Using social media to extend your influence to both customers and influencers sounds very overwhelming. And it can be if you don't have a strategy for boosting your blog posts. To help you get organized and add power to your posts, here are some suggestions to get you started.
1. Create a unique post for each social channel.
This idea sounds harder than it is. Since social channels are a way for you to reach out to people, you will be posting the same blog post link to each one. However, by creating a short snippet, 2 to 5 sentences, that is unique for each channel, you create original content for people to see. This way, you aren't just posting duplicate content on all of your channels. It is actually better to focus on two or three channels and do it right, than to spread yourself too thin and post streams of duplicate content.
2. Know your social channels.
Not every business will find prospects and customers on every social channel. It is important to do your homework and post on channels that have the demographic that you are looking for. And remember that social sites have changing demographics. For instance, when Facebook started out, it was populated by teens, but now the age range is much wider.
3. Post during optimal times.
Each social channel has optimal posting frequencies and times to post. Familiarize your channels to discover when is the best time to maximize your posts and post regularly during those times. Posting too often is as bad as not posting enough. Too many posts will be considered spam by your audience.
4. Include a CTA in your posts.
A CTA or call-to-action is exactly what it says. It calls your audience to take a specific action. It can be as simple as "bookmark this post for later" or "download our coupon." Tell your audience what to do and many of them will take the action. In most cases, social channels will ask for readers to click to a post or interact by entering to win a drawing.
5. Have real conversations.
Use social media sites to have conversations. Each site lends itself to different types of conversations. Twitter is great for a quick back and forth, while Facebook gives you more room to write. Having real conversations with people turns a channel truly social and gives you a chance to connect with actual people instead of just spewing out posts.
6. Customize for each platform.
This idea can be as simple as creating different-sized media for each channel. You can take the same image and crop it differently to post to Pinterest, Instagram and Twitter, for instance. It takes very little time, but has a much bigger impact on each channel.
7. Use powerful and keyword-rich headlines.
Headlines are for grabbing attention and you have only a few characters to do it. Use your headline to grab attention by using strong assertive language and filling it with keywords that your audience is interested in.
8. Take the extra step to stretch your message.
While you can use only free social media channels, sometimes you need the influence that paid social media can get you. There are numerous ways you can extend your reach by paying a fee. It is worth your while to experiment with paid channels to see how much more your message is disseminated. You will have to research which paid channels will work best for your brand.
