INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL MEDIA By Aaron Hopkins-Johnson
Published 2017 © Fasturtle Digital www.fasturtle.com Phoenix, AZ United States of America
CONTENTS
What is So-Shell? 5
Chapter I: Social Media Setup 6 Measuring Success on Social Media 6 Step 1: Define Goals 6 Step 2: Check Your Engine 7 Step 3: Create A Baseline 7 Step 4: Create A Road Map 7 Step 5: Pump Your Brakes 7 Step 6: Keep Going! 8 Setting Up Your Presence 8 Google + 8 Choose an Accessible Gmail Account 8 Create a Page with the Desired Account 8 Customize Your Public Profile 9 Facebook 9 Twitter 9 LinkedIn 10 Instagram 11
Chapter II: Developing Voice 12
Chapter III: Tricks for Saving Time 16 Use Stock Photos 16 Paid Stock Photos 16 Shutterstock 16 Free Stock Photos 17 Pexels 17 Pixabay 17 Google (Free Usage) 18 Post at the Best Times 19 Facebook 19 Twitter 19 Pinterest 19 LinkedIn 20 Contact Current Customers 20 Use a Management Tool 20 Hootsuite 20 Sprout Social 20 Fasturtle’s So Shell 20 Deciding What Is Best For Your Business 21 Use Fasturtle 21 Additional Resources 21 Snapchat 21
Chapter IV: Grow Your Audience 23 Active Listening 23 Mentions 23 Aligning Voice with Trends 24 Hashtags 24 Hashtag Do’s 25 Be Specific 25 Use The Recommended Number of Hashtag Per Channel 25 Invent Hashtags 25 Brand Hashtags 26 Hashtag Don’t 26 Don’t go too long or too clever 26 Don’t have more hashtags than words 27 Holidays 27 Responding to Reviews 28 Good Reviews 28 How to respond to a positive review (4 steps) 28 Negative Reviews 29 How to respond to a negative review (4 Steps) 29 Using Optimized Photo Sizes 30 Facebook 30 Twitter 31 Instagram 32 LinkedIn 32 Pinterest 33 Google + 34 Sharing Industry Information (Thought Leadership) 35 Build Reputation 35 Work With Influencers 35 Network 36 Get Published 36 Drive Ahead 36 Using Live Video 37 Facebook Live 37 Snapchat 37 Instagram 38 15 Live Video Tips 39 1. Don’t Use it Just Because It’s There 39 2. Have a Clear Purpose 39 3. Think of Live as Part of the Marketing Whole 39 4. Approach Live Like You’re Throwing a Party 39 6. Go With the Flow and Experiment 40 7. Brace for the Worst, Hope for the Best 40 8. Don’t be a Me Monster 40 10. Harness the News Feed 40 11. Choose Your Audience Wisely 41 13. Consistency Matters 41
Chapter V: Reports and Insights 42 Key Performance Indicators 42 Brand Awareness 42 Audience Size 42 Engagement Percentage 43 Reach 43 Direct Traffic 43 What Is a Conversion? 43 Clicks 43 Leads 44 Online Sales 44 In- Store Visit 44 Peak Times 44 Core Demographics 44
Chapter VI: Optimization 45 Choosing Medium 45 Facebook / Instagram 45 Twitter 46 LinkedIn 47 Pinterest 48 Snapchat 48 Perfecting Headlines 49 Strong Links 49 Free Backlink Sources 50 Unique Backlinks Sources 50 1) Google+ Profiles (PR: 9) 50 2) SlideShare (PR: 8) 50 3) Dailymotion (PR: 8) 50 4) Dribbble (PR: 7) 51 5) Academia.edu (PR: 8) 51 Social & Media Sources 51 6) Reddit (PR: 8) 51 7) Digg (PR: 7) 51 8) Imgur (PR: 6) 51 9) Flickr (PR: 9) 51 10) DeviantArt (PR: 7) 51 Free Blog Sources 52 11) WordPress.com 52 12) BlogSpot 52 13) Tumblr 52 14) Weebly 52 15) Wix 52 Community & Forums Sources 52 16) Quora (PR: 7) 52 17) WordPress Support Forum (PR: 9) 52 18) Apple Support (PR: 8) 52 19) Microsoft Answers (PR: 8) 53 20) Stack Overflow (PR: 7) 53 Deciding Paid Budget 53 Expanding Reach 53
Thank You From Fasturtle 54
Content Calendar 54 January 55 February 55 March 56 April 57 May 57 June 58 July 59 August 59 September 60 October 60 November 61
What is So-Shell?
