Social media platforms are changing at the speed of light. If you’re a marketer or a small business owner or even a salesperson, it’s hard to determine which way to go with your strategy. When marketing channels are in flux, it’s easy to get sidelined wondering which way to go.
Ask any social media manager what it’s like right now and their response will likely begin with a sigh of overwhelm or desperation.
The good news is that you’re not alone. Everyone is struggling to some degree and no one has figured out exactly how to master it all. Focusing on the fundamentals that remain constant is a smart move.
Give customers what they want.
What hasn’t changed is your target audience. They are still there, buying what you’re selling. They are likely in the same places you’ve been reaching them all along.
How much time in the last 6 months have you spent asking your customer what they want? If the answer is none or rarely, then it’s time to stop assuming and actually find out.
In marketing and advertising, we usually look at data to tell us what the customer wants. They spend time on the website, they click on ads, they comment on social media.
But what if you just came out and asked them?
Automotive retail has long been a place where saying YES to customers is embedded in operations. Eager salespeople want their customers to say YES to them, so they work earnestly to provide what customers want.
Carl Sewell, the car dealer I spoke about in one of my recent newsletters, says, “The only thing that matters is what the customer wants. And the only way to know for sure what they want is to ask them.”
If you give customers the chance to talk, and if you’re willing to listen, they’ll tell you exactly what’s important to them.
Ways to ask your customer what they want:
- Short online survey delivered by email
- 3 questions presented at the time they check out.
- 3 questions via social media. This can be a Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn post where they answer in the comments. Or if you have a YouTube channel, present the 3 questions then ask them to answer in the comments.
Here’s a case of not considering what customers want.
I continue to be shocked by the direction Elon Musk is taking Twitter (I will never call it “X”). He recently threatened new brand/business accounts with losing their verification if they didn’t spend at least $1,000/mo in advertising.
Here’s the exchange where he offers an even more crazy option:
Note: I especially like the part where he says that it “more than pays for itself in organic reach.” Are businesses just supposed to take his word for it? And what is organic reach, for heaven’s sake?
I’m convinced that he literally has no idea how to run this valuable asset that so many people count on. Here’s why.
- People don’t buy for your reasons, they buy for theirs.
- If they’re not buying the $1000/mo product you’re offering, that’s your fault not theirs.
- Threatening buyers REALLY is not a path to profitability.
The company and product continue to change frequently. Which is not to say strategically. Musk decided to change Twitter’s name to X on a whim, wiping out anywhere between $4 billion and $20 billion in brand value, according to analysts and brand agencies.
He thinks he’s setting it up for a great future as an “everything app,” which absurdly includes payment processing, but it’s yet another decision that shows how little he understands about what people want from Twitter.
When you fail to give the customer what they want, you create a void that is soon filled by your competition.
Threads provides an alternative to Twitter
As the Twitter debacle continues its daily nose dive, Threads has been hard at work after their very successful launch on July 6th.
Since the launch, Daily Active Users (DAU) has declined (which is common with new apps) so the name of the game now is to make people want to come back, and that’s what Facebook/Meta has had the most experience with year after year.
There was so much demand for something like Twitter in the world that Threads got 100 million users within a few days, and now they have to do the hard work of building out the rest of the features.
Last week, Threads rolled out an update that includes a feed to view posts from accounts you follow in chronological order, the ability to see who you are following in your followers list, and advanced notification filters.
Talk about asking your customers what they want…and giving it to them!
Threads still has a lot of levers to pull and it has the potential to grow into something even better than Twitter ever was. It is far and away the most likely to replace Twitter in the popular imagination.
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