I have a love/hate relationship with social media.

I love it to stay connected to friends and family, get news (that I can filter) and look at aspirational travel photos and tips. I love connecting with people all over the world and finding like-minded people I can talk to.

I hate it for the feed full of irrelevant ads that overtake everything and leave me feeling frustrated and further convinced that Facebook is evil. I hate it for the addictive time suck it is, particularly when it comes to marketing.

There are positives & negatives for it and not all social is created equal. For e.g.: I am an active user on LinkedIn as that was designed purely for business, Facebook WAS NOT!

I can give you a bunch of reasons why you need to stop focusing on Facebook starting with these:

• We all know that organic reach on social is dead.
• It is now a pay-to-play platform – you cannot build an empire for free anymore.
• It wasn’t made for selling – despite it having business pages and an evolving ad platform, people are not on Facebook to buy. They are on it to connect.
• The algorithm is CONSTANTLY changing and not designed to be beaten.
• Time for effort, it is the least performing marketing channel for most.
• I could go on…

But these 3 are the most powerful reasons that have a massive cost to your health & your business:

Decreasing attention spans

We have been trained like monkeys to expect everything with the click of a button. We don’t want to wait seconds for ANYTHING and our attention span is less than that of a goldfish.

Why is this an issue? If our attention is waning, then it is harder for you as a business to grab my attention. Whatever you are selling has to be VERY relevant for me as a prospect to look at, let alone click on it.

We all get caught in the ‘scroll hole’ which means you need to stand out. But at the same time, you need to stand out to the right people and in the right way because this is a perception of you and your brand.

We are consumed with marketing messages across both traditional and digital channels and we have moved from fast forwarding through the ads on TV to flicking past ads in Facebook.

Increasing ad prices

It’s the classic case of supply & demand. As demand increases then so do does price.

This means your small $20 a day campaign is getting seen by less and less potential clients. Bigger ad budgets are taking over your feed and that’s exactly what Facebook want. That is how they are making a g-zillion dollars a year profit.

And your hard earned but small ad budgets are adding to their bank balance, not yours.

As more and more people join the Facebook ads revolution, there is more competition means you are fighting over the same eyeballs. Do you have the budgets to win? And know that the more you advertise, the more it is costing you.

Mental exhaustion

Your health is something that cannot be replaced.

Comparitisitis, feeling inadequate, and like you are drowning in a sea of people who have it figured out (but most of them don’t) is commonplace on social media.

Posting then waiting for that red notification to pop up so you can see who has liked and commented on your post, is a pure hit of dopamine which social media relies on. This addiction is what draws you back to it time and time again.

Just jump onto YouTube and Google and you will see that people are starting to rebel against it. They are feeling mentally exhausted and drained from the perfect Instagram feed and the unreal Facebook posts that are designed to portray a perfect life which no one lives.

 

Social is good for general brand visibility – not for generating sales!

It can be part of your overall marketing mix but paying someone to manage organic Facebook content alone is not a strategy I would recommend. If it is not part of a wholistic strategy, then organic Facebook & Facebook ads are a waste of time.

Manage your Facebook expectations and remember it is not the holy grail it is made out to be.