Have you committed these 8 social media crimes?

Common social media pitfalls can ruin otherwise good campaigns, but pros can avoid digital offenses by following these tips for branding success.

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Social media marketing makes it easier than ever to connect to thousands of potential customers, but winning the trust and interest of your audience isn’t always straightforward.

These eight common social media mistakes illustrate that many brands don’t understand the best practices of effective social selling.

1. Starting a Tweet with “@”

When you’re tweeting to a follower or fellow brand on Twitter, your first instinct is probably to tweet something like this:

@icmconsulting – Thanks for the follow!

Unfortunately, your first instinct is wrong. By starting your tweet with the “@” symbol, Twitter thinks that you’re having a private conversation. As a result, your tweet will only be visible to the user you’ve tagged, and your entire audience will be excluded from seeing it.

Thankfully, getting around this is simple. By starting your tweet with a full stop (a period or dash symbol), you can bypass this mechanism, making your latest tweet visible to both your audience and the audience of any other users that you’ve tagged.

.@icmconsulting – Thanks for the follow!

If you’ve ever made this mistake, you’re in good company; even professional marketers have fallen victim to this simple slip-up.

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