Would you get your local carpet fitter to sort your plumbing out?

Would you get the local farmer to be the chef in your 5* restaurant?

Sounds ridiculous to even ask these questions, but welcome to the world of the upsell and Tenuous Link brigade in the Social Media world – in their world the scenarios above would be a fist pumping yes – after all the carpet fitter has a tenuous connection with housing and the the latter example a connection with food

I bring this up because i’m increasingly seeing local businesses fall into the common trap of the upsell from the tenuous link brigade

Here’s a list of companies that often ALSO offer Social Media services

• Web Designers
• SEO Companies
• Trad PR Companies
• Online Directory Companies
• Outsourced PA Companies

Now some of these may have the very basics, some of them may be quite good – but Social Media is not their core business, they don’t necessarily do it every day and ultimately it’s a bolt on to what they actually do

I was travelling back recently from a business meeting and a friend in business actually used the phrase “There is no way I’d let a web designer near my social media. It’s all geekery and dungeons and dragons”. It may have been a flippant comment, but it had a grain of truth in there – web designers are traditionally not great with engagement and marketing

Ultimately when companies offer additional services it’s often in their interests rather than yours and you have to ask the question – do they actually have the skills for this area?

THE UPSELL / THE BOLT-ON / THE ADDITIONAL SERVICES CROSS SELL
Go to any business networking meeting or pick up any business book and you’ll always hear about the upsell – getting your customers to spend more with you!!

Now that’s good business sense and it’s fine in certain scenarios. A restaurant for example wants you to extend the birthday meal out to your anniversary meal, the Xmas works night out and they want you to bring and tell more and more people at the same time. If you have a great meal you probably will do all this naturally without being pushed

But what if you’re Web Design company for instance has simply looked at their bottom line and thought how do I raise my income by 30%? Ok, I don’t know that much about it, but whilst they’re in front of me I might as well offer Social Media services as well – the classic cross sell

It happens all the time and people buy into it, because they have dozens and dozens of recommendations for their original service and you were happy with it.

QUESTIONS TO ASK IF A NON-SOCIAL MEDIA COMPANY OFFERS SOCIAL MEDIA SERVICES

• Can I have a look at your social media profiles?
• What experience do you have in this field?
• Can you tell me about success stories for clients for social media specifically?
• How will I measure the Return on Investment on what you’re doing for my business?

Those 4 questions alone should provide a basis for their Social Media knowledge and experience and their own Social Media profiles are very telling as to how they use Social Media specifically

We’d always recommend you choose a company that specializes in Social Media – have a look at our How To Choose Your Social Media Manager or Trainer Guide by Clicking here

Altrincham Hq

“With over 12 years experience of Social Media and 17 years experience of online marketing in other companies, clients come to myself when they want a veteran rather than a rookie” Alex McCann