Social Media Marketing – Are We Listening?

"There are people who, instead of listening to what is being said to them, are already listening to what they are going to say themselves."
— Albert Guinon

My mother says it. You’ve heard it. “You have two ears and one mouth—behave accordingly.” Social media marketers tend to be so busy about the task of deciding what to say and how to say it that we can miss the important practice of listening. Content has been dubbed the king of internet marketing, and we are busy about creating and curating content to share and broadcast. The quotes stream forth abundantly from Twitter accounts and endless updates inundate our LinkedIn feeds. Are we missing the fine truth of communication by spending so much time talking and little time listening? Here are 3 keys to adding some listening value to your social media marketing.

1. Surveys and Polls. Have you conducted a survey of your target demographic lately? Do you know what they think they want? Have you polled your social media subscribers, followers, or fans to get their take on your company or industry? Grab a survey tool or polling widget and find out. Construct your survey to best capture unbiased and useful data. Do some research on best practices for building a survey or poll and then fire off one or two. People will be glad you care enough to inquire. Speaking of inquiry…

2. Questions. The best sales people know that asking questions is a sure-fire way to build trust and engage prospects. Yet, we seldom ask questions on social media. When is the last time you asked a sincere—not leading—question as a part of your social marketing? Too often we ask questions then proceed to answer them in a vain effort to demonstrate our expertise. Asking a sincere question and creating an encouraging space for conversation is a pleasant interruption to the constant noise of social media. How could you insert questions into your social media activity today?

3. Repeat what you hear. People like to be heard and understood. A proven technique for effective communication is to repeat back to someone what you think they said, and then get their confirmation that you heard them correctly. While you can practice this technique literally on social media, a similar technique is simply acknowledging the content of someone else’s comment or update. How delighted I was last weekend when my birthday check-in on social media was acknowledged by the business where I chose to spend my birthday. It was specific to my communication and acknowledged that they heard me.

Engagement is a term used often to describe the interaction between brands/companies and people on social media. When you hear the term “engagement,” think listening. It could do wonders for your social media marketing efforts.