Yes, your brand should be taking risks on social media.

In the world of marketing and advertising, social media is still a new frontier and it's quickly becoming it's own thing inside of the marketing umbrella. No longer is a marketing position tasked with social media. Now the person handling social media is expected to actually be an expert in social media. That's a good thing because social media is massive with many variables to consider. Those variables make it a highly customizable form of marketing and allow results to be very different from brand to brand.

To succeed in social media, your brand must experiment. All the data and latest trends in the world isn't going to tell you what YOUR audience prefers. The only way to find that out it so experiment with new ideas and then analyze the results. The more you experiment the more calculated you can be based on the results of previous experiments.

Take risks-- no such thing as bad publicity really

That means you have to be willing to take risks. Calculated risks, but risks all the same. If you're always playing it safe you'll never disrupt the noise of a newsfeed or stand out. Risks can be scary but they pay off. Even if the result of taking a risk isn't what you wanted, there will still be valuable analysis to gain from it.

Try new approaches and tools, see how it goes--don't be afraid to be a pioneer!

Try new things! Don't stress because no one else is doing something yet, don't be afraid to pioneer! A great way to disrupt the noise is to be one of the first to do something. All eyes will be on your brand for it. Play with new features of a social platform, try out new tools to improve content. Go with a new approach. Plenty of brands have completely revamped their social media presence by trying something new and different. Like Wendy's and their all sass all the time commentary. Some people love it, a few dislike it, but it has certainly caused more people to pay attention to them.

Calculated risks are a good thing. They offer an opportunity for your brand to be wildly successful and learn a lot more about your audience in the process. Need help calculating social media risks for your brand? Click here.