This ebook is intended to be a comprehensive update on social media channels and the best practices brands should follow in order to strengthen brand, engage potential customers, improve sentiment and drive action. If your time is better spent on developing product, managing your team, search engine optimization or spending more time with your family - then stop right here. Fasturtle already has a solution for you.
For $595/mo, all the information detailed in the rest of this book will be managed for you by a social media marketing expert. Touch HERE to get started today!
If you are someone that enjoys education in all aspects of your business, please read on! We are going to cover the steps on how to set up each social media channel, how to develop your voice, tricks to speed up your content creation, best practices for growing your presence, analyzing reports, and optimizing performance.
Chapter I: Social Media Setup
Before you set up your social media channels for your business, it is important to create realistic goals and expectations. Measuring Success on Social Media
It’s undeniable. Social media has taken over the world. You see it daily in your interactions with family, friends, and coworkers. As an organization, it’s no secret that you will probably want to be on social media — these days, most people are. Social media has the potential to provide many assets to a team including elevating your organization’s mission, establishing relationships with existing partners, and forging new relationships with target audiences. But, how do you know what’s right for you? How do you know the time and effort you’ve invested in Facebook, Twitter and other mediums are gaining traction? If you’re not sure whether social media is helping your company achieve its goals, you’re not alone. The benefits of social media may not be immediately apparent. Thankfully, we’re here to help. Follow this step-by-step guide to get started:
Step 1: Define Goals
To gauge success, you need the right metrics. What are your organization’s primary goals? These will determine the metrics on which you should be focusing. Common goals we see with non profits:
● Attract website visitors → # of followers and referrals (clicks to your website) ● Grow mailing list → Referrals and conversions (email opt-ins) ● Get donations → Referrals and conversions (donations) ● Strengthen brand → # of followers and engagements (Likes, Shares Retweets, Favorites and replies)
You might be thinking, “I want all of those things!” That’s okay, but it’s best to focus on one or two goals, and be absolutely certain that you have the right tools to measure them. ● # followers / Fans Facebook Twitter Other Platforms ● # engagements per post (average) ● # referral visits to your website each month ● # conversions each month (donations or email opt-ins)
Step 2: Check Your Engine
To build and maintain a successful social media presence, you need to make sure you have the resources to dedicate to it. Think about the following points when you’re planning your social media efforts: ● People: Who within your organization can manage your social media accounts? Will you need to hire outside help to achieve your goals? ● Time: How much time do you or other members of your team have to dedicate to your social media each week? ● Budget: How much money do you have to spend on social media?
Step 3: Create A Baseline
Think about your audience. Who is going to carry your message? Who are you trying to reach with social media? For example, are you trying to reach students age 18-25 for an education initiative, or are you looking to reach another group entirely? Once you have an audience in mind, it’s time to create a baseline. There are many great you can use to measure social media success, but at the very least, open up a spreadsheet and write down: This way, you’ll know if your efforts going forward are having a positive impact on your metrics. If you don’t already have this information recorded, this is a crucial step. Don’t skip it!
Step 4: Create A Road Map
Social media, by nature, is somewhat spontaneous, but having a plan is still very necessary. It’s worth spending time to create a content marketing plan. This can be a simple spreadsheet in which you outline the posts you will publish to each platform on a weekly basis. Be specific. Plan ahead. The more detailed, the better. Here’s an example: You can focus on different topics throughout the year, but make sure to be consistent. Ask yourself: What content will be relevant to my audience? Regardless of topic, reminding your audience what you find to be truly important to promote isn’t a bad thing (Think: #tbt, ICYMI).
Step 5: Pump Your Brakes
Remember your baseline metrics? Each month, compare those to your most recent numbers to see if you’re making progress toward your goals. If you find a downtrend, don’t panic. Be sure to highlight what worked and what did not perform as expected. Social media is an ever-evolving process. Altering your strategy to fit your campaign goals is a necessity. One thing to remember: Find what works and do more of it.
Step 6: Keep Going!
It’s easy to get burnt out or to get off track with your publishing schedule and content plan. But if you stick with it month after month, you will see results. The best part about social media is that growth tends to be exponential. The more followers you have, the more you will get. It can feel overwhelming, but once you hit a critical mass, social media is a fast, flat, and fun part of your organization’s success.
Setting Up Your Presence
Google + With a network of more than 40 million members, Google+ is indeed deserving of your marketing attention, so smart marketers should set up their Google+ Pages as soon as possible. But don't worry -- it's simple! Here are 5 easy steps to create a Google+ Page for your business.
