Social Media Archives - Do This Not That Marketing

February 28, 2017 by RonTester 2 Comments

Creating Content for Social Media

One of the types of content that you need to create in your content marketing endeavors is social media content. Social media content is any content that you will use for purposes of promoting on social media. It might be a blurb that goes with a link to a video or blog post, or it might be an infographic or meme to help you get a point or two across. Creating content for social media is an important part of every business’s marketing strategy.

* Plan Ahead – Most people seem to totally forget to plan ahead regarding social media content. This is a mistake. If you create a blog post, for example, then you should create a tweet, a Facebook post, and other blurbs for whatever social media network that you plan to share the information on. I use PromoRepublic as one source of ideas, then post ideas on my calendar.

* Add the Content to Your Calendar – Include social media content on your editorial calendar. If you know that in August you’re going to promote a great new product or service, then you should also be planning for social media content to use in that promotion — both leading up to the launch and during the launch.

* Create Images for Social Media – Remember that images are a form of content, and that you need to create images for social media sharing. Images are more likely to be shared than text and are an important part of your marketing actions on social media. Using a variety of images as content, like infographics and memes, will increase shares and engagement. For images you can use for free (personal and commercial), I use Pixabay.com. If they don’t have what I’m looking for, I use a stock photo site such as DepositPhotos.com. Please be very careful not to use any image without explicit permission. If you copy and paste an image from another website, it could end up costing you thousands of dollars in legal fees. There are unscrupulous lawyers that make a living suing bloggers and small business people for unauthorized use of photos/images.

* Outsource It – You can use your content calendar to get help creating social media content with experts. These experts can help you create infographics, memes and a with a copywriting expert they can also help you craft just the right words to use for a blurb supporting your other promotions, products and services. I have an awesome virtual assistant that I found on Upwork.com. She does a great job and gives me tremendous peace of mind.

* Share More Than Once – It’s important that you promote the content that you create and that you do it more than once. People do not check their entire social media stream, so sharing the same content with new blurbs and a new spin on the information several times will increase the view rate exponentially. This is something I’m working on. I am sharing on Twitter and Facebook pretty regularly, not so often on LinkedIn, and I rarely reshare content.

* Conduct A/B Testing – Also called split testing, you want to see what times, headlines, and topics get more attention than others. As you collect this data, you’ll soon know exactly what time is best to share any updates with your social media followers. This is something I am reading more and more about but honestly haven’t been doing that much of. Perhaps when I have more time or get more sophisticated in my testing.

* Target Each Audience – Each social media network has its own personality, and the portion of your audience that follows you and engages with you on each network is usually slightly different. Therefore, it’s important to ensure that the content you create is right for that network.

* Create Content Often – With social media you need to have content for most days of the week, and share it more than once per day. This can seem like a lot of content to create, but it all stems from the basic message you want to get across to your audience based on your promotions. I was inspired to post more by Grant Cardone, the sales trainer and author who wrote The 10X Rule. He’s a social media machine, posting a dozen times a day or more. I don’t feel like going there, but I did realize I needed to step it up.

Creating content for social media will be a large part of your content creation program. It will help ensure that the products, services and information that you need to communicate to your audience gets the attention it needs. While you’re busy creating all of this content, be sure to listen to your audience and see what they’re saying. Are they asking questions you can answer? Is there confusion in your market you can help to clarify? More good reasons to post!

April 30, 2016 by RonTester Leave a Comment

What Should a Business Share on Social Media?

Questions You Should Ask Before You Post

When deciding what your business should share on different social media platforms, it’s important to take into consideration the mood of the social media network as well as your audience. I was on LinkedIn yesterday and someone had posted a picture of a cat doing something forgettable (I honestly can’t remember what the cat was up to). I didn’t mind, but I thought it was an odd status update for LinkedIn, and there was a flurry of comments encouraging the poster to save the cat pictures for Facebook, Instagram, etc.

The standards for email copy, website copy, and social media copy are different and there are things you should think about before you write the copy. Not only that, you don’t always want to put the same copy up everywhere. While some overlap is common and appropriate, you also want to keep your copy specific, innovative and fresh. So before you go posting, here are some questions to consider.

What Platform Rules Exist? – Each platform has its own rules that you should keep in mind before you create the copy for that medium.

Should Your Content Be Short or Long? – Some social media platforms require different lengths of content. As you know, with Twitter, you only have 140 characters to get your point across. And if you want your tweet to be retweetable, it’s best to make them shorter than 140. With Facebook you have a bit more space, as with others. Remember, though, that if you write too much on Facebook you will end up with the dreaded ellipse (… more) and you will lose a good percentage of the readers who won’t bother clicking to get the rest of your brilliant post. On your blog you technically have unlimited space. So consider which social media you’re writing for before you write the copy.

