The marketing potential of social media is not as some kind of hyper targeting tool that you can use to advertise your products/services to consumers. Rather, the value of social media lies in how it can help brands and affiliates build trust and a reputation with their target market. And that trust, in turn, can not only help you gain added customers, but actually retain them. After all, when a consumer feels like they have a relationship with your or your brand, they are that much more likely to become a loyal customer.

That being said, when many marketers first wade into social media, they can often make. Here's an overview of 5 common social media mistakes:

1. Trying to dictate the conversation: trying to censor the conversation will rob your communications of the authenticity that makes social media so powerful. Besides, it's not very social when you talk at people.
2. Putting on a false front: outright lying to consumers can backfire spectacularly. Just imagine if one day you found out your best friend was never who they said they were. Would you ever trust them again?
3. Failing to prepare for the flood of customer communications: once you get a conversation going with consumers, you need to take responsibility for answering queries, addressing complaints and updating content. You can't engage consumer and then just give them the silent treatment.
4. Mistaking social networking for traditional advertising or corporate comms: social networking is about forging connections, creating credibility and building relationships rather than hard-selling, so injecting some personality into your communications will help you seem more inviting and engaging.
5. Thinking that they'll come if you build it: you need to put some effort into marketing your social networking presences, and even more importantly, you need to give people a reason to want to engage with you..

The original post, of course, goes into more detail on each of these. But suffice it to say that social media marketing is similar to many other acquisition channels in that it is not a get-rich-quick, overnight-conversion scheme. Rather, it's something that takes time and planning to do correctly.

The return social media marketing, however, can be many times greater than the investment. After all, not only will make back your time and effort in conversions over time, but you will also gain the trust and respect of consumers, which will help you retain them.