5-step guide to save your failing social media program

I pray that you never find yourself in this position but I suspect that many community managers find themselves in a dire situation.

The numbers don’t look good. The social media conversation around your brand looks worse. Even though you’ve put in a herculean effort, you run out of time, money, and people. The management team, already dubious about social media, smells blood in the water.

How do you turn the ship around? How do you demonstrate that you know the realities of your program and have a realistic strategy for getting back on track?

The first step is to understand why social media programs fail. After you identify the pitfalls, you can devise a response.

1. Understand why your programs suffer.

Checking the box

There is tremendous pressure for businesses to “do something” with social media. Marketing teams are forced to create platforms to check off their social media box. This leads to fancy Twitter and Facebook profiles that lack meaningful content. Worse, sporadic updates to the platforms communicate the organization’s lack of commitment.

Wrong objectives