Choose an Accessible Gmail Account
● If we learned anything from creating our own account, it's that Google+ Pages' administrative capabilities could use improvement. Avoid creating your business page through just any old account, such as a personal gmail account. Instead, choose a gmail account that is accessible to multiple members of your marketing team (e.g. [email protected]), and use that account to create your page. Because Google+ Pages' administrative capabilities currently don't seem to be as sophisticated as Facebook's (which enable you to assign multiple page admins regardless of the page's origins), you'll want to choose a host account that makes your page as accessible to multiple contributors as possible.
Create a Page with the Desired Account
● Visit http://plus.google.com/pages/create, and if you see the option to create a Google+ Page, get started! Follow the wizard (it's much like Facebook's Page wizard), and choose the most appropriate option to classify your business. You'll be able to select from the following options: ○ Local Business or Place ○ Product or Brand ○ Company, Institution or Organization ○ Arts, Entertainment or Sports ○ Other ● After selecting your classification, fill in your basic information, including your page name (i.e. your company name), your business' website URL, your category (i.e. your industry), and the classification of your page's content (i.e. any Google+ user, 18 years of age or older, etc.).
Customize Your Public Profile
● The third step involves customizing your public profile. The profile basics include your tagline (think of it as your business' elevator pitch) and an image (your company logo is a great option).
Pages are for businesses, brands, organizations and public figures to share their stories and connect with people. Like profiles, Pages can be customized with stories, events and more. People who like a Page can get updates in News Feed.
To create a Page:
● Go to facebook.com/pages/create ● Click to choose a Page category ● Select a more specific category from the dropdown menu and fill out the required information ● Click Get Started and follow the on-screen instructions Note: Anyone can create a Page, but only official representatives can create a Page for an organization, business, brand or public figure. Fasturtle does have this ability and can work with your organization as a mediator through the process under the Social Media Setup Product. Twitter
To create an account on the web:
1. Go to http://twitter.com and find the sign up box, or go directly to https://twitter.com/signup. 2. Enter your full name, phone number, and a password. 3. Click Sign up for Twitter. 4. In order to verify your phone number, we will send you an SMS text message with a code. Enter the verification code in the box provided. Learn more about having a phone number associated with your account here. 5. Once you've clicked Sign up for Twitter, you can select a username (usernames are unique identifiers on Twitter) — type your own or choose one we've suggested. We'll tell you if the username you want is available. 6. Double-check your name, phone number, password, and username. 7. Click Create my account.You may be asked to complete a Captcha to let us know that you're human.
If you'd like to sign up with Twitter using an email address, you can do so via the "Use email instead" link at the bottom of the sign up page.
Tips for picking a username:
● Your username is the name your followers use when sending @replies, mentions, and direct messages. ● It will also form the URL of your Twitter profile page. We'll provide a few available suggestions when you sign up, but feel free to choose your own. ● Please note: You can change your username in your account settings at any time, as long as the new username is not already in use. ● Usernames must be fewer than 15 characters in length and cannot contain "admin" or "Twitter", in order to avoid brand confusion.
Important information about signing up with email address:
● An email address can only be associated with one Twitter account at a time. ● The email address you use on your Twitter account is not publicly visible to others on Twitter. ● We use the email you enter to confirm your new Twitter account. Be sure to enter an email address that you actively use and have access to. Check your inbox for a confirmation email to make sure you signed up for your account correctly.
A LinkedIn Company Page helps others learn more about your business, brand, products and services, and job opportunities. You can create one from the Add a Company page.
Note: Before starting, you must own a personal LinkedIn profile set up with your true first and last name. Also, make sure you meet our requirements to add a Company Page and that your current company doesn't already have one.
To create a Company Page:
● Move your cursor over Interests at the top of your homepage and select Companies. ● Click Create in the Create a Company Page box on the right. ● Enter your company's official name and your work email address. ● Click Continue and enter your company information. ○ If the work email address you provide is an unconfirmed email address on your LinkedIn account, a message will be sent to that address. Follow the instructions in the message to confirm your email address, and then use the instructions above to add the Company Page. ○ A red error message may appear if you have problems adding a Company Page. ○ A preview of your Company Page is not available. When you publish the page, it is live on our website.
Note: To publish your Company Page you must include a company description (250-2000 characters including spaces), and company website URL.
Important: Company Pages and the LinkedIn desktop experience were both recently redesigned. The new experience is being released in phases and may not be available to everyone at this time. As an admin, you can click Take me back to the old Company Page at the top of your Company Page. This will allow you to manage the old view, which is still visible to some members.
Instagram Instagram is a mobile app that you can download on iOS and Android phones and tablets as well as Windows Phone 8 and later. Keep in mind that you can only share photos and videos from the mobile app.
