If you've ever said, "I'm posting all the time, but nothing is happening," it's not just you I promise.
I have met a lot of disillusioned business owners over the years who feel that although they are consistently posting, it’s still not driving sales to their business.
Consistency is very important, of course, but the type of posts you’re posting matters as much as your consistency!
Posting is just one thing you have to do within your marketing strategy. Marketing involves understanding who your audience is, creating a SMART strategy, communicating your message consistently, building trust, generating leads, and ultimately helping people choose your business over your competitors. Sounds simple doesn't it :D
The onus to create something every single day or week is huge, though. First, our audience expects it. We need to let our audience know what we do, what our opening hours are, etc. These are all very relevant, but we need to understand the whole customer journey to our products and services to make the most of what we create and promote.
If we start sharing every “special” day, week or month, it could well be diluting our message online. We don’t need everyone to look at our products and services. We need the right people to see and engage with them instead.
As mentioned above, think of posting as one task on your marketing to-do list.
When you create a Facebook update, upload an Instagram Reel, publish a LinkedIn post, or share a story, you are posting content. It is an action you take to communicate with your audience.
What's most important is to post with purpose.
Many people wake up, take a photo, write a quick caption, and hit publish because they know they should be visible online in some format. There’s nothing wrong with that occasionally, but if every piece of content is created this way, it becomes difficult to measure whether it’s actually helping your business.
Posting for the sake of posting often leads to random content that lacks direction. One day you are sharing a quote, the next day a product photo, and the following day a picture of your coffee. While each post might be perfectly fine on its own, together they may not be helping potential customers understand who you are, what you do, or why they should work with you.
Your marketing should begin long before you create an actual post.
It's meant to start with asking important questions. So give these a bash the next time you’re considering creating your next piece of content:
· Who are you trying to reach?
· What problems do they have?
· How does your product or service help them?
· What action do you want them to take?
· What makes your business different?
When you answer these questions, you begin to develop a marketing strategy for your business. Your content then becomes a funnel that supports that strategy.
For example, imagine you run a training business (like me!). Your goal might be to generate bookings for an upcoming workshop. Instead of randomly posting throughout the month, you could create content that educates your audience (awareness), answers common questions, shares testimonials, demonstrates your expertise (consideration and be sure to share features), and explains the benefits of attending (conversion).
Ideally, every post should have a purpose that’s supporting a larger goal.
Another major difference between posting and marketing is where the focus of the post lies.
Many social media posts are business-centered, quite naturally. They talk about what the business does, what the business sells, and what the business wants people to know.
I personally believe a bit of "broadcasting" is important, but it shouldn’t be what you do all the time. Effective marketing should focus on the customer. Their lives and how you potentially slot into it.
Customers are generally not interested in hearing how great a business thinks it is (these are all features of the business). They want to know whether that business can solve a problem, save them time, reduce stress, increase profits, or make their lives easier (these are benefits of buying from you!).
When you approach your content from the customer's perspective, your messaging becomes more relevant and engaging.
Instead of saying, "We offer social media training," you might explain how your training helps business owners save time, feel more confident online, and attract more enquiries.
The service hasn't changed, but the way you communicate its value has.
If social media is your only way to reach your audience, unfortunately, that’s just not enough. No matter how often you post.
Social media is important, but it is only one marketing channel.
Good marketing often includes a combination of various activities working together. This should at a minimum start with your website but might include email marketing, networking, public speaking, partnerships, blogging, search engine optimisation, public relations, events, referrals, and advertising. I appreciate its a lot, but you don't have to do them all at once right from the start. Just add them as you manage time better.
The businesses that see the best results are usually the ones that don't put all of their eggs into one basket. I have seen businesses lose access to Facebook for instance and as they have had no backup, its essentially finished the business.
How would you feel if Facebook disappeared tomorrow, would your marketing continue?
If the answer is no, it may be time to think more strategically about how you reach your audience.
Marketing is about creating multiple opportunities for people to discover, trust, and buy from your business.
Posting can sometimes feel like shouting into the void. You create content, publish it, and hope for the best, because you may not have a formal plan.
Marketing takes a much more measured approach. Rather than simply counting likes and comments, marketing looks at whether your activities are helping you achieve business objectives. They should have a set of key performance indicators (KPI’s) that you regularly use. For instance:
· Are people visiting your website?
· Are they joining your email list?
· Are they booking discovery calls?
· Are they making purchases?
· Are they recommending you to others?
A lot of the answers to these can be found in Native Analytics.
A post that receives hundreds of likes may look successful, but if it doesn't contribute to your business goals, its value may be limited. Equally, a post that generates only a handful of reactions but results in three new inquiries could be a significant success.
The numbers that matter are not always the most visible ones.
We all spend a lot of time IN our business and not ON our business. It’s difficult to step back and look at the larger picture when you're managing so many roles within your business.
I remember Greg Fry saying back in 2020 “At the end of the day, there’s more busy fools in the social media world than there are productive ones.” So we need to stop being "busy fools".
We are all hitting that checklist of:
· Posting regularly.
· Being active on social media.
· We are creating graphics and videos.
· We are writing captions.
Yet despite all this activity, we’re not seeing the results we've hoped for. It’s really not from of lack of effort. But it is a lack of strategy.
With the structure mentioned above, I’m hoping that you'll be thinking beyond "What should I post today?" to “This is what will help my audience better understand how I can help them and how I better understand them as a whole.”
Posting is about creating content. Marketing is about creating results.
The most successful businesses don't just focus on being visible. They focus on communicating the right message to the right people at the right time. So, keep an eye on your analytics and insights and remember internal and external factors impact these throughout the year.
When you sit down next after reading this post, think about what you want to achieve, and what you then create for your posts will be much easier to do.
Don’t forget you can also get some ideas from my content calendar. I have a small range of digital products that you may want to checkout in my shop.
Working with clients Nationwide from base in Mullingar.
