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Social media marketing will only work if you’re doing it right.
If building an online following is a massive challenge, gaining back the audience you lost—meaning, your “un-followers”—is an even bigger trouble. Social media marketing becomes instantly useless if people keep unfollowing you, and that’s why most marketers hold a grudge against this Facebook feature.
But why are people unfollowing you anyway? Can’t we all just happily co-exist in one online space and help one another grow?
Unfortunately, your audience, who craves valuable content, says no. Fractl and Buzzstream asked 900 social media users why they unfollow brands and found that the same issues are rampant not only on Facebook but also among email marketing campaigns. The reasons behind the unfollows, however, are largely similar.
If you’re suffering from follower churn, you may be one of these five types of companies.
1. The plain-old-Jane
In other words, you’re too boring. It’s either you’re very much into unimportant things or you’re talking about the same things over and over. If you’re guilty of any, or both, of these two grave mistakes, don’t even ask why your followers are starting to bid your page good bye.
In their study, Fractl and Buzzstream found that 21% of customers unfollow brand pages when they get too repetitive. You might consider tackling a new topic or spicing up your page with informative-yet-entertaining content once in a while just to break the monotony.
2. The annoying chatterbox
So your greatest fear is to become a plain-old-Jane, but aren’t you overdoing your online marketing a little too much?
According to 19% of social media users, they don’t like brands that post way too frequently. That means six or more times per day. Sure, you might be honestly trying to gain more followers by intensifying your social media marketing efforts, but you should also be careful not to spam everyone’s news feed with your posts. Remember, the last thing Facebook users need aside from too many ads and auto-playing videos is clutter.
3. The one without a filter
Your audience knows that you want (and need) to be involved in social issues that truly matter. What they won’t understand is how you ended up posting something unquestionably offensive to some groups of people.
It’s best to think twice about your posts if you’re already hesitating to make them public in the first place. The online community is becoming more sensitive, and frankly a little harsh, so just be more cautious each time.
4. The snob
Although many would disagree, technology has made this era the golden age of conversations. We might get distracted from our face-to-face interactions because of all these gadgets, but technology primarily exists to create dialogs.
It’s also why brands don’t have any excuses left as to why they keep ignoring those who keep in touch with them online. Brands have all the resources to keep their audience engaged and there’s no legitimate reason why they won’t be able to put these resources to good use.
5. The misunderstood one
If you don’t fall into any of the four categories above but still suffer from follower churn, you might be one of the misunderstood brands. These brands are those that post on Facebook at the right time and respond to comments promptly. However, they cancel out all these plus points as they rave about irrelevant topics. Your “news” articles may be two weeks old already or you probably use unverified information to create your content.
To avoid this, just remember what matters to your followers, so you can create a catch-all online marketing strategy that works for them.