Two conversations come up almost weekly. One: "we have social media but it brings nothing". The other: "we never post, are we losing customers?". Both start from the same misunderstanding: expecting social media for local businesses to do what Google does. It is not the same job nor the same moment in the customer's head, and confusing them costs money and grief.
What it actually does
In a local business, social media is rarely where somebody discovers you with intent to buy. That is the search engine: whoever needs a locksmith at eleven at night does not open Instagram, they type into Google. We cover it in why your website doesn't appear on Google.
What it does do, and it is not trivial:
- Confirm you exist and are still open. Plenty of people who already saw you on the map open your profile to check somebody is behind it. A profile whose last post is eight months old says what it says.
- Show finished work. It is what convinces most in trades where the result is visible: building work, hairdressing, workshops, kitchens, gardening.
- Win the comparison. When somebody hesitates between two similar businesses, the one showing how it works starts ahead.
- Keep the relationship with past customers, who are the cheapest people to sell to.
What it does not do: replace your Google listing, or bring a wave of customers because one video did numbers. Followers do not pay wages.
Which network, depending on your trade
It rules anything visual: hospitality, beauty, fashion, interiors, before-and-after work. It is decided in the first second, vertical and without sound. The platform itself has an official guide for businesses covering the basics of a professional account, worth reading before posting for the sake of posting.
If you sell to other companies —software, advisory, industry, technical services— that is where the decision-makers are. The first line gets read and that is where someone decides whether to expand the post. A company page takes minutes to set up and LinkedIn explains how.
Still king in many towns and neighbourhoods, mostly through local groups and an over-forty audience that uses it daily. For notices, special hours and everyday business news it works better than its reputation suggests.
Practical rule: two networks done well beat four done halfway. And the choice depends on where your customer is, not where you feel comfortable.
What to post when you are not a fashion brand
This is where nearly everyone gets stuck, and the answer is in your phone: what people ask you every week. How much, how long, whether they need an appointment, the difference between two materials, what happens if it rains on installation day.
Four types of post that work for service businesses:
- The finished job, with one line of context: what the customer needed and how it was solved.
- The mistake you see every week and how to avoid it. Showing judgement sells better than showing prices.
- Who is behind it: faces, names, the daily routine. People hire people.
- The practical stuff: August hours, changes, a note that this month the diary has room.
And one idea serves several networks, but not copied and pasted: the same story becomes a short video on Instagram and four lines with a direct link on LinkedIn.
One profile, two jobs
It helps to separate what the profile does before someone contacts you and what it does after. Before, it is a shop window: the last five posts and the pinned ones are what a stranger scrolls through in fifteen seconds, so they should show work, faces and prices or ranges rather than motivational quotes. After, it is a channel: messages arrive, questions get asked and a booking link gets tapped, which means somebody has to be responsible for answering within the day.
Most profiles we review do the first job badly and the second one not at all. Fixing the order —window first, channel second— is usually cheaper than producing more content, and it is the part a business can do on its own in an afternoon.
Consistency is half the result
The most repeated pattern: three intense weeks and then two blank months. That is worse than posting little but steadily, because a stalled profile creates doubt exactly when somebody is deciding.
A realistic cadence for a small business is one post a week that goes out no matter what, plus day-to-day stories when you feel like it. Written into a calendar, not kept in your head. If it depends on someone having a free afternoon, it will not happen.
Want to know what it would cost you?
We reply the same day. No commitment, no sales pitch.
The numbers that actually say something
Followers are the easiest metric to look at and the least decisive. What we review monthly is different:
- Messages received and how many turn into customers.
- Clicks on the profile link and visits reaching the website from social.
- Saves and shares, which tell you whether the content is genuinely useful.
- Which post brought what, so you repeat what works and drop what does not.
That decides the following month. It is the same logic as in how much digital marketing costs per month: without numbers, any spend gets defended with feelings.
Mistakes we see daily
- Posting only promotions. A profile that only sells gets tuned out.
- The same text on all three networks, with Instagram hashtags smuggled into LinkedIn.
- Not answering messages. If the channel is open it has to be staffed; if not, close it and make the phone number obvious.
- The account in your nephew's name because he created it. Access belongs to the business, with two-factor and several admins. The account-security side is well explained in INCIBE's material for companies.
Should I put everything into Google instead?
If you had to pick one thing and your business depends on being found when somebody has a need, start with your Google listing and your website. It is what we tell clients when the budget is tight, and it is all in our guide to the Google Business Profile.
Social media comes after, and it works better once there is something to show and somebody to answer. Doing both at once is fine; starting with social while the listing sits abandoned, almost never.
What it costs to have them run
Our prices are published. Social media management sits in the advanced plan at €1,500 a month, which also includes content, Google listing, reviews and campaigns. The €400 and €750 plans include content and the listing, which is where we usually recommend starting.
All excluding VAT, no lock-in and with migration included. If you would rather run them yourself, that is a fair choice: what matters is that somebody owns the task and that it goes out every week.
We work from Palamós with businesses in Girona and Barcelona
Our office is in Palamós. The plan, the copy, the production and the monthly review all work remotely; being on site makes sense the day we film and photograph at your premises, which is where the material people actually share comes from.
Where to start this week
Open your profile and look at the date of the last post. Then check the messages: how many are unanswered and how old they are. Those two answers already tell you whether the problem is content or attention.
Message us on WhatsApp with your business name and we will tell you, without a sales pitch, whether investing in social makes sense right now or whether your money works harder elsewhere. Same day, no strings attached.
Tell us what you need and we'll give you a price
We reply the same day. No commitment, no sales pitch.