared on Strategexe Blog and has been republished with permission.Find out how to syndicate your content with B2C Author: Kane Pepi Kane Pepi is an experienced financial and cryptocurrency writer with over 2,000+ published articles, guides, and market insights in the public domain. Expert niche subjects include asset valuation and analysis, portfolio management, and the prevention of financial crime. Kane is particularly skilled in explaining complex financial topics in a user-friendly … View full profile ›More by this author:VoIP Basics: Everything Beginners Should Know!Bitcoin Investment, Trading & Mining: The Ultimate Guide for BeginnersIs This a Better Way to Set Your 2020 Goals and Resolutions?