Are You Maintaining A Consistent Social Media Presence?

One of the more important tenets of business internet usage we regularly tout is consistency and nowhere is that more important than across your social media channels. Therefore asking yourself if you are maintaining a consistent social media presence is a good idea to ensure you are upholding this belief.

If by chance you are on the fence about the importance of consistency, keep reading and let us convert you to the faith!

The concept of consistency

Why is consistency so important in our opinion? Primarily it has to do with clarity and a lack of confusion.

The internet has become a very busy place. There is a lot to see and do from games to news to information to social interaction. Within all of that you have a multitude of businesses operating, some successfully, some not successfully.

One thing that many successful businesses do is to showcase themselves, or their brand identify, in a consistent manner at all times which makes them easily recognizable as well as a known commodity.

For example, when you are driving along the highway at night and you are hungry if you see a sign with a bright yellow “M” almost assuredly you know that a McDonald’s is nearby. Also you probably have a pretty good idea of the type of food you will get from them. Regardless of your thoughts on McDonald’s their brand identity is very clear and recognizable which serves them well.

Now what if each McDonald’s served different kinds of food? What if some were only open for breakfast while others were open for just dinner? What if you had to wait to be seated or there was no drive-up? Each of those instances would show a lack of consistency. If that kept happening then people would not know what to expect when they see that big yellow “M” and that same idea holds true for your brand on the internet.

You need to be consistently putting the same everything out there across all channels, especially social media so people clearly understand who you are and what you have to offer.

Keys to a consistent Social Media presence

Why the focus on social media? Basically it is because we see more inconsistency in business’s social media presence compared to anywhere else.

Most businesses are very good at establishing some basic brand identity around their office. That then translates directly to a website with colors, logos, typography and messaging being similar.

However when you get to social media often we see each channel having its own personality for whatever reason. Maybe a different person manages Facebook compared to Instagram. Perhaps it has to do with the channel itself and people think they should act differently.

Regardless of why it happens, the key takeaway is that you should be consistent in these areas:

• Voice – Are you funny? Are you serious? Does your business use the royal “we” to respond or the independent “I”? However you normally talk, such as in newsletters, content, or emails needs to not only be consistent in those areas but also on social media. When your company speaks, regardless of where, it always should sound like the same person talking.
• Response – When you respond to people, either comments or feedback, you need to consistently sound the same. Just because you are on Facebook doesn’t mean you give a different answer or have a different opinion compared to LinkedIn. It often helps to have the same person responsible for responding to all channels.
• Appearance – Colors, preferred font, style of images used and even taglines should all associate the brand and be consistent. If you develop a great tagline then it should be used everywhere. Your logo and color scheme should be the same on all profiles.

Important Social Media tips

Along with the above keys to maintaining a consistent social media presence, you should also:

• Actively Update – All accounts need regular love and attention if you want them to grow. This is another area where consistency is king!
• Actively Cross-Promote – People use different social channels for different thins and hopefully you do as well, which is a wonderful reason to remind users on one channel about all the other channels you have and what you use them for. You can also cross-promote marketing campaigns and contests. The goal is maximum exposure and reaching all of your users!
• Actively Educate – People follow what they like and find interesting. That means you need to stay interesting and relevant. I’m sure some of you out there have followed something or someone for a while and then decided to unfollow them because they provided no value. Don’t be a business that gets unfollowed!

The bottom line is that consistency is one of our keys for good reason. Hopefully after reading our reasons why you should be maintain a consistent Social Media presence you can see why we value it so highly.