Great content means nothing on the wrong platform.
Social media management systems such as Hootsuite are supposed to make handling social media easier. With the opportunity to schedule and share posts across Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and even LinkedIn, it sounds great.
A strong social media presence leads to brand awareness, strong customer relationships and an increase in traffic. Or does it?
Do it right, or don’t do it at all!
Can systems such as Hootsuite really cover all bases? Whether you’re sharing your latest content, a quick update or a news story, platforms receive them differently. You really can’t throw paint at the wall and hope it’ll stick, when you don’t pay attention to the timing and platform choice of your users.
Your audience may be used to checking Instagram in the evening while they pay attention to Facebook in the morning. So you need to run a few tests to gauge when they’re most active and where.
We’re all too familiar with Twitter’s character limit, so those lengthy Facebook posts do nothing for your audience there. While it’s tempting to post out the same message in the click of a few buttons, each network performs differently.
Social media management systems (or SMMS) such as Hootsuite can quickly create more chaos than conversions. Working with a digital marketing agency makes your social media a hell of a load easier. Save time tackling with Hootsuite and let us take care of things.
Let’s start by exploring the platforms themselves…
Facebook is a great place for conversation. You have more words to play with, so be conversational with your approach. It can be good to blend in with status updates in order to not appear like a pushy sales pitch with every post.
Since you don’t want to lose fans, don’t go bombarding your page with a flurry of posts in one go. That’ll simply turn your fans away when you flood their newsfeed. The less spam-like your posts the more likely users are to click through to read more.
With a 140 character limit, Twitter has always remained unique compared to other platforms. This limit means you need to be wise with your words. Repurpose your content by determining the best summary. Instead of tweeting the title of your content, pick out a relevant point or question to do with your topic.
If you need to tweet ten times to get the point across, you’re doing it wrong.
Instagram is all about images and videos. And hashtags. It is important to be a part of larger conversations on Instagram, by including both existing and unique hashtags. What do users naturally associate with your business? Combine new hashtags unique to your company with those used on Instagram daily to get the best of both worlds. From there, as your following grows you can encourage users to use your hashtags to find your content straight away.
LinkedIn is about networking and connecting with other businesses and colleagues. It’s all about creating connections with the aim of sharing content related to your industry. As a professional platform, it is imperative to approach LinkedIn in this way. It has a very different tone to one you may use on other platforms, with the encouragement of discussion over shares and likes.
What does a digital marketing agency do differently?
We eliminate the hassle of tailoring your content to every platform. While SMMS such as Hootsuite seem like a great idea, you’re probably doing more damage than good. By sharing the same content in the exact same manner you’re speaking to each batch of users as if they’re the same. Users don’t read the content in the same way, wasting your time and theirs.
The moral of the story…
If you’re posting the same thing out to all social accounts, you’re most likely doing it wrong! Social media is now a very important aspect of your online business, so do it right, or don’t do it all.
The right agency will assess your audience and suggest the right platforms and ways to share your content to improve audience engagement levels.
