Every few months a new platform turns up and the panic starts. Should we be on it? Are our competitors on it? Have we already missed the boat? Before you know it, a business with one part-time marketer has accounts on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, X, Threads, Pinterest and YouTube, and is doing a half-decent job on none of them.
I’ve been running social for small businesses since 2016, and this is one of the first conversations I have with almost every new client. You do not need to be everywhere. You need to be brilliant in the places your customers actually spend their time. For most small businesses, that’s two platforms. Sometimes it’s one.
Why does being everywhere mean being average?
Every platform has its own language. What works as a LinkedIn post falls flat as a Reel. A TikTok that flies would look odd on Facebook. Doing a platform properly means learning how it works, making content built for it, and turning up in the comments every day. That takes time, and time is the one thing small marketing teams don’t have.
So what happens? The same graphic gets posted to six places with the same caption. The hashtags that made sense on Instagram end up on LinkedIn. Videos get cropped badly to fit. Nobody replies to comments because there are too many inboxes to check. Each account looks a bit tired, and people notice.
A dead account is worse than no account. If someone finds you on a platform and the last post was eight months ago, the message they take away is “this business might not be trading”. You’d have been better off never setting it up.
Two platforms done brilliantly will beat six done badly, every single time.
Start with your customer, not the platform
The question isn’t “which platforms are popular?” It’s “where are the people who buy from us, and what are they doing when they’re there?” Those answers are very different depending on who you sell to.
- Selling to other businesses? LinkedIn is usually your strongest bet, because that’s where decision makers go to think about work.
- Selling to local people? Facebook and Instagram still do the heavy lifting for most local businesses, from cafés to plumbers. Local Facebook groups alone can bring in serious work.
- Selling something visual? Instagram and Pinterest, where people go looking for ideas and things to buy.
- Got a younger audience, or a product that’s fun to watch? TikTok and Reels, if you can commit to video.
Don’t guess. Ask your best customers where they spend their time online. Check where your website visitors come from in your analytics. Look at which platform already brings in enquiries, even small numbers. That’s your evidence, and it’s worth more than any trend report.
Which platform should you pick?
The best platform on paper is useless if you can’t feed it. TikTok might be where your audience is, but if nobody on the team is comfortable on camera and there’s no budget for video, it isn’t the right choice this year. Be honest about the skills, time and money you actually have.
A good test: could you post there at least three times a week, every week, for a year, and reply to every comment within a day? If the answer is no, it’s not one of your platforms yet.
Claim your name, then park it
I’m not saying ignore the other platforms completely. Register your business name on the main ones so nobody else takes it, add your logo and a short bio, and pin a post that points people to the places you are active. Something like “We’re most active on Instagram, come and say hello there”. That’s honest, it looks tidy, and it takes ten minutes.
What you don’t do is half-heartedly post there. Parked is fine. Neglected isn’t.
Earn the next platform
Once your main platforms are running well, with a steady rhythm, people engaging and enquiries coming in, then you can think about adding another. Treat it like a test. Give it three months, make content made for that platform, and set yourself a clear goal before you start. If it works, keep going. If it doesn’t, park it and move on with no guilt.
And when the next shiny new app arrives, and it will, you don’t have to jump straight on. Let the early adopters work it out. If your customers move there in big numbers, you’ll know, and you can follow them properly.
Less, but better
Clients often worry that cutting back will make them look small. In my experience the opposite happens. One brilliant Instagram account, full of real people and proper replies, makes a business look far more established than seven accounts that all say “Happy Monday!” and nothing else. Focus is a strategy. Being everywhere is just being busy.
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