In our last Blog, we touched on WHY it is so important to have consistency as an absolute key part of your Social Media Strategy.
Today I thought we could jump in with a brilliant Real-World example of how implementing a strategy where Consistency is a priority can have a very real and positive effect on your business.
If you didn’t get a chance to read our last blog, we mentioned, there are two key points at the heart of WHY consistency is so important…
- Establishing Trust with your audience
- Playing nice with those pesky algorithms!
Let me walk you through an example……
One of the local gyms I recently gave some advice to, runs an amazing weekly CrossFit style circuit class.
Every week the circuit is slightly different, and every week it endeavours to post a plan of the upcoming class’ circuit on its Social platforms.
But there was no plan about when or how or even who would put that information out there, it was (at best!) a haphazard ‘we’ll do it when we get around to it’ type of affair.
Which meant some weeks, they didn’t bother at all….and they thought this was OK, because ‘We just don’t get that many people looking anyway, its just something to post’
WRONG!!!
So wrong! They have an amazing group of really committed clients, who WANT to follow them, WANT to know the inside scoop of what is happening in their business WANT to be able to talk to their gym buddies about ‘next week’s class’ and want to be the first to know, and the Gym had totally underestimated this aspect of their business and hadn’t given credit to the power of the people!
So…Considering this situation from a customer point of view.
If I (the customer) know that every Tuesday at 8pm my favourite gym will release the info of this weeks circuit on Facebook, I know I am going to go and look at it because I am excited to see what they have in store for us!!
I am excited about their business and this puts me in a good mood and makes me feel positive about my experience with them.
Maybe I even interact with the post, share it with my sister (who comes to class with me) to make sure she has seen it, she comments on the post, which then comes up in her neighbours feed, and she thinks it looks fun so comes with us- Boom….and in one post (and 5 minutes!) the gym have a new customer.
If that happened every week for a year, that is 52 new clients….Imagine if that happened 5 times a week, or 10!
See where I am going with this!!
Managing your customers expectations should never be overlooked.
Now let’s look at this situation, thinking about the ‘ol Facebook algorithms.
Imagine the gym make the same post, but just ‘when they get around to it’.
Their clients may stumble across the post, but then it’s just another post in a crowded feed.
Yes, they are still producing the same content and the info is still out there, but if a customer goes to ‘actively’ look for the info during the week, it may be there….but it also.. just as likely not to be there…and that frankly is a bit annoying and disappointing for the client.
However….The Gym decide to commit to consistency…They decide Tuesday at 8pm will be THE time. They tell all their clients that already come to class to keep an eye on your Facebook page at 8pm on Tuesday, then as promised at 8pm on Tuesday, they post next week’s class details, and their clients go wild for it!!
‘Liking’ it, ‘Loving’ it, leaving them gif comments, tagging their gym buds in it.
Facebook suddenly thinks ‘Whoa…..this pages fans are loving this content, lets show it to some more people’ so it does and they pick up 5 extra bookings for next week’s class!!
But now…Facebook is waiting for them to post that content again, to test the water…see if that post was a one off, an anomaly, or if they have really started to strike a chord with their audience.
Next class, they prime your clients again, then the following Tuesday at 8pm they post the following class’ details.
EVEN more of their clients search for their page this time to check it out (now they know where and when they can get the info first).
They have created some real-world hype, that has crossed into the digital world, that they can now play to their advantage!
Facebook is ready and sure enough, because their fans are loving on their post, it puts it out there even more people once again…and this time they pick up 10 extra bookings!!
So, now Facebook knows that they have some content that people are going nuts for on a Tuesday at 8pm and it wants in! It WANTS to be sharing content that is super engaging and fun, so it is ready and waiting the next week to share The Gyms post again, because it is pretty sure it is going to be good!
But then The Gym don’t post it, they forgot, or didn’t get around to making the image, or fell asleep!
They now have disappointed clients who came to look at the class plan that never appeared…but Facebook is also disappointed to not be able to share their awesome content, it was ready and waiting and now has to go and find someone else’s content to share and filter in to peoples feeds, Facebook was ready and they let it down.
OK….Maybe I am giving FB more feelings than it will ever actually have, but hopefully that helps you see how the workings of Facebook operate with a real life business.
The Gym in question, has since started making it a priority to post the class plans at the same time each week and has seen the engagement in each post rise and rise each week and that has translated into more views and ultimate more new customers.
Whilst I am not saying YOU MUST have a super strict regiment with your posts, there will be better times to post on your page than others (and every business will be different) and types of content that work better than others.
But if you can find that nugget that consistently (see, that word again!!) gets people engaging with your content, Facebook and the likes will reward you with sharing more of your content more often with your followers and the wider world- which is ultimately why we bother with a Marketing plan at all isn’t it!!!
In our next blog we will be looking at some simple steps to helping you keep consistent with your Social Media presence and taking the stress out of constantly creating new content for all your Social Outlets.
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