What Most Local Business Owners Get Wrong Re: Social Media Strategy

Somewhere along the way, “social media strategy” got confused with “posting every day and hoping for the best.”

Or posting once a month. 

Or even worse, posting things that are completely irrelevant to their business.

I get it. Posting feels like ‘the work’. It’s the visible part, the part you can point to and say “see, yay me, I’m doing marketing!”

But posting isn’t the strategy. It’s just the output of one, and if nothing’s actually underneath it, the output, as Joey from Friends likes to say…is just moo. (Doesn’t mean anything).

As a marketing consultant in Mission, who works with small and mid-size enterprises all over Canada and the United States, here’s what I see the most: a huge gap in strategy.

So let’s build it here together!

And if you’re a business owner or founder in Mission, the Fraser Valley, or elsewhere in North America, and your efforts feel like they’re falling flat…this is for you.

Step 1: Build the Foundation

First of all, if your current “strategy” is to ask Chat to create a content calendar for you, using a handful of stock photos, and zero hand-written captions, we need to talk. 

(Sorry, not sorry).

The foundation is built from the following pieces, and skipping any of them is exactly why your posting isn’t working. P.S. Throw AI out the window (metaphorically) for this exercise. You don’t need it. 

• Your ideal client profile. The answer to this first one isn’t “everyone.” And even if it is everyone, pick one or two avatars that you can actually direct your posts at. Make it personal!
• Your brand voice and tone. How you actually sound. Not the GPT version of your business. Be yourself!
• Your core brand message. The one thing you want people to understand about you, that shows up across every post.
• The problem you solve. Said simply. Make it easy for people to understand. Don’t overcomplicate it.
• Profile optimization. Your bio, your highlights, your links…connect them back to your website, your contact page, or directly to your booking calendar. Make it easy for people to learn about you and call you. 
• Content pillars. The three or four core topics everything you post should fall under, so your content has a clear throughline instead of feeling random from one post to the next.
• Content formats and types. Knowing which formats actually serve your message, instead of doing whatever’s trending that week. For example – a carousel to explain one of your services, a reel to share the behind the scenes. 
• Posting frequency that’s realistic for you. Not what everyone else is doing. What you, specifically, can actually sustain. (This is different for EVERYBODY).
• Goals that are attainable and sustainable. No explanation needed.

Ok, a slight explanation, because I can’t help myself. Your strategy has to reflect what you and your team can actually maintain long term. 

Spending time on a content calendar that requires two hours a day of time and resources you don’t have is not sustainable. It’s called burnout. What actually works for your business? What can you realistically accomplish? 

Step 2: Decide What You’re Actually Posting

Once the pieces above are in place, especially your content pillars, the “what do I post” question gets a lot simpler, because every post should be doing one of two things: moving someone from not knowing you to getting to know you, or moving someone who already knows you toward actually taking a step.

Here’s a tip for you: not everyone looking at your page is ready to buy. 

Many people are still in the awareness stage. They don’t know you, and they don’t fully know what you do, so your content needs to speak to that stage too, not just the “ready to purchase” one.

My favourite thing to do is to take it back to the basics. 

What do you do?
Who is it for?
What does it actually involve?
What foundational pieces does someone need to understand before they’d ever consider hiring you? 

Remember, people don’t know what they don’t know. Simplify your message and start from the beginning, every time, for every new person scrolling past.

And every post, no matter the format, should be intentional and actually related to your brand. That means skipping the random post about your pet unless your pet is genuinely part of your brand, and skipping the empty “Happy [Insert Holiday Here]” post that isn’t tied to anything you actually do. 

(Don’t even get me started on holiday posts…)

It also means avoiding the AI-generated graphics and captions that are starting to flood everyone’s feed looking identical to each other. None of that moves your business forward. In fact, there’s a huge movement right now of consumers resisting and protesting businesses who use AI. 

Just keep it simple and original.

Step 3: Stop Chasing Virality

I know this sounds backwards, but hear me out. Going viral can genuinely work against you, and this is why.

New followers from a viral moment are rarely your ideal audience. It feels good, sure, vanity metrics always do, but a follower spike from people who were never going to buy from you isn’t progress. It’s just noise.

Ask me how I know: I’ve gone viral a few times, the most recent for my backyard bear videos, and besides having my content monetized on Facebook, nothing came of it. 

P.S. Aren’t they cute?? As of this post, nearly 17M views and 32K followers later…

You also can’t plan virality. When it happens, it happens, and building your strategy around chasing it means building around something you can’t control. 

What you can control is creating consistent, reliable systems that bring in the right people, even if that’s slower and a lot less flashy.

Viral posts are usually the entertaining ones, not the converting ones. If a post takes off but isn’t directly related to what you actually sell or who you actually serve, it doesn’t do anything for your business. 

And B2B posts rarely go viral. 

It can even dilute your positioning instead of strengthening it. You end up known for the wrong thing, to the wrong people, and none of it moves your business forward.

Step 4: Choose Your Platform Intentionally

Not every platform is right for your business, and trying to show up everywhere usually means showing up well nowhere.

Pick one or two platforms and focus on doing them well. 

The reason I asked who your ideal client is first, is because we need to know who they are to know where they’re hanging out online. 

Not only that, but what mindset are they in when they’re there? 

You’ll notice while I do post “business” posts about my services, a lot of my posts are intentionally funny or reaching the business owner who is frustrated/confused/needing a laugh just like me. I know which ones are going to get engagement, and I make more of those!

Step 5: Get a Social Media Audit Instead of Guessing

If you read through everything above and realized you’re missing more of these pieces than you have in place, that’s exactly what my social media audit is built to fix.

It starts with a pre-call, then a 90-minute audit and brainstorm session, and you walk away with a full PDF guide covering your ideal client profile, your brand voice and tone, profile optimization, three to six months of content ideas built specifically for your niche, recommended posting frequency, your content formats, types, and pillars, and even sample CTAs so you’re never staring at a blank caption box wondering what to say. I make the plan, we brainstorm the content together, and you walk away ready to execute it.

If you’re a small business owner in Mission or anywhere else in the Fraser Valley who’s been posting without a real plan behind it, book your social media audit here and let’s actually build one.

Key Takeaways

• A real strategy includes your ideal client, brand voice, core message, content pillars, and sustainable goals, not just a posting schedule
• Every post should be intentional and tied to your brand, not random or AI-generated filler
• Chasing viral moments can dilute your positioning instead of growing your business
• Choose the platform where your specific audience actually is, instead of trying to be everywhere at once
• A social media audit gives you all of these pieces mapped out at once, instead of guessing your way through them