Nothing is worse than carefully crafting a social marketing campaign only to kill it during the execution. Just because social media is effective for promoting your products, service and business, it doesn’t mean using it is foolproof. There is a right way and a very wrong way to do it. If you’re guilty of any of the following, stop immediately. These five ways are guaranteed to kill your social marketing campaign.

Never Update

The entire point of social media is to keep people updated. Businesses often make the mistake of simply creating a profile and posting a few posts or links. This isn’t enough. Unless you give users a reason to notice you, you’ll gain no followers and no traffic. Update several times a day, if possible, to be a true social media hero.

Post Too Often

Posting every few minutes is a major mistake. Users see this as spam. Unless you truly have something important or useful to your followers, limit your posts to no more than one an hour. You should also avoid duplicate posts as users get tired of seeing the exact same thing.

Getting Too Personal

Remember you are running a business. Keep your personal life, including your opinions, out of your social media campaign. Nothing kills a campaign faster than controversy due to political, religious or slanderous comments. Your followers may not share your opinions. Always keep posts business relevant only.

Creating A Single Strategy

Most businesses use multiple social networks. Using a single strategy for all of them means only one will succeed. Every social network is drastically different. While there are similarities, create a different plan for each to ensure you take advantage of each network’s strengths.

Ignoring Followers/Friends

Once you gain a following, nothing hurts a campaign more than ignoring those who like you. Participate with your fans. Just like with updating frequently, you must respond to messages and comments. This doesn’t mean respond to every post, but show fans you actually read what they post.