Which Subset of Your Audience Is Here? – Every person who is a member of your target audience does not have access to you via every single social media network. Some will be on Twitter, some on Pinterest and some will only want to read your blog. It’s up to them, and something you should think about. You can study which subset of your audience is following you on each social media network so you can focus the copy more toward them. Also, I strongly encourage you to try to entice people back to your blog. That’s where people will really get to know more about you, have a chance to sign up for your stuff (although they can do this with Facebook, LinkedIn, you don’t control those platforms so you want to bring them back to your website whenever possible).

Is the Platform Buttoned-Up (Liked LinkedIn) or More Free Like Twitter? – Some platforms are more serious and professional. That means that sharing that picture of the cat hung up in the blinds might not be a good idea on LinkedIn, whereas sharing it on Facebook might be fine if you can relate it somehow to your business. On the other hand, your business needs to maintain its identity wherever you post. I think about it like this: you are you whether you show up at a picnic in Bermuda shorts or at a wedding in a tuxedo. You don’t change your identity just because you change how you present yourself. Same with your business and your social media presence.

Should You Use #Hashtags? – I used to see them only on Twitter, but now I see them on Facebook, Instagram, etc. I think one or two well-chosen hashtags can be really helpful, conveying the essence of your post. But if your post ends with #LoveThis #MeanIt #CouldNotLiveWithoutIt #WishIHadMore #CanYouBelieveILiveThisLife #WishMyDaddyWereHere #Heaven then, unless you are trying to be funny/ironic, you aren’t being selective or creative enough. Even if you are trying to be funny/ironic, remember that some of your audience won’t “get it” and/or won’t think you’re funny. Your teenagers might get away with that but your business posts should probably be more focused.

Is the Platform Visually Based? – Yes, it’s true that Twitter is trying to be more visual, as is Facebook. But, Pinterest, Instagram, and Snapchat still lead the charge on being visual. Those three platforms would not do well with just a text-based update. You should consider that prior to creating the content. Also, if you have something you want to say within a graphic, I recommend Canva.com on your computer or WordSwag on your iPhone. Canva is free and WordSwag is cheap. Both will help tremendously if you’re going to up your visual game.

What Is Your Objective? – What is the point of your update or share? Do you know what you are hoping to achieve? Do you have a well thought out, specific, numbers-driven objective in which you can measure results? Even if it’s not a specific, numbers-driven objective, your posts should still fit strategically with what you want to accomplish.

What Kind of Call to Action Should You Include? – You should always include a CTA (Call to Action), but how you do it on each social media network is what’s important. I think it’s great to post CTA’s like, “Like us on Facebook” or “Check out our website and subscribe to our newsletter for more helpful information.” Just as important to consider, what type of CTA would tick off your audience, or would get you kicked out of the social media network? Avoid those. I had a business post a spammy ad for cheap sunglasses to my Facebook wall and when I tried to delete the post, Facebook said they were having technical trouble and couldn’t delete it then. I will NEVER EVER do business with anyone who does something spammy to me on social media. And you should never ever do something spammy, either. The downside risk just isn’t worth it.

Is Your Copy Sharable? – A really important factor for social media copy is whether or not it’s shareable. Shorter, visually oriented, relatable content is better to post on social media when you want it to be shared. Remember that if you’ve posted a 3 minute video on Facebook, almost no one will endure to the end and relatively few will want to share. Even if you post “wait for it…” if I have to wait more than a few seconds I’m out. Do me and your audience a favor and edit yourself so we get the biggest payoff for our limited time and attention. Otherwise, it’s easy to be forgettable like 99.9% of the posters out there.

Creating copy for social media is different from writing keyword-rich articles, just like writing Twitter posts is different from writing keyword-rich articles. As you create your content strategy, think and post carefully to make sure you give your business its greatest chance at success.

Thought experiment: without going back to Facebook now, think about the stuff you’ve seen/read/consumed in the past 24 hours. Which businesses do you remember seeing? What did they say or what value did they bring? What about Twitter? What business posts do you remember? Why do you remember them? Did you follow any of them back to the company’s website? Why?

Here’s what I remember: On Facebook, someone shared a video from Business Insider of Tony Robbins talking about how to break through a plateau. I liked it and shared it. On Reddit, someone shared a clip from a TED Talk about monkeys not receiving equal pay for equal work. It was interesting and funny and I shared it. On LinkedIn Charles Duhigg shared a short video talking about 5 ways to be more productive/get stuff done. I liked it and shared it. I don’t remember anything from Instagram or Twitter that I liked so much I shared it.

Here’s my point: everyone is different and your business’ audience is unique to you. Consider the platform, consider your audience, and consider how you want to present your business to the world and what you want to accomplish with your posts. If you do that, you’re much more likely to achieve what you really want when you post to social media.

If you need help thinking through your social media strategy, email me.