Have you been ghosted by your own social media?
Ghosting is usually something that happens between people. Things seem to be going well, the messages are flowing, and then silence. No explanation, no goodbye.
Plenty of business social media accounts go the same way. Scroll through enough local Facebook pages and Instagram feeds and you'll spot the pattern. There's a burst of enthusiasm when the account is set up, a steady trickle for a few months, then a cheery "Happy Easter!" with a picture of a daffodil, and nothing since.
I see it all the time, and it's rarely laziness. Usually it's a business that's been too busy doing the actual work to talk about it.
How it creeps up on you
Nobody sits down and decides to abandon their social media. A busy spell turns into a quiet month on the socials, and the quiet month turns into a season. By then, coming back feels oddly awkward, as though you need a good reason or a big announcement, so you leave it a little longer.
Meanwhile the jobs, the customers and the good news carry on happening. They just don't make it online.
What it looks like from the outside
Most of your followers won't notice you've gone quiet. The people who notice are the ones who come looking. Someone hears your name from a friend, checks your page to get a feel for you, and finds it stopped in April. Some will ring anyway. Others will quietly wonder whether you're still busy, or still trading, and try the next business on the list.
There's a practical side too. The platforms tend to favour accounts that post regularly, so after a long gap your first few posts back may not reach many people. That's normal, and it's no reason to give up again. It picks up as you keep going.
Coming back without making a thing of it
You don't need to apologise or announce your return. Nobody was keeping count. Post something ordinary, like a photo of a job you finished this week or the answer to a question a customer asked you. The next post will be easier than that one.
Then make it small enough to keep up. Two posts a week that actually happen will do more for you than an ambitious daily plan that lasts a fortnight. An hour on a Monday morning to write and schedule the week's posts is plenty for most small businesses.
It also helps to keep a running note on your phone of things worth sharing as they happen. Take the photo while you're on site, jot down the question while it's fresh, and you'll rarely be stuck for something to say.
If social media keeps sliding down the list because the real work gets in the way, handing it over is part of the outsourced marketing support I provide for businesses across Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Suffolk. And if your last post really was a daffodil, you're far from the only one.
