A common question that comes up when businesses are thinking about using social media is about how much time it is going to consume. There are a hundred different ways you can utilise the different social media platforms and having the attitude of just “diving in”, although admirable will probably leave you in a “time sink”. Unstructured social media use can leave you spending hours and hours trying to effectively market your business online and fewer and fewer hours actually doing your business.

So, before you even start to look at the different platforms and techniques involved with social media networking and marketing you need to put a strategy in place. Having this plan is as important as any business or marketing plan and will give you a clearer idea of what you should be doing with your social media accounts, how to make them work effectively for you and ultimately provide you with realistic and achievable expectations for your brand.

The most important question you can ask yourself before you start is “what do I want social media to do for me”? Maybe you want to increase traffic to your website, or interact more with your customers or start generating some valuable sales. Once you establish what you want to do you will be able to start building your strategy and deciding which social media platforms will best suit your purpose. Your strategy will also help you decide what kind of content you need to create and how often you need to create it. You will be able to determine what groups of people you want to target and how to find out where they “hang out” online. Ultimately a strategy will help you achieve the goals you set out when you asked yourself what you wanted social media to do for you.