To create an Instagram account from the app:
1. Download the Instagram app for iOS from the App Store, Android from Google Play Store or Windows Phone from the Windows Phone Store. 2. Once the app is installed, tap to open it. 3. Tap Sign Up, then enter your email address and tap Next. You can also tap Log in with Facebook to sign up with your Facebook account. 4. If you register with email, create a username and password, fill out your profile info and then tap Done. If you register with Facebook, you'll be prompted to log into your Facebook account if you're currently logged out.
To create an Instagram account from a computer: 1. Go to instagram.com. 2. Enter your email address, create a username and password or click Log in with Facebook to sign up with your Facebook account. 3. If you register with an email, click Sign up. If you register with Facebook, you'll be prompted to log into your Facebook account if you're currently logged out.
If you sign up with email, make sure you enter your email address correctly and choose an email address that only you can access. If you log out and forget your password, you'll need to be able to access your email to get back into your Instagram account.
It is important to note that these platforms change DAILY and the learning curve for someone that does spend 7 days a week using these platforms for business purposes may have a difficult time navigating the set up process. For a one time payment of $995/mo, all of these accounts will be set up for you by a social media marketing expert. Touch HERE to get started today!
Chapter II: Developing Voice
Your message is what you’re trying to communicate. Your tone of voice is how you communicate it.
Tone takes a statement and either breathes life into it… or sucks the life out of it.
It goes without saying, I think, that the tone you should be aiming for is the kind that will breathe life into your copy… bring your brand out of its shell… and help your visitors connect with your brand and offering.
But how do you create that tone?
Is it as simple as sitting down at your desk and putting your Mr. Creative hat on – then letting the proverbial muse take over?
Or do you head over to your competition’s site and mimic – or counter – what they’re doing?
Well, there is a bit of an art to getting a tone right, so the muse may come into play (unlike anywhere else in web copywriting).
But, that said, it shouldn’t surprise you to know that
Your paying customers can help you find and refine your tone.
Recommendation: Poll your new customers. Send a follow-up “thanks for choosing us” email within days of a purchase, and ask your customer to indicate – quite simply – which adjective (of a short list of options) best describes how they feel about your brand.
Learning what adjective(s) your customers use most often to describe you can help you find your tone. How can that be? Because nearly every tone under the sun is simply an adjective brought to life. Your tone can be nerdy, romantic, condescending, patriotic, joyful, shocking, cool, happy, foolish, funny, formal or flirty. Those are all, of course, adjectives. They are brought to life on the page by combining diction and syntax to create tone.
Your tone can be anything. Unfortunately, it is most often this one thing: BORING.
B2B copy is particularly guilty of being boring to read… because there’s this misconception that businesses, lawyers, accountants, etc only wish to be informed. As if they are robots. As if they have no emotion, don’t smile at puppies, don’t watch movies, wear uniforms and live in a plain white box.
Now, I’m not a “finance and operations” pro, but I have a hard time believing that the tone of this copy would connect with anyone. It’s entirely factual and informative… which [incorrectly] assumes that people make buying decisions rationally, sans emotion.. I’d venture to say that this Oracle copywriter – who’s probably a perfectly nice person that’s been beaten into submission by one too many Fortune 500 HIPPOs – knows that people are going to sign up for this event because they have to, not because they want to.
So, great, if YOUR visitors HAVE to use your solution, you may not need to invest in a tone of voice that connects with people…
But if YOUR visitors get to make a choice – if they get to say ‘no’ to you – then optimizing your tone makes sense. Why?
A great tone can inspire desirable emotional responses in your visitors. And emotional responses are huge in human decision-making.
Emotion is one of three key considerations when building successful online interactions. Failing to build emotion-inspiring moments into your site can negatively impact your user experience, conversion rate and customer retention. Tone creates emotional responses in your reader, and that’s a very good thing.
What’s extra-fantastic about that is that emotional responses are damn hard for the competition to mimic or steal from you. Once you’ve made your audience feel for you, good luck shaking ’em! That means tone can be great for attracting and retaining customers… to say nothing of increasing the likelihood that they’ll tell their friends about you. (People remember how they feel about a brand or experience. If they feel nothing, they remember nothing.)
Now, you may be sold on the idea of cultivating a better tone. And, from there, you may come to believe that your tone should reflect your personality – but, IMHO, creating a personality shouldn’t be your primary objective in developing your tone. Rather, you should develop a tone in order to: ● Enact the value your visitors desire, such as dependability or entertainment ● Engage your visitors by making your site copy more enjoyable to read (i.e., less like work) ● Stimulate positive feelings that then become associated with your brand With those points in mind – rather than simply “creating a personality” – you can see that real business goals can be directly tied to the development of an excellent tone.
