Social media, no doubt, is one of the most valuable tools for promoting blog content. But with innumerable posts on social media sites coming up every minute, it’s no easy job for audience to locate your content, leave aside reading it. However, there are two schools of thoughts that throw some light on this debacle.
The first one emphasizes on the fact that since internet is an entity where relationship counts, you need to give something to get something. In other words, “to be more effective at promoting your content, you first need to become more effective at promoting other people’s content. It means that you ‘need to be involved in getting familiar with people that includes other bloggers, business owners, subscribers, Twitter and Facebook, as also Pinterest connections’. The protagonists of this theory believe that ‘when you build that familiarity or relationship and when you share, promote and comment on other people’s work in a way that seems valuable to them, they will reciprocate in similar fashion.
However, the other group has hit upon a more direct approach by way of providing tips to optimize your blog content for social media that are listed below for your benefit. To begin with, you need to follow a code that specifies 80 / 20 ratio, where 80% of your content on social media will be informative and entertaining, while 20% will dwell on business promotions, events and updates. The protagonists of this theory believe that when you share informative content which is entertaining too, the viewers will become more interested in engaging with your trade-related posts. However, it is easier said than done for the simple reason that creating 20 percent of trade related content is breeze (as these mostly consist of product details, etc), but turning those 80 percent into informative and entertaining could pose a problem for many. Nevertheless, as mentioned earlier, there are tips to turn your content into something very good for social media as also providing help in ‘effective Social Media marketing strategy’. Here are the tips.
First of All, Try to Fathom Your Target Audience
Before deciding on your blog content, it is imperative that you know about your target audience, as otherwise the whole thing will simply turn into a hocus pocus, benefitting none. You should, therefore, select a few questions, such as those provided below and await their response before starting your blog
- What questions your prospective customers are likely to ask about your industry or trade?
- Topic of interest your prospective customers are likely to share amongst them?
- Issues that your prospective customers may raise and how you are likely to resolve those?
Needless to say, the answers to these questions will empower you to create relevant informative content that will engage your audience to go through your content.
Create Enticing Titles
Create captivating titles to attract visitors. Remember, website visitors are a fretful lot who are mostly headline readers. Unless you can make the headline or the title unique and eye-catching, you will lose the battle. But that does not mean you will use memorable lengthy lines as titles. Keep in mind the old adage that says topic titles should be like a lady’s skirt; as short as to evoke interest.Incidentally, some social media websites including Twitter limit the number of characters that can be used in a post.
Impart Life to Your Content With The Aid of Graphics, Images and Video
Studies reveal that blog posts with images attract as much as 94% more viewers as compared to those that lack that quality. But bear in mind that the images or videos must be relevant to the topic. A blog describing the benefits of using automobile seat covers should not have candy bar photos.
Include Enticing Meta-descriptions
When sharing a blog post on social media sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Google Plus, some description of the post automatically comes out. Sites usually generate this (description) from the URL’s meta description. Despite the fact that these meta-descriptions are no more considered important in search engine optimization, they, nevertheless, prove quite helpful for social media optimization and so should be encouraged.
Do Not Neglect Social Sharing Buttons
According to studies conducted by BrightEdge Technologies, it has been found that ‘sites that include social sharing buttons generate 7x more mentions, as compared to those that do not include these buttons’. Also, if you add social sharing buttons for sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+, it will encourage your website visitors to share your content in social media. You can add these buttons to every landing page, blog article, web page, and other piece of content that you create.
Include Purposeful Quotes Within the Content
Whenever you think of delivering any purposeful or interesting statement, you can make it easy for the readers to share the quote by offering a click-to-tweet link. This is considered to be one of the finest ways to optimize a blog post. Since this does not involve much efforts on part of the audience, while it immediately draws attention to the sharing option, viewers will become more prone towards tweeting your post.
Institute a Call-to-Action
Believe it or not, this is one of the surest ways of raising exposure of blog content on social media. Even though there is no bar on asking people to share your content; but instead of bluntly babbling “Please share my post”, it is far better to connect with your viewers and make them share your blog post by way of focusing on how they have enjoyed reading your content.
Unroll Customer Quotes
Social media networks, needless to say, are not only very popular social structures that are made up of a set of individuals (or organizations) but are also considered as one of the highest forums for word-of-mouth recommendations. Therefore, when you are receiving encouraging customer feedback via online review sites, email or in some rare cases in person, too, you can jolly well highlight those commentaries on social media whenever you may feel like. In addition, you can munch upon accolades and ‘thank you messages’ you have received from various sources that include individuals and business owners alike.
Bottom Line
Social media is a labyrinthine social platform where opportunities for successful social media marketing through content are simply enormous. However, if you intend to enhance social media optimization of your content, there are two ways of doing it. You may either follow the route described above or hire an experienced social media expert to do the job efficiently. The choice is yours!