The way into the digital age for SMEs is not through social media
Do your homework first
I recommend that you first look at the most important means of communication these days, your own website. If it doesn't contain the latest information, isn't mobile-friendly or doesn't run under https, then you need to do your homework here first.Almost every company should do this anyway. In almost all cases. So much for "it depends"...
Only the very best content is found
If you don't get your content into the top positions of Google's hit list, you don't need a social media presence. It wouldn't be maintained well enough. Companies without their own marketing department don't need to worry about social media. Apparently the promotion of the products or services has worked without it so far?In order to operate social media successfully, it is not only necessary to constantly provide interesting and attractive content. It also requires well-trained and strategically-minded staff: - What should be achieved with the social media presence? - Which is the most suitable channel for this? - For which target group? - With what message? - And how do you measure success in order to justify the costs of continued operation?
Social content needs to be promoted - and that costs money!
a minimum monthly budget of CHF 1,000 for the promotion of social content. you can expect that only 1-2% of Facebook fans will see company content. To provoke a click, you have to calculate with approx. CHF 0.75 in Switzerland. To get a Like, you have to expect to pay around CHF 1.30, whereby Likes from older readers tend to cost more and women are more expensive to reach than men.Operating social media not only incurs costs for the concept and content procurement, it also means personnel costs and advertising costs.
Less and less referral traffic ...
What's more, you don't own the platform and the provider adapts the rules as it sees fit. This recently happened with Facebook in the wake of various data scandals: many Facebook e-commerce operators lost their business basis overnight. .This confirms the suspicion that it is not particularly clever to build your business on the basis of other people's technology. about the status of the services can no longer be reached and updated...Can you imagine what would happen if Google went down for a few hours?
Influencer marketing: to be enjoyed with the utmost caution
The usual suspects such as Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat and Twitter are all inefficient for small and medium-sized companies in my opinion. They are only suitable for larger investments in personnel and advertising. In my opinion, this is even less efficient in the Swiss SME environment and only suitable for certain sectors such as beauty, lifestyle or tourism.
LinkedIn or Xing are worthwhile
But I consider LinkedIn or, in certain sectors, Xing to be interesting channels for SMEs: The SME managing director can manage the profile himself with reasonable effort and the results are often surprisingly good. These platforms are also well suited for job advertisements.why you shouldn't "rent" social networks, but need your own platform. Well done, lion!* Walter Schärer has been involved in online and content marketing since the early days of the WWW. He experienced the Internet hype of 1998-2000 and the subsequent crash in 2001 at first hand as a consultant in a web agency. He then managed the internet departments of several Swiss companies for 15 years. Since 2017, the internet pioneer has been back on the agency side as Director Marketing & Business Development at BlueGlass Interactive in Zurich. In his MK column, he analyzes Internet trends from time to time and gives his opinion on them.