“Emotion is the adhesive that, when mixed with trust, equals loyalty.” The Marketing Power of Emotion – John O’Shaughnessy
People want to feel something. They do not want to be bored. They don’t want to forget about the new brands they encounter. They want to like things – they want to like you.
As a copy hacker, it’s your job to help your visitors feel, to avoid boring them, to help them remember you, and to make them like you. That’s all part of your ongoing goals of 1) increasing their happiness and 2) selling them a better version of themselves. Yes?
So, let’s say you decide that it’s time to work on your tone.
Great. If you do the poll I recommended above, you could come up with any adjective (I can’t possibly anticipate what yours will be). But, whatever tone you decide to experiment with or fully adopt, it may help you to see a few examples of companies that do tone well for their audiences – and to understand the types of tones that can work well for various offerings and brands. Voila:
Innovative Tone Who It May Be Right For ● Software companies ● App firms ● Agencies How to Do It ● Be brief, succinct and simply articulate ● Use conversational language, minus curse-words and colloquialisms ● Let customers/users speak for you (i.e., testimonials instead of marketing messages)
Expensively Elegant Tone Who It May Be Right For ● Spas and salons ● Boutiques (even boutique Etsy stores) ● High-end items targeted at affluent women How to Do It ● Use lengthier, flowing sentences ● Use lots of adjectives… but not many action-oriented adverbs (which give the sense that one must rush, when the wealthy should not be rushed) ● Offer minimal details, especially when it comes to functional stuff
Energetic Tone Who It May Be Right For ● Exercise programs & gyms ● Brands for teen & uni girls ● Fun-focused social networks / apps How to Do It ● Use fragmented sentences, action-oriented bullets and short horizontal lines (i.e., lines don’t run the width of the page) ● Opt for short, power-packed words – like what you might read in a Batman comic – over overused, bland words
Irreverent Tone Who It May Be Right For ● Apps & games targeted at teen boys How to Do It ● Um, watch a lot of Fast Times at Ridgemont High, paying particular attention to how Spicoli talks but steering clear of sounding exactly like a surfer.
Dependable Tone Who It May Be Right For ● Insurance providers ● Schools & courses ● Hosting companies ● Merchant service providers How to Do It ● Use words that feel warm, comfortable and wholesome ● Avoid colloquialisms, curse-words, exclamation points or other high-emotion devices ● Rely heavily on traditional rhetorical devices, like parallel statements
Other Tone Tips ● Your tone needs to feel authentic, not forced. ● Beware of attempts to be funny! They rarely come off as funny… and they tend to be embarrassing for everyone when they fall flat. ● Not every line needs to be tonal. Keep the prominent stuff – like headlines and subheads – tonal, let your inline help messaging be a tad tonal… and let the rest of the copy just be. ● If your competition is very tonal, you could set yourself apart not by competing with their tone but by pulling back and keeping things simple & straightforward. That can help differentiate you. ● Don’t forget context and busy-ness! Your tone shouldn’t be so thick that people who are in a rush or on their mobile devices feel burdened by it. Put usability before tone. ● Avoid inconsistencies. Don’t interject sudden moments of cutesiness in copy that otherwise feels casual. ● One of Cialdini’s six persuasion principles is Likability – so lean toward a likable-for-your-audience tone rather than one that’s potentially less likable.
Developing your copy tone is not an excuse to be clever, and it’s not a free pass to go hog wild with your messaging. But, yes, it can be fun – so you should be excited about it.
And when done intentionally and thoughtfully – like some of the examples I’ve shown – tone can help your visitors trust you, believe in you and connect with you… to say nothing of how great it can feel to publish copy that feels less like a robot wrote it and more like, well, a thinking, feeling human did. When done effectively, voice and tone can turn your loyal customers into social media cheerleaders and spread your business objectives like wildfire on social media. Taking the time to develop this voice and tone takes time. For $595/mo, all the information detailed in the rest of this book will be managed for you by a social media marketing expert. Touch HERE to get started today! Chapter III: Tricks for Saving Time
Use Stock Photos
Stock photos get a lot of hate. Most of time, the annoyance makes sense. Stock photos get super expensive if you’re going to use them everywhere; there are lots of creepy photos that leave you wondering who took them – or would want to use them; and then when you see them thrown in randomly in someone’s blog post or website, you cringe a little inside. Nothing can be more authentic than professional photos taken at a place of business that showcase what your business truly does, the people that work there, satisfied customers, products, and the actual space a business uses.
But really, stock photos aren’t all bad if you can use them in the right way. They can add visually interesting and compelling content to your marketing. They take out some of the design or outsourced photography you might need to build into your budget. And they can be pretty quick visual content solutions in a pinch. Here are some options that you have for saving time by using stock photos.
