Whenever you plan to start a new venture, your expectations can be sure to run wild. Once that venture is underway, however, reality sets in, and you have to work to adjust those expectations. Today, we will address some common expectations and realities of social media marketing on different platforms and how to meet in the middle to achieve your goals!

Expectation: The more followers I have, the more business I will get.
Reality: Follower count is often referred to as a vanity metric: a metric that makes you look good on paper but does not help you understand your social media performance in a way that can affect future growth strategies.
Solution: Instead of focusing on the number of followers your account has, pay attention to metrics such as engagement, impressions, and reach!

Expectation: My followers see everything I post, so I need to post multiple times a day.
Reality: Social media algorithms are frequently changing, and your approach to posting should change along with it. Buffer, a social media management company, experimented with their posting strategy on Facebook by cutting the number of their posts by 50% to focus on quality over quantity. As a result, their reach and engagement both increased significantly.
Solution: There are many resources you can use to research what time of day you should post for maximum engagement on each platform. Create posts for your brand by using research-based data!

Expectation: My content is good enough. Our customers don't really care about what we post.
Reality: You should always create quality content that represents your brand uniquely and robustly. The best way to create content is by defining your purpose; what do you want to get out of your content? Your aim should help you create a clear plan for distributing your content to help you reach your social media marketing goals.
Solution: Work with your team to create a social media plan that prioritizes quality content and encourages engagement on your followers' behalf.

Marketing SFGate