Social media has been providing entrepreneurs and SME’s a great way to establish an online presence and reach out to their target audience directly and in real-time. However with so much information overload on the customers already, businesses often find themselves scrambling for attention, let alone spurring some level of engagement through their social media updates.
Being a social media enthusiast myself and having spent years dealing with the good and sometimes not so good aspects of this powerful digital marketing arsenal, I think it’s always nice to go back to the basics once in a while and make sure that you have considered everything before you hit the publish button.
Just as important as it is for your business to go through a regular content strategy health-check, it’s equally important to get your social media strategy right! Take a look at the checklist below and tick off each one as you craft your next social media update.
1. Is the Message Adding Value?
Your company’s content strategy and social media strategy overlap on several major frontiers. Content that’s not interesting cannot make an interesting update. Interesting content for your audience could be educational –provides solutions to problems, or entertaining!
Ask yourself: will anyone even care about reading this? If that post appeared in your timeline, will you pause to read it or share? If the answer is no, don’t post!
2. Limit the Size of the Update!
Every piece of content you create should be just as long as it takes to convey the message and no longer than that! Twitter allows you to limit your posts to 140 characters so you need to be really creative with that.
Google allows for 100,000 characters, LinkedIn, 600, while for Facebook the character limit is 64,206. However, According to research the shorter a post is the more chances it has of catching attention and getting people to read.
Ideally, 70-100 characters for Twitter, 40 for Facebook and 60 for Google+.
3. Check and Recheck the URL!
Sure you are linking your update to your website in order to entice readers into taking some action, but wait; is that URL correct? By correct I mean two things. One: make sure it’s working and two: Ask yourself if it makes sense when stringed together with the update.
What can make things even worse than a bad or inappropriate URL, is a deceptive URL that promises to take the reader to a great post but instead lands them on a sales page. It’s always a good idea to click on the URL and see where it takes you before posting it.
4. Does the Post Have the Right Keywords?
Keywords and hashtags ensure your post gets the kind of exposure you are looking for. If you know your niche and your target audience, you probably also know what kind of things they are interested in. Try using keywords and hashtags with respect to their interests as well as your business offerings. This way your post will get found easily and will make more sense to your audience.
5. Don’t Forget to Spell Check!
Spelling mistakes bite and they bite us often. In fact they are the lamest of all blunders that happen online. Make sure your content has gone through a good spell-check software before hitting the post button below your update.
6. Does the Update has Visual Appeal
Words matter, but not as much as visuals. Visuals have the power to grab the viewers’ attention within seconds and convince them to listen. If it makes sense adding visuals, do so in an intuitive way. Using images is one of the top tactics to make your post appeal to your target audience.
Try testing this theory by using the same post with and without an image and check the analytics. You won’t be disappointed!
7. Set the Posting Frequency Right!
The right and wrong for this varies from business to business. However, businesses must learn to strike the right balance between being informative and being annoying. The best way of doing it is to predict, measure and repeat what worked, as suggested by Dan Wilkerson of LunaMetrics.
Researchers have found that the optimal frequency of per day posting is: Facebook: 2, Twitter: 3-5, Google+: 2 and LinkedIn: 1.
8. Are You Ready to Take Responsibility for it?
Every post doesn’t result in sweets and flowers! Sometimes what you post can backfire. Especially so when your business does not have a clearly laid out set of guidelines on social media policy, and while you have checked your post for all of the above mentioned criteria, the voice of your update might still be sending out a wrong signal about your brand.
Once the post goes viral, there’s very little you can do to stop the damage.
9. Is Your Business making the Most of the Posting Opportunity?
Finally, ask yourself if there is anything you can add or remove from the post to make it more impactful! Each post gives you a new opportunity to portray your business in the best possible light, solve a problem for your customers, and get more people talking about your brand.
Going through the above mentioned checklist will ensure maximum quality of each post that goes out resulting in higher engagement and stronger reputation for your brand.
Still not sure how to craft your posts for your target audience? With our decade long experience as digital marketing experts we can help your business effectively manage its social media presence across all major platforms.
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About solomoIT
SolomoIT is a boutique digital marketing agency based in Melbourne and Sydney since 2004. Our clients benefit from our years of experience in Digital Marketing. Our strategies are flexible and adaptable and we make sure our clients get the right message in front of the target audience with our expert guidance and holistic approach.
Are you ready to take your business to the digital era and “Think Digital”? Give us a call on 1300 430 949 or +613 8630 2810 for a consultation and we can help you take your business to the next level!