Paid Stock Photos
Shutterstock
Shutterstock is an American stock photography, stock footage, stock music, and editing tools provider headquartered in New York City.
■ Shutterstock now has over 80 million images in our collection (the largest royalty-free collection in the world), with 50,000+ fresh images added daily ■ 3 million+ video clips (over 2.5 million HD videos) ■ Shutterstock has images (photos, vectors, illustrations, icons), video, and music as well ■ Innovative search tools like Shutterstock Labs help you find what you need, fast ■ The company has been online since 2003 and was started by a photographer ■ Shutterstock accepts almost all payment types like Visa, American Express, MasterCard, Discover and JCB ■ Enhanced licenses available with a limited selection of editorial licensed images ■ Shutterstock is the first stock photo agency which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange ■ The Shutterstock standard license has many advantages over other stock agencies ■ Shutterstock photos are high-quality ■ Searchable by: keywords, categories, licenses and buying options with more detailed categories. Good search ability and easy to use. ■ Free weekly images to registered users ■ Languages including: English, German, French, Spanish, Dutch, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Chinese, Japanese ■ Their FAQ is extensive for buyers. The FAQ section is designed to find answers and is easy to navigate ■ Shutterstock has their corporate headquarters in New York, USA and support international buyers with languages and contact options
Free Stock Photos
Pexels
Pexels is a new stock photography site that has over a thousand free stock photos that you can do whatever you want with. All of them are licensed under Creative Commons Zero (CC0) which means you can copy, modify, distribute and even use them commercially. No attribution is required. The site itself is very well designed and the photos are very high quality. The one you see above is from the site. Most of the images are also very high resolution so they're perfect for retina displays too.
Pixabay
Pixabay is very social. You can like, comment, and follow through your Pixabay account, as well as share images to several other social media sites. You can use Pixabay in 20 different languages. When choosing an image, you have the option to download it in small, medium, large, or even extra large resolutions. This is important because when you manually resize images, quality can be lost – especially if you don’t know what you’re doing. It’s also important to get an image the size you need because you wouldn’t want a small image if you’re making a poster, or an extra large one if you only needed to create a small icon. You can see how many people have viewed and downloaded the image, what camera was used to take the picture, focal length, etc. You can copy, modify, distribute and use the images, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission and without paying attribution. That’s good if you’re someone who’s just browsing around, looking for free images to use, because Pixabay allows you to do just that without too much hassle.
The downside is Pixabay appears to be sponsored by Shutterstock. While this may be good for them, every time you search for an image, Shutterstock not only takes up the whole 1st line of search results, but also invades the related/sponsored images on the right side of the screen. When uploading images you have to wait a few days for it to be approved by Pixabay before it is released on the website for all to see. Images are only tagged as well as the user tags them. This means that there could be a really great image out there that is tagged poorly, which means it won’t be seen by many people. So basically, it’s up to the uploader to use as many, or as little, keywords as they please. So experience in these matters comes into play. Depending on your stance, being able to copy, modify, distribute and use images for commercial purposes without asking permission and without paying attribution could be a negative. If you are posting your pictures, expecting to make money and get recognition for your work, this is not the place to do so. You don’t directly pay for the images that you download, but you are given the option to donate to the photographer through PayPal, so again, from the artist’s point of view, there’s less economic incentive at least to share work here. Depicted content may still be protected by trademarks, publicity or privacy rights.
Google (Free Usage)
If you are an in house marketing expert, or an owner of a small business, you probably cannot afford to use a paid stock photo company like Shutterstock. And, if you don’t know what you are looking for, it is possible to get into a lot of trouble by using Google’s Free Use photos incorrectly or trusting a source that lifted a photo without properly giving copyright credit. Using a marketing expert that knows how to choose quality photos and has access to paid stock images may save you a lot of time and money. For $595/mo, all the information detailed in the rest of this book will be managed for you by a social media marketing expert. Touch HERE to get started today! Post at the Best Times
The above image is often referred to by social media marketers as “The Whale”. The Whale tells us when the three best times to post are for this particular channel. The peak is where you want to schedule your most important content. The upward slope and the downward slope are also great times to post fun, engaging content in efforts to stretch out your daily reach and create a new plateau for your peak time to build on. It takes a lot of practice to master this technique and is why some of the most engaging pages on Facebook are able to post 3 - 7 times a day with viral results during waking hours.
This platform is most effective during school and business hours in your local area because many of its users are journalists and students. This demographic is very influential and studies show that Twitter accounts that post 7 to 14 times a day during waking hours yield higher SEO rankings than accounts that only tweet once a day. This is because over 10,000 tweets compete for attention every second!
