Social Media Selling Problem

This website has stated multiple times that Social Media selling is a future selling platform that is increasing day in day out. Probably find that it will go completely downhill tomorrow. But, until then, it is a good way to sell stuff.

And remember that "selling" is actually anything you want a prospect to do (signup to an autoresponder, click on an Ad, buy a product, list to what you have to say etc).

So what usually happens?

• you follow the rules of the social media platform that you have chosen
• you post
• to link to items
• you gain followers
• you build and build

Sounds all too common right?

But what are you actually building?

In reality you are building up that social media platform primarily and then secondarily- you. Regardless of what people say or think...this is what happens.

You don't necessarily have a business, you have an X Business (where X is the social media platform). It may be doing well, it may have tons of subs. But, it is still the platforms business.

So what happened when a Pro had a problem with their social media selling?

Don't know if you have seen...or probably heard of Charles Berthoud? He is a (predominatly) bass playing musician and has a Youtube channel that is filled with very clever playing. He has 420 videos and some 1.4 million subs. Most videos hover around the 800k-1 million videw mark. He is doing well. But then this video appears:

He got kicked off Facebook- or he can not access his Facebook page.

Who cares?

Well, he got it going and for 15 years built it up. 300k subscribers later and he can not access the page.

Check the Facebook customer service email?

According to Charles he contacted them in a variety of ways over a few months- even paying people to find out who had links into Facebook.

Nothing at the present time.

Now, with all this publicity he might get his page back and a sigh of relief. However it is also a very good reason not to rely solely on someone elses platform. Now Charles is trying to get a newsletter up and going where he actually owns the media.

This is not an isolated case

Now the Internet has tons of stories from people who have had their social network platform removed from them- for just or unjust reasons.

For us?

We have had Facebook cancel us. And we really can not be bothered to jump through hoops to figure out why. Well, we know why and it is silly.

When this website was first created we also created a Facebook page. I posted a lot and linked to the website a lot. This is not a good Facebook thing to do apparently. It looked too much like a bot was doing it.  But I couldnt just post once or twice a day, we were finding cool stuff online and we just wanted people to see that. There's no time out phase, no "hey, read this and calm down on the posts".

So. We were in the Facebook sandbox. Emailing helped like a blow up archery target. Changing our email lept onto their logs that we were iffy. Logging in with a different computer worked for a bit, then it didn't. We couldn't get the branded Page back. So we just don't use it now.

So we keep with the site, something we own and got most control over (you don't have total control as your Site Provider and Internet Provider can slap you down).

Any business that you utilise and give to ultimately have their own interest at heart. Facebook protects itself and they should they have spend multi-millions doing so. Other businesses will change their rules to get past a competitor or to reduce payment (Amazon referral fees anyone?). If you solely rely on someone else then you have to jump and move when they say. How many people will sign up and base their business in the Metaverse, cool idea initially but not a safe one for the long run.

Charles has a good plan in offering newsletter/ email sign up but it will take more than a picture on the screen to get people to do it:

That was taken from a Youtube screen grab. The problem? It is on Youtube. To find the link you ned to go to the description, click on the link and then sign up. A 2 step process at best. How many people watch from Apple Box or on their phone, would they sign up? Can you create a link on screen to send people to your signup page (making sure Youtube TOS is OK).

Obviously email sign up pages are another topic all together, but you really need to describe the positives of what people are signing up for. Just saying freebies is not a magnet.

Social media selling or not, yes no, which one?

This question is actually quite simple because you have to use social media within your plan. If not then that plan will not be its best.

Use the social media as a megaphone and interaction but it just can not be your primary store or sales page. Your sales are vastly too important to leave to someone else. This is what changed Zappos into a powerhouse. They figured out the most important issue in their business is getting shoes in and out to customers in a timely and correct fashion. They created a warehouse and never looked back.

There is one point in your business which you can not live without. It is slightly different for everyone. You need...no, have to find yours and that is going to be protected.

Luckily for Charles, he lost interaction and a fan base but his most protective area is his communication method of video. This is where people can see and hear Charles, share and interact. Those 1.4 million subs were gathered over 10 years compared to 300k subs in 15 years on Facebook. Sure, Youtube can go down, change their rules, so you need a backup. Somewhere where those videos could be hosted, or have access to the originals. And some place where you can own the listener.

Because at the end of the day, the listener is Charles's main business need.

Check out other online sales articles at the Jasonera blog here.

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