10 Common Social Media Mistakes in 2023

Social media has become a crucial tool for businesses to connect with customers and promote their brands. However, as with any form of communication, there are certain mistakes that brands make on social media.

In this article, we will be discussing 10 of the most common mistakes that brands make on social media and how to avoid them.

10 Common Social Media Marketing Mistakes in 2023

• Being on all platforms for the sake of it.
• Not leveraging on other brands.
• Being too professional.
• Not jumping on TikTok trends fast enough.
• Posting for the sake of it.
• Deleting a negative customer feedback.
• Not having a Social Media Strategy.
• Not using influencer marketing.
• Using poor visuals.
• Too many promotions.

1. Being on all platforms for the sake of it. 

As TikTok boomed in popularity over the years, many brands have shifted their perspective from being sceptical of this newfound platform to acknowledging its influence on a global level and wanting to jump on this platform with the fear of missing out. With just a few posts, that probably weren’t that well thought out, after a few months, they are left with a dead account and wondering why isn’t it working. 

To avoid this, brands must understand their manpower, if there’s anyone delegated to this social media account and do they have the skill set to achieve the desired outcome. 

2. Not leveraging on other brands.

Based on our experience of building up multiple brands on social media platforms, many of them are still conservative when it comes to their branding where their platform should only feature exclusively their company’s products. With this fixed mindset, they fail to realise that they are missing out on potential prospects who could potentially be loyal to their brand as well. 

For example, if you are a sportswear company, if you are only attracting those who are already playing sports, you would eventually reach a cap in your target audience when it comes to ad targeting. If you view this from another perspective and reverse engineer your target audience, you can further expand your reach by doing further research on what other interests your target audience is likely to have. Is it related to having a healthy diet? Travelling?

Once you have identified their secondary interest, narrow down the other possible brands that you might share with a similar target audience or branding. In doing so, you are potentially reaching out to a new group of audience who are loyal to that particular brand. Consider doing a collaborative product or even as simple as a simple giveaway to gain brand awareness, encourage trial and eventually brand loyalty from there. 

3. Being too professional that you left your brand personality at home.

As the term, social media suggest, brands need to be “Social”. As much as brand guidelines must be adhered to, it should still have a brand persona and not be like another poster you see in the subway. You probably won’t even remember what’s the advertisement you last saw. A good example of having a brand personality is Taco Bell and Wendy’s which are known for their witty response on social media. 

4. Not jumping on TikTok trends fast enough.

Especially on social media platforms, there are always many different waves of ad trends. To ride on the trend, brands should learn when to hop on the trend to leverage on what people are talking about and tweak their content to make it relevant to the trend. 

A good case study would be  DuoLingo, an app for people to learn various languages around the world. The category on its own is a relatively challenging one (language learning), where people don’t wouldn’t generally think about it unless it’s a need. So what the marketer did was to create a character as a brand personality and was prompt to ride on any trend and make it relevant. Just simply doing so, they have made over 80 viral videos, a total of 5.6M Followers and 113.2M Likes on TikTok. Which is an amazing feat for an application to achieve. 

By jumping on trends, the chances of the video reaching out to interested organic viewers are probably higher as compared to posting a commercialised market-y type of video with a heavy boosting budget. 

5. Posting for the sake of it.

Many brands make the mistake of not using social media analytics to track the performance of their social media accounts. This can make it difficult to identify areas for improvement and measure the success of their social media efforts. To avoid this mistake, make sure to regularly check social media analytics and use them to inform your social media strategy.

6. Deleting a negative customer feedback.

One of the most common mistakes that brands make on social media is ignoring customer complaints. This can be damaging to a brand’s reputation and can lead to even more negative feedback and decreased customer loyalty. To avoid this mistake, make sure to respond to customer complaints in a timely and professional manner, and take steps to address the issue and ensure it does not happen again.

7. Not having a Social Media Strategy.

This commonly happens when brands don’t know what they want. Expecting a bit of everything such as brand awareness, engagement and conversions. Ironically, when you focus on everything, nothing is focused. 

Therefore, just like any marketing strategy, remember to set short-term (1-3 months), mid-term (1-2 years) and long-term (3-5 years) social media goals. If you are a brand starting a page from scratch, focus on brand awareness, reach and visuals via Facebook Ads to strategically target those who are likely to be interested in your product and services. So that when your brand builds, it will be easier for your to achieve your mid and long-term goals. 

8. Not using influencer marketing.

Influencer marketing can be a powerful tool for brands on social media. However, many brands make the mistake of not using it or not using it effectively. Even if they did engage a few influencers before. However, when they fail to see the immediate return on investment and therefore stopped investing in influencer marketing at all.

To avoid this mistake, research influencers in your niche and consider working with them to promote your brand. You can consider getting feedback from them to further improve your product. Keep a lookout for those who have the same brand values and will eventually become loyal to your brand that will talk about your brand even without your prompting it. 

9. Using poor visuals.

Visuals are a powerful tool on social media. They can help to increase engagement and reach on your posts. However, many brands make the mistake of not using visuals or using low-quality ones. To avoid this mistake, use high-quality visuals in your posts and consider using video or live streaming.

10. Too many promotions.

Yes, you want your audience to know that you have a promotion going on, and how cheap your product is. However, when there are too many going on, the promotions no longer feel exclusive and the audience will experience content fatigue, thinking “uh! This again..” To avoid this, brands can shift their focus on creating more quality content and more of what the consumers can benefit from it through light-hearted contents. Alternatively, brands can also create followers only promotions every once in a while to emphasize on the exclusivity.

In Conclusion

Social media is a powerful tool for businesses to connect with customers and promote their brand, but it also comes with its own set of mistakes that can be easily made. By being aware of these common mistakes and taking steps to avoid them, brands can ensure that their social media efforts are effective and successful.

Now that you know what are the things that you should avoid, do make sure to find out what are some of the must-haves as well in your social media!