When to step away from a social media platform

Social media is a key marketing tool for most businesses these days, and HR consultants are no exception. Used well, it can be enormously effective at raising your profile, building your connections, generating referrals and encouraging people to join your mailing list.

But it can also be extremely time consuming and time is very precious for any business owner, being pulled in multiple directions, wearing many different hats, and that’s just within the business, not including personal and family commitments!

Sometimes stepping away can be the right thing to do, and here are three circumstances in which you may want to consider doing just that:

1. Spreading yourself too thin

If you are on multiple platforms but only have a limited amount of time to spend, you may be doing none of them well. Consistency and engagement are important to social media, and doing it really well on fewer platforms is likely to be more effective than being sporadic or absent on more.

Alternatives to stepping away: you could outsource at least some of your social media, to ensure higher coverage without taking more of your time, and you could utilise various apps to post in multiple places (noting that engagement with posts like these is often less, because the various social media platforms prefer their apps/websites to be used directly).

2. It’s not generating what you need

You should certainly be analysing your social media activity, and it may be that your activity on one or more platform just isn’t working for you, and you shouldn’t therefore waste your time.

Alternatives to stepping away: consider carefully why it isn’t working. Maybe the key demographic for the platform just doesn’t match your desired customer base. But it could be something else. If it is that you aren’t using it well, haven’t defined a goal, aren’t using effective content or maximising the platform, it might be worth trying again before giving up.

3. It’s damaging your mental health

Sadly, social media can be a difficult place to be at times. ‘Pile-ons’ occur, and people can behave in ways they would not dream of doing in person, when it comes to expressing opinions or criticising. Notice if social media is damaging your wellbeing in this way, and if it is, stepping away might be best. You are unlikely to be using it effectively if that is the case anyway.

Alternatives to stepping away: Look carefully at who you are following, use ‘block’ functions liberally where appropriate, or maybe take a break for a bit and then come back.

As with any marketing tool, social media should be used as effectively as possible, and can be powerful when that happens. But when it’s not working, rather than continuing to the detriment of your time and perhaps your wellbeing, reflect and review. Could you either make changes to make it work for you, or do you need to leave that platform behind altogether and focus your energies elsewhere?

If you’re interested in talking to us about becoming a partner with face2faceHR with bags of support, do get in touch.