4 Non-Facebook Social Media Strategies

Non-Facebook-Social-Media-Stragies-for-2014

Fellow marketers, have you noticed yet another decline in your Facebook reach? Personally, I know our business page reach went from meager to abysmal despite a steady increase in fans. That’s because after over a year of complete denial, Facebook finally admitted to deliberately killing your organic reach. Those of us who follow the company closely certainly aren’t surprised. The admission merely reinforces what we’ve known all along: Facebook is NOT on your side. Nevermind all the Small Business Saturday, #shopsmall, #buylocal lip service: actions speak louder than PR fluff.

Now I’ve seen a lot of posts from other admins urging businesses to revolt & completely ditch Facebook. More power to them, I say, but before you make a bold move you might regret, consider the impact such actions could have on your long term growth. The fact is that your customers are probably still using the site, so it’s in your best interest to maintain an active presence. But it would be foolish to put all your eggs in Zuckerberg’s basket at this point.

Think Outside the Book in 2014

By book, I mean Facebook, of course. While I don’t recommend deleting your fan page, I do think it’s time to shift your focus elsewhere. There are plenty of other networks where your customers hang out from LinkedIn to Instagram, depending on your industry. But I’m going to focus on the 2 that I believe have the biggest impact on SEO.

Google Plus

G+ is an excellent choice for B2B as well as local marketing. Many are calling this network “LinkedIn Lite,” which seems pretty accurate in my experience. The conversations on G+ tend to be higher brow than the Facebook chatter, and I find the intellectual stimulation very refreshing. The SEO impact of Google Plus is well documented; obviously, being active on the largest search engine’s pet network can’t hurt. Here are 2 easy ways to engage with the community right away:

  1. Join Relevant Groups/Communities- You’re probably familiar with LinkedIn groups already. Although Facebook offers a similar service, most users don’t even realize this feature exists. Anyway, I know joining G+ groups helped me feel at home on the site. I quickly found likeminded friends and we even promote each other’s content on occasion. Since becoming active on G+, I’ve seen our blog traffic steadily increase as my personal network expands. And I always find shareable content in my stream, which makes content curation a breeze.
  2. #WordlessWednesday – Before I get into the specifics of this hashtag, I’d like to point out that G+ users actually use hashtags, unlike their Facebook counterparts. Facebook users typically ignore hashtags and may have a negative reaction if you use them in your posts. Why? For 2 reasons. Facebook didn’t used to have hashtags, so many users don’t understand what they’re for (hashtags still don’t work on mobile devices, which accounts for the largest portion of Facebook traffic). Beyond functionality, hashtags represent open discussion, a willingness to engage with complete strangers. Yet most users view Facebook as a closed, intimate network exclusively for people they know in real life.
     
    But I digress. #WordlessWednesday is a popular hashtag that appears on both G+ and Twitter. The trend comes from the blogsphere, so it’s no surprise to see lots of activity on G+. The idea is to share an image alone without any words or only a minimal caption. As social media expert Lena West explained on a Moz Whiteboard Friday post, this visual exercise gives your brand an outlet to show its personality instead of straight up advertising.

Pinterest

Pinterest works well for B2B as well as B2C, and boasts of the highest social conversion rates on the web. That’s reason enough to get involved, but another benefit of Pinterest is the ability to build followed links! No, they’re not primo, high quality links, but low value links are better than the no links you’ll get from Facebook. *Drops Mic* Here’s what you can do to quickly increase your Pinterest presence:

  1. Use the Invite Friends Feature- One advantage to having a solid presence on Twitter and Facebook is that you can connect with most of the same people on Pinterest as well. You can always add a Pinterest tab to your Facebook page and invite customers to join you on the network through an email campaign, too.
  2. Be Desirable- You may have noticed that companies get away with posting crappy cellphone pictures on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter all the time. Users on those sites don’t seem to mind poor image quality. Pinterest, however, is a whole new ballgame in that respect. Pinterest is primarily a visual platform, and users are inspired to repin posts of beautiful photos, helpful information, etc. So only show the best of your products, company, and industry. And make sure you include at least 1 strong image in every blog post for pinning purposes.

Holiday Social Media Marketing Pro Tip

Now you’re ready to dive into these networks come January. You’ve got about 3 weeks to plan and prepare. But you still have to finish out the rest of the 4th quarter, and time’s a wasting. I generally discourage marketing automation, but hey, it’s Christmas! You’re spending quality time with friends and family. So here’s a nice set of social media tools to improve your productivity at least until 2014.

Published by Katherine Tattersfield

Katherine is a professional copywriter and social media manager at PrintFirm.com. She fell into online marketing in 2010, and built her career around this dynamic field. She earned her B.A. in Political Science from California State University, Northridge (Summa). When she's not writing, Katherine enjoys photography, skateboarding, graphic design, and chasing her dog around with her husband. Connect with her on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google Plus.