Pinterest The best times to post and pin on Pinterest are 3am in your local area (the post-bar crowd) and during lunch hour. Users typically use the platform during breaks from daily activities and work. LinkedIn Anytime during 9am-6pm in your local time zone is a great time to schedule content. Many users are using the platform to either find new talent or to communicate to businesses that they are available to work, so content that is posted earlier has a higher probability of being shown to more eyeballs by the end of the day.
Contact Current Customers
Let your existing client base know that you are on social media. Allowing your customers know that they can choose to follow your business on social media empowers them to have another way to learn about the services or product you offer and for them to let others know you are available to help others.
Use a Management Tool
Management tools have really come a long way in the last few years, allowing for social media managers to write content for multiple channels and even schedule the content to go out at times that make sense for each channel and business.
Hootsuite This platform has helped more social media marketers schedule and respond to social media channels than any other social media tool. However, the reporting is less than ideal and makes it hard to optimize strategies or to show the boss how your campaigns are performing.
Sprout Social Sprout’s social media management tools can help you and your team monitor, respond, measure and collaborate to ensure smarter and faster communication.
Fasturtle’s So Shell So Shell Social Media Dashboard was created after years of scheduling content and monitoring performance on social media. The dahboard is conveniently laid out with portals to manage content, schedules, manager approvals, gamification, customer messages and metrics. Deciding What Is Best For Your Business
With over a decade in social media marketing experience, Fasturtle has developed So-Shell, a social media marketing tool that does everything Hootsuite and Sprout Social can do, and then some.
This chart should quickly identify features that any social media marketing expert will be looking for and which platform allows these functions for users.
Use Fasturtle
Let Fasturtle put our blend of insight, experience, assets, and expertise to work for you so that you can become a social media engaged business – and see tangible ROI driven results. For $595/mo, all the information detailed in the rest of this book will be managed for you by a social media marketing expert. Touch HERE to get started today!
Additional Resources
BuzzSumo - Data-driven Content Marketing: Discover what resonates with your audience using BuzzSumo to research, amplify, and monitor your content.
SumoMe - A Suite of free tools that can be used to grow website traffic.
Bit.ly - An online link shortener that also provides metrics and data for campaign tracking.
Nuvi - Twitter integrated tool that allows for sentiment tracking and predictive tweet performance using audience’s history analysis.
Rite Tag - An online database of popular hashtags great for Twitter and Instagram research and use.
Canva - A free online photo editing tool with drop-and-drop templates for making high resolution images.
Snapchat
Snapchat opens to the Camera, so it’s always easy to capture what’s happening in the moment! Just tap the Capture button take a photo Snap, or press and hold to record a video Snap.
There are other helpful tools on the Camera screen:
ˠ: Selfie Camera in the upper right hand corner of the screen! Flip between front and rear-facing camera.
⚡ : The flash icon! To enable or disable your flash. Note, front-facing flash is not available on all devices.
Then, after you take a Snap, more tools will be available to you:
✂ : The scissors tool makes it easy to copy and paste just about anything in your Snaps!
: The Stickers tool will let you decorate your Snap with Stickers and a Bitmoji.
횃: This tool lets you add a caption. Pro Tipʊ: Add a fun twist to your captions and Chats with different text styles like bold, underline, and italics. Just take a Snap, press and hold on your caption to select it, and different text styling options should appear! ͑
͏: This tool lets you doodle and draw freehand on your Snap.
-: A timer icon to choose how long friends can view your Snap — but remember, they can always save your Snap by taking a screenshot!
: After you take a Snap, just tap this icon to save it to Memories, a personal collection of Snaps and Stories backed up by Snapchat.
: Tap this icon to add a Snap to your Story!
Pro Tip ʊ: You can also swipe right or left on the Preview screen to add colored Filters, the current time, local weather, speed overlays, or Geofilters, and more to your Snaps.
This is only a small batch of social media monitoring tools and tricks that a marketing agency can afford since they work professionally with many clients that one in house social media expert simply cannot see the return on cost from a small business. Not to mention all the time and research spent on learning how to utilize the power of each tool in order to make it an effective tool for your business. For $595/mo, all the information detailed in the rest of this book will be managed for you by a social media marketing expert. Touch HERE to get started today!
Chapter IV: Grow Your Audience
Active Listening
Social listening is the process of tracking conversations around specific phrases, words or brands, and then leveraging them to discover opportunities or create content for those audiences. It’s more than watching @mentions and comments pour in via your social profiles, mobile apps or blogs. If you’re only paying attention to notifications, you’re missing a huge group of people that are talking about you, your brand and your product.
