My 2016 Social Media Year in Review
I recently took a little break from the blog to launch my new website — what do you think of the new design?!?!?
The website redesign turned into a great big mess that included an unexpected discovery of infected files, working with two different programmers to clean the site and then moving hundreds of files over to a new server only to find that the files were still infected.
I was finally rescued by a company called Sucuri that cleaned up all the infected malware. It took them 6 hours of work for them to help me finally breathe again. { I can’t begin to tell you how happy I am that this nightmare is over! }
For a full month, I was locked out of my site so I was put on a self-imposed hiatus with my business plans. The only thing I could do was work on my 2017 planning worksheets, review everything that happened in my business in 2016 and spend some time with my son Jake.
My review was pretty eye-opening and I discovered something about myself and my business …. I had such high hopes for my business in 2016 but once again, this year didn’t turn out the way I thought it would.
I knew what programs I wanted to create. I did my monthly planning. I did a review every 3 months to see where I was with my plans – the activity in my social sites, where my site traffic came from and even drilled this down to learn what posts and content brought the most people to my site.
I showed up every day and did the work. So what, happened? Why didn’t 2016 turn into the year I had envisioned in all those planning worksheets?
It wasn’t until I saw the full picture of 2016 in my end of the year review that I realized I had fallen into the 80/20 trap. The 80/20 rule states that 80% of your results come from 20% of your skills.
I was spending way too much time working on the 80% of the actions I thought I should be doing and focused less on the 20% that would bring me stronger growth in my business and more successful results. I knew where all the dots were – I just didn’t do a good job of connecting them.
So in the spirit of clearing out my old ways and bringing in the new, I’d like to share with you how I reviewed 2016 to get ready for 2017.
My Power Words
It seems to be the big thing to have power words for yourself every year. Words that represent how you’d like your year to go. Words that give you direction or help you move outside your comfort box.
I started this tradition a couple of years ago and I will admit, it did help me create a consistent theme to everything that I worked on in my business.
My power word for 2014 was Design. In 2014, I began the process of designing the plans and direction for my business.
In 2015, I took my power word to the next level and claimed it would be the year of Build. Once I laid down the foundation in 2014, it was time to start building this thing in 2015.
When it came time to come up with my power word for 2016, I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was thinking about the 80/20 rule. What could I do to grow my business and increase my time to work on my 20% result-driven work?
I could invest more time in learning how to focus on my 20% skills. I could invest with the online coaches I was following and participate in their training programs.
I could invest in myself and my business. So, my word for 2016 became Invest.
And what about 2017 – what is my word for 2017?
It didn’t take me long to come up with my next power word. I knew what I needed to do in 2017 to have the year that would bring me the growth I wanted to see in 2016.
My power word for 2017 will be Focus.
When I looked it up, this was the definition of Focus:
I think that’s exactly what I need so 2017 will be the year of Focusing.
My 2016 Social Media Story
Last year I did a full disclosure of my social media story – what worked and which sites were just a great big frustration. I ran a few more social experiments and discovered how to be more efficient with my time online as well as what happens when you don’t work the steps.
Read on as I share with you my 2016 Social Media Story:
If you’re a regular reader than you know that Pinterest is my number one traffic referral to my site. I use this site to grow my email list, to find content to share on my other social sites and to do research for my social media experiments.
I started using Pinterest’s Promoted Pins in 2015 and I’m more than thrilled to see that this paid social advertising has helped my number one traffic source increase my email list. Once I saw how Pinterest could get people to click on something as simple as my email opt-in, I began adding Promoted Pins to every one of my product and program launches.
Pinterest continued to change its program which had a huge effect on the way we use this visual site. I tested the way I pinned, what I pinned and how often. All of that testing helped discover a way to grow my Pinterest referral traffic and reach new people with my content who were not already connected to me.
I was so excited with my results that I created The Pinterest Traffic Builder coaching sessions to teach other small business owners and bloggers how this process works so they can grow their Pinterest presence.
