Before your company can fully utilize the maximum rewards from an effective social media strategy, you need to do some serious soul searching about what your goals are regarding the web. Having unrealistic expectations about what your social media strategy can do for your business is counter-productive. You have to ask yourself what you hope to accomplish by starting your social media strategy.

What are your goals you want to achieve from your social media marketing effort? Setting an achievable goal for your social media campaign is the key to any successful campaign. If you know what you’re working towards, it’s easier to strategize a plan to achieve those goals. If you want to strengthen your customer service then you need to focus on having a 24/7 customer care service, not so much on a twitter feed.

How will you measure your success? Every company has a different scale to measure their success. It really depends on what your goals are and how much you’ve achieved them. Some companies use a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) to measure their performance. Sometimes success is defined by reaching an operational goal all the time, like having a set number of visitors to your site or having a number of followers.

Will you have a plan to synch your social media strategy with other marketing plans? Internet marketing doesn’t exist in a vacuum. You need to match your other marketing plans with your internet marketing strategies to get full synergy. Promoting a product in traditional marketing platforms one way and not carrying it out on the social media platform could cause your customers whiplash. Not to mention it’s detrimental to the company as a whole.

What social media platforms are you going to target? Where should you focus your efforts? There’s blogging, Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Linkedln just to name a few. Which of these sites are better for your target market? Your customers might be flocking to Myspace instead of Youtube. You need to do research on where your company could profit the most.

How will you assign the duties for updating your social media campaign?You need to relegate employees to update your Facebook page, answer questions from fans of your blog or Tweet something entertaining. This isn’t a job you can do haphazardly. There needs to be a coordinate effort from marketing personnel so you need to see if your employees can handle the additional duties. If they can’t you need to consider hiring social media experts or at least outsource.

Who are your fans and how will you win them over? Not everyone can be won over with a pithy comment on your Facebook wall or a long blog post about your business. You need to look at your customers and what they’re interested in. Your social media strategy should correspond to their likes and dislikes.

Not all social media strategies can apply to all companies. You need to have a strategy that is tailor made for you and your business. You need to ask yourself these questions before you start an online campaign. The better prepared you are, the better you can handle the challenges of an online marketing campaign.