5 Grave Mistakes that Tarnish Your Business's Reputation

You may have the best social media strategy on the face of the planet, but if you’re not going out of your way to satisfy the needs of consumers, you’re not doing your job. Here are five mistakes that could tarnish your business’s reputation:     Not Knowing Your Audience Your social media strategy will suffer if you don’t have a solid understanding of your consumer base. Not every customer is a perfect one. Every single customer is a critic, including journalists, employees, bloggers and personal connections. Stay alert. Weak Presence in the Right Areas Once you have identified your target audience, you will want to start promoting your product in a way that is most likely to reach as many individuals in your target audience as possible. If you know they visit Twitter on a regular basis, set up a Twitter page for your business. Do the same thing with Facebook if you think you might generate significant traffic there. Establish yourself as a leader where it matters most. Inability to Benchmark 24/7 You can’t be online every minute of every day. It’s just not feasible, but you can set up automated alerts on your social media pages that allow you to read every post wherein someone mentions your brand directly. This type of monitoring might be referred to as your ‘eyes in the sky.’ The more you know, the better prepared you can be. Outsourcing Your Marketing Initiatives When you charge a third party with your marketing initiatives, you are putting your reputation in their hands. Choose the wrong representative and you could wind up paying for it more than one way. If you want to come across in a certain way, you will just need to promote your brand yourself. Congruity Errors As your business grows, you will likely find yourself doing business with many groups of people in many different locations. Ensure that everyone who sees your brand is given the same information about your products or services. Anything else will result in mixed messages, and as many consumers questioning the validity statements that you make on public forums.