My Blog
I realize that my blog isn’t technically a social site but I like to refer to my blog as the hub of all my social links.
I believe that the main purpose of our social links is to generate traffic back to our websites. You don’t own Facebook – so stop using it as your website folks! – and you can’t ever know what’s going to happen with Twitter but you do have 100% control over your website.
This is the place where you can capture emails to add to your sales funnel. This is the place where you can sell your stuff, promote your services and share your information. And the best place to catch someone’s attention to bring them to your site is the content you create with your blog.
Even though I blogged consistently every week, my web site traffic numbers were up and down all year. My traffic was overall higher than my numbers in 2015, but not a steady climb that I was hoping for with my blog.
I still believe in the power of blogging and creating your own content so it’s something that I will continue to improve on in 2017. Once I invest more time with that 20% stuff, my content should be even more focused to help me connect to more people who are looking for a resource like me.
Keep watching my blog for a social media challenge in January and a behind-the-scenes look at the development of a new online coaching program to help you develop a social media routine to get more done in less time.
Facebook has always been a struggle for me.
In 2015, I made the decision to shut down a Facebook business page with over 800 fans and start all over with a new fan page – and I blogged about the lessons I learned on the way.
I learned how to use my Facebook Insights and experimented with Boost Posts. It was a deep learning curve that reminded me that consistency was more important than worrying about creating the perfect posts.
But honestly, while I still posted every week to my Facebook business page, I had a greater social impact participating in Facebook Groups. Spending time in these groups is one of the best ways to grow your social connections.
Facebook Groups work because of one basic thing – people are already on Facebook for personal stuff so it’s easy for them to click over to the group to see what’s going on. They ask questions when they need help, share their success stories and promote their latest programs.
I have found that the Facebook Groups where I’m most active are the ones that have provided some kind of value for me. A couple are great blogger groups where I can connect with other bloggers and I can share my latest blog post with the group.
And then I have a couple more groups that feel more like an online mastermind community. In these groups, we share our problems or questions and others jump in with suggestions, links and ideas to help you work through your issues.
I’ve made some great connections in these groups. There’s something that happens when you share from a vulnerable moment in your life in a safe place. It brings people closer together.
And the more people I connect with, the more people click the Like button and become fans. Then these fans click over to my site and join my email list, giving me the chance to share my products and services with them.
Facebook Groups are what building relationships in social media is all about. This is how we can really see the “social” in social media.
I still love Twitter and wish I could have done more with this social site. I tweeted and shared content but honestly, I didn’t spend as much time working to grow my connections.
I just posted and tweeted. I wasn’t social in one of the best networks to meet new people.
Now that I’ve got my posting schedule and plans in place for Facebook, it’s time to focus more on sharing and using this form of social marketing. It’s time to jump back into Twitter and see what can happen when you try to connect with a 140 characters.
I was in and out of this program all year long. My numbers crept up when I was active and then dropped back down again when I would disappear.
Some solopreneurs swear by this program to grow their sales but I’m just not seeing it. Right now, I’m just having fun by sharing quotes, images of the stuff I’m working on and my personal world.
At this point, I’ll keep posting and try out some photo styling ideas to help me tell my story on Instagram. Maybe once I’m more consistent and work on a marketing strategy, then I’ll see the sales numbers that others are raving about with this visual site.
Your Social Media Story
As you get ready to start the new year with a fresh outlook for 2017, I want you to think about how you’re using social media to grow your business.
What does your relationship with your social sites look like?
Are you like me with triumphs on some sites and struggles on others? Is there something holding you back from using a social media program you know you need to be on because you just don’t know how to fit it into your weekly to-do list?
I think the first place to start is to admit to where you are right now. Share it with friends, post your struggles in the comments section or write your own blog post. Just find a way to get it out of your head and start thinking about how you can make some changes.
So here we go into a new year my friends. Time to learn from our struggles and celebrate our successes.
This is my social media story. This is my truth. What’s yours?
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