7 Social Media Success Tactics You Can Learn From Kids

Basics of social media marketing are so simple that you can even learn from a child. It’s confusing but true.

If you’re finding it hard to find good content marketing ideas, ask your children to help you find an interesting image and describe it in one line. You’ll be more surprised.

Children see the world from different and exciting angles. They create their own world of toys and objects where everyone lives happily.

They create appealing imaginary characters. Because of their observation and quick learning, children can conclude anything better than adults.

In her book, Yvett Adams explained that kids know more about technology than adults. They know better than you how to use your cell phone. According to the author, it happens because of their clean memory and fresh mind. Devices are new to them, so they explore them and try to master them, which they eventually do.

ThoughtBlog published a remarkable post by Heidi Priebe. It highlights 10 attributes in kids that adults should learn from them.

Great people do things before they are ready. They do things before they know they can do them. Doing what you’re afraid of, getting out of your comfort zone, taking risk like that – that’s what life is”

Amy Poehler

These are just the few examples referring to the edge kids have on adults. Talking about social media, they may not be using them like us, but they have strong tendency to outrun us in this field as well.

7 Social Media Tactics You Can Learn From Kids

1. Kids like to play.
2. Kids don’t hesitate to ask for anything they want.
3. Kids are risk-takers.
4. Accept your mistakes and say “sorry”.
5. Open up and show your natural charm.
6. Kids know how to prioritize things.
7. Kids have interesting observations.

Instead of running away, accept this reality and learn from them what they are best at. You can always ask your kids to teach you some of the following. They’d love to teach.

1. Kids Like to Play

Kids like to play and find fun in anything they like – things that most of us consider irrelevant. All of their “Important work” revolves around joy and fun that helps them learn and remember. When was the last time you did something for fun?

Social media, for instance, is all about having fun. Sticking to the fun element on social media gives your brand a natural charisma and attraction.

Going back to the point of learning and remembering, kids always try new things while playing.

Your child learns faster when they’re accompanied by other children, and want to have the toy other children play with.

They play and compete, but they don’t have any fear of failure. So, adopt the “Fun and Play” attitude, try new things and get out of the fear of gain or loss. Bring the creative element out and see the difference in your posts.

B 2 C published Jesse Aaron’s article on humanizing Facebook brand pages. He also emphasized on presenting funny side of the brand for better engagement.

2. Kids Don’t Hesitate to Ask for Anything They Want

Children depend upon people around them for everything. They cannot feed themselves, protect themselves or clothe themselves, but still they do these things by asking for help. They display the real nature of interdependence among all human beings.

What do they do to persuade?

When it comes to persuasion, children are the best species to follow:

• They cry out loud and ask for help.
• They show emotional attachment with the thing they want.
• They persuade repeatedly.
• They are good at reasoning and arguments to persuade.

In a few years, they will grow up and become independent, but not so much that they can do everything by themselves. No one can do everything on his own.

What’s the point of that?

Learn from kids how they persuade others to do what they want them to do. Don’t be shy to ask for favors. Social media allows you to get in touch with everyone, so there is no reason for you to deny. Reach out to the people. Most of them will surely help.

In his post published in Harvard Business Review, Wayne Baker proposed that you need to come up with a SMART request to get what you wanted. Your request should have the following elements:

S – it should be Specific

M – it should be Meaningful

A – it should be Action-oriented (something to do)

R – your request should be Real and authentic

T – it should be Time-bound.

You should have persistent approach; bring up the value and show your emotional attachment to the cause of the task. And it’s quite easy on social media; sometimes reposting gets you the desired results.

3. Kids are Risk Takers

The best thing you can ever learn from kids is their consistency. They don’t give up until they learn something. Because they don’t know what “Risk of Failure” means, they keep on trying harder to accomplish what they want.

Growing up takes this fearlessness, makes us more risk averse. As a result, we come up with objections, risks and fears to do something, and loose a possible chance of success. This could be our biggest mistake in achieving our objectives.

Here’s the point

Social media is a platform where you can experiment and see the results rather quickly.

According to Peter Muir,

The biggest risk is your time, followed by product acceptability.

1. Negative comments can destroy credibility.
2. You need time to grow your profile.
3. Your topic can get sidetracked.
4. Some of your followers may not tolerate changes.
5. Threat of viruses, identity thefts and malware may occur.
6. The bigger the business, the harder it is to control.
7. Utilizing social media only for marketing.
8. You might lose the most important person who drives visitors to your page.
9. Inability to localize your message for a specific audience.
10. You’ll lose a few customers because they’re ignored.

