Last time we discussed different approaches you can take if your current social-media program is behind the times. Nice, but probably a little high-level for all us social-media footsoldiers.

This time we’ll look at specifics – the practical changes you can make to the core components of your social-media program to keep it performing well without becoming a time-and-attention pit.

Channels

As we mentioned last time, every channel has issues, to the point where you could be justified in walking away from all of them.

Before you do that, try this:

Start with LinkedIn. I’m amazed at how many organizations have no presence on LinkedIn, though LinkedIn is where your competitors, customers, and key contacts live. It’s also where it’s cool to be a business or organization. Maximize your social content and scheduling for LinkedIn and build out from there.
Gradually become more visual. We’ll get into this more later, but the more visual you are the better you’ll look on LinkedIn and Facebook, and the more ready you’ll be to jump into Instagram and Pinterest, if you decide that makes sense. Even if it doesn’t, becoming a more visual brand is never a bad thing.
Always come back to the core. Don’t chase channels; instead, create content for your core two or three channels and expand from there as it makes sense.

Content

The latest research fro m So cialbakers showing that Instagram gets the most brand interaction is just further proof that the future of social media is visual.

The problem is that good visual is hard, and requires a different mindset from word-based marketing.

This is a temporary hurdle; the longer visual marketing is a thing, the more visual marketers will come into the business, and the easier visual communication will become for brands.

(This also applies to voice-and-audio-based marketing, in case you’re wondering.)

For the time being, though, there’ll be some square-peg/round-hole visual and audio marketing being done, and it won’t be pretty.

Supposing you’re a word type, how do you make your marketing more visual – and what if your organization isn’t particularly good-looking?

Try this step-by-step approach:

Be intentional. It’s not enough to want to be visual. You need the attitude that you’re going to be visual no matter what, and any public-facing marketing is going to be visual first. It won’t always be, of course, but thinking that it should be will help you see previously undetected visual possibilities in your organization.
Adjust your lead times. Visual marketing takes more time, especially if you’re not used to it. Give yourself three times the amount of time to create visual assets, and adjust from there.
Adjust your release schedule. Spray-and-pray is really hard to do with visual marketing unless you have a very active in-house team. You’re probably going to produce fewer videos and infographics as compared to blogs and traditional social posts. Don’t blow all your good stuff the first month and scuffle the rest of the year. Spread it out, building your calendar around the really good pieces you know are coming.
Stockpile assets. The problem with visual marketing is that it takes a long time to create, but it’s consumed quickly. If you’re transitioning to visual marketing, make sure you have at least three months’ worth of quality material on hand before you cut over.
Create multi-purpose assets. We mentioned this last time, but the more versatile your visual assets, the easier it will be to justify their cost of creation, and the less pressure there will be on social metrics to justify the cost.

Frequency

The only question that matters with frequency is, “How frequently do your publics expect to hear from you socially?”

You’d be surprised how seldom even your best customers want to hear from you.

Don’t believe me? There are two ways to learn this for yourself:

Ask them; or
Gradually scale back your social frequency until one of your key metrics shows a negative impact.

If less customer contact sounds counterintuitive, let’s put it into perspective.

We’ve often compared social media to public relations cut into bite-size pieces. How frequently do you put out a press release – and under what circumstances?

A few organizations still put out press releases every time a Customer Service Manager 2 gets promoted to Customer Service Manager 1, but their numbers are thankfully dwindling. Otherwise, PR is reserved for important announcements and thought-leadership opportunities.

If all you did on social media was make important announcements and establish thought leadership, what do you think would happen to your most important metrics? They’d probably go up – and isn’t that what you want from social media?

It’s what your audience wants, that’s for sure – especially in light of recent research that shows a majority of B2B buyers use thought leadership content to “vet the capabilities of potential vendors and understand the caliber of their thinking and services.”

Posting less but getting more aggregate impact sounds too good to be true. It’s not; for many organizations it’s the new, better way forward.

Metrics

We are squarely in the measure-everything age, but all that means is that the chances are greater that we’re measuring the wrong thing, and that the metrics we care about are the wrong ones.

Humor me and answer this simple question: What measurement matters most to your brand or organization?

If it’s “sales,” as it is for a lot of organizations, answer this question: What measurement has the greatest influence on sales, or is the greatest predictor of sales?

That answer might be “repeat customer behavior” or “appropriately qualified leads.” If it’s either of those, what measurement accurately captures that?

You can tell where this is going. You need to keep walking back your key metrics-based question until you get to something you can measure via social. And that becomes your most important social metric.

Is it going to be likes or shares? Probably not – and that’s the point. Your most important social metric is probably not going to be the same as another brand’s, but because you’re making that determination for yourself, you can be sure it’s the right metric to measure.

Influencers

Statista says influencer marketing on Instagram is projected to be a $2.38 billion market by 2019 – but like everything else about influencer marketing, that number is amorphous.

The $2.38 billion refers to “market value,” which strikes me as a particularly odd way of measuring the impact of influencer marketing.

It’s just one of many kludgey things about influencer marketing, starting with this: Influencer marketing is usually nothing more than spokesperson marketing – and spokesperson marketing really doesn’t have a lot of “market value.”

I mean, what is the market value of Chris Paul and James Harden just standing around for State Farm?

(And hard as it may be to believe, social-media influencer marketing is even more terrifically wacked, as Brian X. Chen from The New York Times discovered for himself.)

ThoughtCatalog says you can measure the ROI on an influencer campaign by:

Growth in followers
Growth in users / subscribers
Traffic increases
Social-media buzz (likes, mentions, shares, comments)

But are any of these a tangible return – like, you know, sales?

Uh, no.

If you’re going the influencer route with your social campaigns, do me a favor: at least just consider creating your own influencers.

How? Through a superior customer experience.

We’ve noted here many times that the absolute best form of advertising and marketing is a repeat customer who promotes your brand or organization to others without being solicited or rewarded. Every other form of marketing – including social-influencer marketing – is a pale attempt to duplicate that.

So why drop a ton of money on the imitation when you can drop the same amount or less on the real thing, and have happier customers and employees in the process?

Before you sign up an influencer, think about how they influence and what they’re trying to influence, and ask yourself whether there’s a better, more direct way.

If everything is truly on the table with your social program, there’s never been a better time.

Social-Media Reality Check: Calling It A Day On Spray-And-Pray (Part 2)