There is no question that social media plays a monumental role in today’s marketing mix. No business can ignore the potential reach and personalization that is possible from utilizing social media. Social media takes marketing campaigns to the next level – social media is instant, personable, and conversational. It allows businesses to have a conversation with customers, not just talk at them.

While social media has been around for quite some time (in Internet time), many businesses are still relatively new at social media marketing. Here are a few dos and don’ts for any company using social media in their marketing mix.

Facebook Do

DO respond to every comment your business receives. Social media is all about creating a rapport with your customers on a more personal level. The key to any relationship is communication. This is just as true in marketing. Like your customers' positive comments, and try to respond with something if possible. Getting lots of negative feedback? Don’t delete the comments or ignore them, respond to them. Win back the customer by offering to fix whatever issues they have with your businesses. Sometimes you just get rude people trying to cause trouble. This is an opportunity to display your businesses personality – kill them with kindness, or even throw in a little snarky humor. Just make sure to avoid this kind of epic meltdown on your page. Amy’s Baking Company was easily one of the most famous social meltdowns of 2013. After appearing on the show “Kitchen Nightmares” and acting absolutely unapologetic for their shoddy business practices, viewers took to social media and began to call out the company through Facebook and Twitter. Amy’s Baking Company freaked out, and posted a series of capitalized rants defending the company’s practices and promising to sue everyone who “slandered” them online. After some seriously negative press, they began to claim they were hacked.

Facebook Don’t

DON'T pay for more likes. The days of the popularity contest are over. The value of Facebook is to have an interaction with your customers. More Facebook likes that aren't organically earned (by being an awesome business with a great product!) will actually reduce your page’s engagement. More likes means more number of fake accounts that are diluting the number of potential customers that might see your updates. Learn more about how more likes can reduce the value of your promotions in this Mashable article. 

Twitter Do

DO interact with other tweeters. Many clients ask “How can I boost my Twitter engagement”, or the more basic “What is the value of Twitter?” The value of Twitter, like all other social networks, is two-fold: You can create a better relationship with your customers / potential customers, which in turn builds your brand. A relationship, as I've already mentioned, is all about communication. Rather than blindly tweeting self-promotion, try to interact as much as possible. Retweet, particularly if it is a positive tweet about your business or your employees. Reply to other tweets. Send out a thank you tweet to new followers. Mention your followers in your tweets. We all get a little warm fuzzy feeling when someone notices us, and it makes us have more positive feelings towards that person / business. Spread the warm fuzzy feeling by interacting as much as possible.

Twitter Don’t

DON’T use automated services. Now, I’m not talking about scheduling tweets. That is perfectly fine and sometimes necessary (although you lose the benefit of marketing real time that Twitter can offer, like this example of the Oreo tweet during the Super Bowl blackout of ’13). I am talking about automated services, like thanking new followers or automatic retweets when your name is mentioned. These services are annoying and can be viewed as spammy. They also fail to harness the real benefit of social media – building relationships.

Google+ Do

DO create a Google Plus profile. I still have clients ask if Google+ is worth the time to fill out a profile and post content. I always answer with a resounding YES! While it can be challenging to build a following and the number of people using Google+ is far behind networks like Facebook, there is one huge advantage to using Google+: Googling. Approximately 2 billion searches happen each day on Google, and guess what pages are ranking at the top of search results? You guessed it, Google+ pages / posts. 

If you are a local business, Google Pages have been replaced by Google+ Pages. The more complete your profile, the more information people will get about your business in a local search. If you use blogging, posting your blogs to Google+ will help your blog show up better in search results and will also assign authorship to it. Even if you don’t get a lot of engagement on your page, it will still be worth your time to create one and keep it updated. Get more information in this NY Times article about the value of Google+.

Google+ Don’t

DON’T put all your eggs in the G+ basket. I just spent that last paragraph convincing you how important Google+ is for brands. But that doesn't mean you should focus solely on Google+ (or any social network, for that matter). I love this explanation from Google+ Helper: “Facebook helps you to keep in touch with the people you already know, Google+ helps you to get in touch with the people you want to know.” Use Google+ like you would your other social sites, but don’t use it exclusively or you might risk missing out on potential customers and connections. Read more about this and other great Google+ tips from this blog. 

LinkedIn Do

DO create a company page and request recommendations. LinkedIn is all about professional connections. What is one of the main ways people make choices on where to buy? From recommendations by trusted connections. This is particularly important for B2B companies. Get recommendations for your products or services from your network on LinkedIn to create trust in your potential clients. It is simple. Just create a company page, add your products, and then use the ‘Request recommendations’ feature to send out requests to your connections.

LinkedIn Don’t

DON’T over-message your connections. LinkedIn is about self-promotion – you want to include some glowing references / recommendation, post your resume, awards, and other bragging rights. But you don’t want to ride that self-promotion train off the track. Sending out messages about yourself or your business opportunities is a quick way to annoy connections and ensure that no one is going to be interested in what you have to say. Sending out messages to connections is great, but mass messages are not so great. That is what email marketing is for. 

What kinds of things are good to message? Ask for people’s opinions, help with connecting to someone in their network, special opportunities that are just for them (ie Hey Joe, take this quick survey for me and I’ll hook you up with a free dinner)… The key is to send a personal message to a connection that utilizes their expertise or that you could reciprocate. Save the mass messages for your PostalParrot lists.

There are many more social sites that are great for businesses. Stay tuned and we'll cover Dos and Don'ts for video and image sharing sites like Instagram and YouTube.

Do you agree with these Dos and Don'ts? Have any to add? Share them in the comments below!

 By Lindsey Winsemius.  Lindsey is the Vice President of Communications for ApogeeINVENT, and is the social media voice and blogger for the company. Follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn or Google+