Such risks impact your social media marketing strategy a great deal, but they can be dealt with if you’re focused and persistent with your approach.

If you’re not getting a good response, you’re not marketing your product the right way. Perhaps a different approach or different angle can get you what you are seeking.

Before revising your strategy, you need to show you have made a mistake. Read details in following point.

4. Accept Your Mistakes and Say, “Sorry!”

Risk-takers don’t hesitate to accept mistakes and that’s what children do more often. Remember how a child reacts when they break an expensive item in your living room. Your initial reaction might be different, but it will not last long after you see a face with a big “Sorry!” written all over it.

The same goes with social media. People know that mistakes happen, and social media is just the right place to accept mistake and correct them. People are generous enough to accept apologies, and they like honesty. Take a look at this apology from Buffer after recovering itself from hacking.

Some common mistakes on social media are as follows:

• Not posting according to audience’s demands. You might post irrelevant content, or anything that they don’t like at all. If you own a popular brand, your posts can affect a large number of people out there. The rule of successful content marketing is to post anything that does not hurt the credibility of the brand, as well as the emotions of the people. If you have made a mistake, revert to it, correct it and repost. If you cannot do it because of time constraints, at least leave a comment that the posts will be modified as soon as possible.
• Not responding to negative comments. Ignorance to negative comments leads to doubts, and doubts lead to a possible brand failure. It is a huge mistake if someone comes up with a disturbing comment, and you don’t respond. There are two ways to respond. Either clarify your point and ask for favorable reviews, or simply accept your mistake with a promise to correct it. Silence indicates you’re not too brave to face the challenge.
• Failing to provide what you promised. It happens with businesses that use social media page for customer support. You might fall back because of any discrepancy in operations or any other event. Do let the people know that you’re falling behind because of certain reasons. It will keep them calm. Accepting mistakes indicates towards your commitment and honest approach. This is not it, you can learn more from your child’s honesty.

5. Open Up and Show Your Natural Charm

Simplicity and upfront honesty is something you can only see in children. It brings out their charm. If you let a stranger talk to your child for a moment, you will see that your child takes a bit of time to develop confidence in him, and unknowingly he opens up.

This is what we miss as adults. We’re not too brave and carefree like them. But still, we can learn from this behavior.

Here’s what you can learn:

Let go of your fears. Don’t be scared to share inside information if they are not personal. People like stories of you and your business. There is nothing secret in the world, and let’s accept it, you cannot hide company’s secret beyond certain limit. So be prepared for anything unexpected in your way and face it.

Open Up. Social media is a platform where you cannot win by keeping secrets and hide your emotions. So, it’s not bad to crack a few jokes. You have to be yourself, open to discussion and suggestions. That’s how you can succeed.

Get into the shoes of your prospects and imagine how you can get their attention. If you succeed, what will be your next move to keep him for long? All of it demands that your brand and business must be transparent to your audience.

6. Kids Know How to Prioritize Things

“Why are you buying beer, Dad? Do you know how much candy we could get with that money?!”

Children have great instincts to determine what’s more important in life. They listen to their inner wisdom and prioritize things according to the way they want. Seeing things in their own way makes them feel satisfied.

One day, they want chicken nuggets for lunch and change their mind the next day.

Being consistent on social media doesn’t mean that you keep posting what you find interesting. Adopt the habit of listening to your heart and inner wisdom before posting anything.

You’ll soon learn what to post and what not to. The nature of your posts will likewise gather minds as well.

7. Kids Have Interesting Observations

Have you ever heard someone asking, “How does a rope in the middle of the pool stop deep water from entering shallow water?” If you ever have, it must be from a curious child.

Child’s curiosity always leads to interesting funny questions. And these questions lead them to discover new things in life.

If you’re an expert in the field, you’ll have fewer ideas as compared to beginners. So, which option suits you, if you’re a marketer?

Adopt beginner’s attitude and look at things like you are seeing them for the first time. You’ll soon find yourself asking intriguing questions which will lead you to ideas for some really attractive posts.

Lesson

Those of you who think children cannot teach, better start observing them to learn quite a few interesting lessons.

No matter what you sell and how you sell it, the basic thing is to keep your marketing strategy simple, adaptable and consistent.

Don’t hesitate to share your weaknesses and ask for favors. Keep yourself open to ideas and learn from everyone, leaders and followers alike.