Ever Wondered What A Social Media Strategy Includes? ( And Why Most Businesses Don’t Have One)
You get it, your business needs to be present on social media platforms. So you hand over your Instagram to someone kind of tech savvy, and just hope for the best. After all, some exposure is better than none at all right?
So posts get published, sometimes they’re consistent, and sometimes not. The aesthetics are looking okay, but you’re starting to notice that that effort isn’t really moving anything for your business. There aren’t any new people finding you, and the ones that do aren’t sticking around. Maybe at this point you’re wondering if social media is just not worth it for a business like yours.
But allow me to explain that what your experiencing isn’t because of the products you sell, your space, or your community.
What you’re experiencing is a lack of strategy.
I’m just going to say it: a content calendar is not a strategy.
This is the most common misconception I come across, and it’s really an easy one to make. Having a content calendar feels strategic because it had dates, topics, and formats all planned out for you. It creates a sense of order and intention, and to be clear, having a calendar is part of a strategy. It’s just not all of it.
A calendar will show you what and when. Strategy, on the other hand, will answer the why, for whom, and toward what end.
When whoever is in charge of your socials skips the strategy part and goes right into scheduling, a few things tend to happen:
The content gets created around what’s easy to post and not around what meaningful to the people you’re trying to reach
The voice shifts depending on who wrote the caption that week
The goals are vague, like more followers, more engagement, without a clear picture of what you’re actually working towards or how you would know if it’s working.
What’s in a real social media strategy?
Here’s what I think a lot of business owners don’t know what they’re missing because no one’s ever laid it out clearly for them.
Here’s the work we go into before a single post get’s written:
Brand and Audience Research - This is THE FOUNDATION everything else is built on. Before we write a word of copy for a client, we need to deeply understand who they are. Their voice, their values, the type of energy that’s in their space. What makes them different from every other restaurant or studio or cafe in their neighborhood. We also need to understand their community. Who their current customers are, what brings them in, what keeps them coming back, and who the business hasn’t reached yet but should. This step takes time and it takes real attention. This step will never be skipped.
Content Pillars - This idea or concept has been being dragged through the dirt recently for not being as important as people think but as far as we’re concerned, having defined content pillars are the very structure of how our strategies for your business is formed. Each pillar will serve a specific purpose or goal. For example, one pillar might be about attracting new people, another might be about building trust with the people who are already aware of you. Another might tell the stories behind your business to keep things human and community oriented. Having content pillars are what keeps content that you post from being random, and ensures that over time, the cumulative effect of everything you post is pointing towards a goal.
Brand Voice Alignment - I think this one is the most underestimated part of the strategy than almost everything else. Your social media content needs to sound like you. It shouldn’t sound like a template, it shouldn’t be following a trend, and it should not sound like whoever is writing your caption for that day. Getting this part right takes work. We’ll listen to how you speak about your business, understand what words and rhythms sound natural to you, and then build a consistent voice that’ll hold across every post, every caption, and every reply. When it’s not done well, people can tell that something’s off and you would probably lose trust and engagement.
A Posting Plan with Purpose - And this is where that content calendar comes into place, but it’s really built with everything we’ve outlined above. Which formats serve which pillars? How often is it showing up, and when? Let’s make sure the content is varied and intentional rather than be repetitive.
And then there’s our favorite, community management.
This is the piece that often gets left out of conversations about social media management, but it’s one of the most important ones.
Community management is not replying to comments. It’s part of it, but that’s just the surface layer. The way we go about community management is being proactive. It’s showing up in the spaces where your ideal customers spend time online and engaging genuinely. It’s following businesses and creators who share your values and building real relationship with them. It’s treating your DMs like real conversations and not notifications to clear. It’s noticing when someone has been a loyal follower for a while and making them feel seen.
For a hospitality or lifestyle business, this is the online equivalent of what you already do in your physical space. You aren’t standing at the door and waiting for people to introduce themselves. You create an environment where people feel welcomed, you remember faves, and you make people feel like they belong. Community management is how you do that on social media. When it’s done well, it builds the kind of loyalty that turns online followers into people who will actually come and visit.
Again, this work takes time, and it’s something that can’t be batched once in a week and called done. And that’s why, for most business owners, it’s the first thing that falls off.
This is why Social Media Management is a full-time job, not just a side task.
The reason most business don’t have a real social media strategy isn’t due to laziness or lack of care. It’s capacity.
Running a hospitality or lifestyle business is all-consuming. You’re already managing staff, overseeing the experience, handling hundreds of small things that make the front-of-house feel alive. Social media is important, and you know this to be true, but when something has to give at the end of a long day, it’s usually the caption you were suppose to write.
Everything that was mentioned, like the research, the strategy build, the voice work, the content creation, the daily community management, and the monthly reporting and analysis, is a significant ongoing investment of focused time and thought. It’s not a task, but an important skilled role in any business. When it’s treated as something that anyone can do in their spare time, the results reflect that.
Here’s a question for you.
If you’re reading this and feeling a some recognition that what you have right now is a schedule rather than a strategy, then I have a questions for you.
What would it feel like to have your online presence fully taken care of? Not just posted, but actually thought through, actively managed, and quietly doing the work of turning curious people into loyal ones?
That’s what a real strategy makes possible.
If you’re ready to partner with someone to help you figure out what that looks like for your business, I’d love to hear from you!
🍊Farnsworth Street Marketing is a community-first marketing house for hospitality businesses and lifestyle brands. We help you build a social media presence that actually reflects the community you’ve already created, and help you attract the people who belong in it. Let's connect here.
