[by Carolyn Potts]
What social media marketing has in common with plate spinning.
If you’re wondering if you should add social media to your marketing mix, there’s a simple test. How many plates are you successfully spinning right now?
Think of each of your marketing initiatives as a plate…. a plate you have to keep spinning–like the old vaudeville plate-spinning jugglers.
Keeping your website updated with fresh content is one plate. Keeping in touch with your existing clients by phone is another. Sending out email blasts and/or printed promos another.
You have to be able to spin what you’ve already got, without crashing any plates, before adding another.
Can you balance it all? If you can honestly report that in the last 12 months you have updated your web site at least 3 times and sent out at least 6 email blasts and/or printed promos, then it’s a sign you have the bandwidth to add a social media plate to your routine (or you have the resources to outsource that plate to an able assistant or a service provider).
Consistency is the single most important factor in marketing. If you try to do too many things at once, the risk of crashing goes up. Build your skills.
If the bulk of your clients are hanging out on FaceBook, then do that channel consistently. Then add a another plate. To really see the power of marketing, get at least one or two marketing habits solidly into your workflow before adding another channel. No matter how bright and shiny another channel seems.