How to Market Your Business Without Social Media: What to Do When You Hate It but Feel Afraid to Quit.
When you hate social media or start to feel unhappy spending time there, the obvious solution for most people is to stop using it. Deactivate your profile, delete your accounts or have a long term social media detox.
But if you’re a business owner who relies on social media to market your business it’s not that simple. This is especially the case for therapists who have grown a personal brand off the back of social media platforms.
I know, because I’ve been there.
The thought of leaving social media can fill you with equal amounts of relief and dread because although you’ll get a break from all the things you’ve come to dislike, unless you have an alternative plan, you’re also going to lose revenue. The good news is, that relying solely on social media for marketing is a bad idea and unsustainable in the long term, so now is as good a time as ever to fix that.
In this blog, I’m going to share some strategies that can help you transition away from relying on social media for marketing to giving it up completely.
For me, it felt like I woke up one day and was allergic to social media. I felt instantly irritated when I opened platforms, I felt increasingly negative towards “people” and the constant stream of AI- generated content left me feeling short-changed. In reality, the romance began to end about two years prior.
A small nagging resentment about the amount of time social media took grew into something bigger. The “enshittification” of my platforms of choice and a polarised world led to increasingly unpleasant and alarming social media feeds that left me anxious and distressed each time I opened an app. This was topped off by decreasing positive results in my business for my efforts and an ever declining concentration span.
The reason I pushed through the original negative feelings was because social media worked for my business. I had built my personal brand through Facebook and originally found social media a very positive experience for connecting with like minded peers. It’s almost unbelievable how different, and not in a good way, Facebook in 2015 was to the Facebook of today. I was attached to Facebook groups especially, maybe even a little addicted.
My attempts to reduce social media reliance led to strategies such as introducing a podcast to my business, a website redesign to increase SEO, growing my email list and ceasing busy admin roles in facebook groups. Fortunately, I had email marketing in place since 2019. Despite all of this, somehow by the time I decided to call it quits I found myself posting on more social mediaplatforms than ever before and starting a new facebook group.
It’s fair to say I came close to burnt out due to increasing my social media platforms that required varying content forms and ignoring my own coaching advice of “Choose two platforms and do them well.” This led to a significant period of rest to avoid burnout completely. And now, I find myself not wanting to resume social media marketing at all and instead strengthening my other forms of marketing.
How to stop marketing on social media ASAP:
IMPORTANT: If you’re relying solely on social media to market your business and grow your brand, it is best to put in place some alternative marketing strategies in place before you completely stop posting on social media. When you stop a marketing strategy that works without a proven replacement, you will almost certainly lose revenue, if not immediately, in some months time when the impact of no new leads into the business occur. If you’re having a really hard time with it or just can’t stand another minute, consider reducing your number of weekly posts or recycling your older posts that did well for you. If you have the budget, employ a social media manager to create and schedule your content for the period where you are working on your strategies.
Here are the non-social media strategies I use in my business:
Email marketing: send quality emails to people who subscribe to your list. I have been doing this since 2019 and it has always been far more effective for revenue generation than social media posts. This is because I don’t have to rely on an algorithm to choose to show the email to subscribers. The bonus of email lists is you own the list, unlike your social media following which can disappear if you get banned from a platform or the platform closes. I recommend you use 2FA for your email list and develop strategies to collect email.
Blogging: Write at least one quality blog per month. This helps improve the SEO for your website and also helps chatbots find you. For this to work, it is better to write something original with your unique voice and perspective than creating via AI. The market is currently flooded with generic AI content that makes everyone sound the same. When you sound like everyone, you don’t sound like a trusted expert. So, avoid where possible.
Podcasting: Start your own podcast. Podcasts gives people a front row seat to who you are as people can hear how you talk and experience your energy in a way that the written word doesn’t. My podcast has helped convert clients into high-ticket individual and group coaching programs, purchase courses and work with me in supervision. Podcasts are more time intensive than blogging and email marketing but the value in a podcast is that invites in a differnt type of ideal client and because it is evergreen content, it allows them to find you when they are ready and listen in to as many episodes as they need (sometimes they will binge the whole lot).
Guest Appearances: I’ve had excellent referrals from a couple of podcast episodes I’ve appeared on as a guest as well as live and recorded event collaborations with peers with a shared audience. For this strategy to work, it’s best to seek invitations from those with a relevant or shared audience demographic.
In-person events: In my opinion, there are few types of marketing that work as well for therapists as in-person networking. Whether you’re trying to grow your private practice or build an additional income streams trust forms much more quickly in person than online and this often leads to direct leads or referrals from broader networks. Whether it’s a large event, having a coffee with a colleague or dropping in to meet a GP, in-person networking works in-person connection builds the kind of trust that is vital for business succes. Maintaining these connections over time deepens the impact even more.
Small group dinners. I decided to begin meeting quarterly with local schema therapists in my city. Although for me this was more about reducing isolation as I actioned my intention to reduce social media participation or leave it completely, these kind of events can be a great way for introverts to make business connections for shared referrals. Since offering these dinners,I have sent referrals the way of the therapists I have connected with. (want to join the next Perth Schema Therapists Dinner let me know here).
Get on a stage. Speaking events, like conferences and community events, can be a great way to market your expertise and get in front of a new audience. Tired of waiting to be invited? Why not host your own event and create your own stage. You can do this online through a live event or in person in a brick and mortar building.
More strategies
There are some other great strategies that I don’t currently use in my business but I have seen it work very well for some of my coaching clients. These are:
Writing a book. Writing a book is a great way to demonstrate authority and can operate as a lead attractor in your business. Books have the added bonus of opening doors to promotional stages. With a book as part of your assets, you’ll find it easier to get invited to appear on podcasts and traditional media opportunities like TV and print media.
Recorded video: Uploading recorded video to platforms like YouTube can be a very effective YouTube strategy that assists with SEO/ AI summaries. Video also build authority and trust quickly as it allows people to see and listen to you as you talk about your area of expertise.
As you can see, there are so many options beyond social media that are just as impactful, if not more, and more reliable. Plus they don’t require you to engage with a platform that works like a gambling slot machine on your emotions to try to hold your attention.
The good news is that since almost completely quitting social media, my attention span is returning to normal levels, I feel a greater sense of good will to others and my desire to create is returning.
Yours in thriving,
Nadene