Would you walk into a cocktail party, climb up on the bar with a megaphone, start telling everyone how awesome you are, and then try to sell stuff? Of course not—unless you’re a clueless jerk. Unfortunately, when it comes to social media marketing, that’s exactly what some businesses do.
Instead, you’d probably look around the party for friends to visit with and for new, interesting people you’d like to get to know. Then, after briefly introducing yourself, you’d strike up conversations. You would ask about the other person, you would listen, and you would show interest in what they do and who they are. You would find “connective points”. That’s how valued relationships begin face to face and how relationship marketing begins and grows using social media. The old adage says it best, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”
Mentions
The big benefit to tagging people and pages on social media is that you’re instantly connected to these users and companies. Your update links directly to their account, and the users and companies get a notification that they’ve been mentioned. It’s a great way to gain a bit more traction and awareness for your update. Here’s a bit about what I’ve observed on how best to tag: ● Add a “via @username” to the end of stories you share on Twitter. Most often, the “via” references the author who wrote the story or the site that published it. ● Add a “HT @username” to credit those who turned you onto a story or idea. HT is shorthand for “hat tip,” the practice of tipping one’s hat toward another person to say thanks. ● When referencing a person or company in an update, replace their name with their tag or username.
Aligning Voice with Trends
A strong brand should be memorable and it should differentiate you from others in your marketplace by projecting distinctive qualities that are true, relevant to your audiences, and supportable. Before you go about aligning your social media with your brand, be sure that you understand your brand and that it’s working as effectively as possible.
As you develop your social media strategy, coordinate it with your overall marketing strategy. What does this mean in practical terms? If your business is producing educational content like blogs, whitepapers, eBooks, or videos, share that goodness with your followers and connections. But take care not to overshare. Many brands follow the “80/20 Rule”, where only 20% of social media content is self-promotional.
Social media should be one cog in your larger marketing machine – it shouldn’t feel like a strange parallel universe of non-sequitur retweets or memes. A social media calendar (coordinated with your overall content calendar) is an important way to keep everything straight, aligning big content releases with effective social media practices. A calendar will also help you take a bigger picture perspective, ensuring that you’re providing an interesting variety of content that, taken together, aligns well with your brand identity.
So once your business identifies the immediate business objectives, how do you find the other content that will increase your engagement and build a lasting bond between your brand and your customers? The following trends will allow for your content calendar to connect with social media users with fresh, current content!
Hashtags
Hashtags are such a prominent part of culture today that it’s rare to find anyone who doesn’t know what they are. In fact, the hashtag is so recognized that it was added to the Oxford dictionary in 2010, and the Scrabble Dictionary in 2014 (#official). Yet even as most people have come to know what they are, many people still don’t understand how to use hashtags.
Hashtags, once your phone’s pound sign, now have a place on most popular social networks, including Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram, and Pinterest. The hashtag is likely the most popular means of categorizing content on social media. It makes your own content discoverable and allows you to find relevant content from other people and businesses. The hashtag also allows you to connect with and engage other social media users based on a common theme or interest.
Knowing how to use hashtags is fundamental to your success on social media. Here are a few best practices to help you achieve that success.
Hashtag Do’s
Be Specific Try and hone in on a passionate community that shares an interest in one specific theme. The more specific you can get with your hashtag, the more targeted your audience will be—and a targeted audience generally means better engagement. If you don’t have your own business hashtag, find one or two existing ones that really fit the photo. Say, for example, your business sells baby products. Instead of using #parents—resulting in parents of children of all ages—opt for #newmom. The hashtag #newmom is specific to mothers of newborns—your target customer.
Use The Recommended Number of Hashtag Per Channel
While hashtags on all social networks have the same fundamental purpose of content tagging and discovery, the use of hashtags still varies by network. Hashtags on the photo and video sharing platforms are often more focused on description of the content. This is at odds with Twitter, where hashtags tend to be more focused a topic of conversation, or a group of people (a chat for example) that you would like to engage. Before using hashtags, do research on the proper way to use them for that particular network. Most networks will have guides for hashtag selection and use. Also take the time to discover the most popular and most relevant hashtags on a specific subject for each network. This extra time you invest will pay off in engagement down the road.
Invent Hashtags
Brand hashtags don’t have to (read: shouldn’t) mention your brand name, but should represent your brand and what you stand for. Destination British Columbia created the hashtag #exploreBC. The tourism company uses it to share scenic photos of the Canadian province taken by their employees and the community. Seeing photos from regular people on the official Destination British Columbia account quickly prompted more of their followers to embrace the hashtag and share their own photos. As such, the company has created a growing movement that supplies them with fantastic, follower-generated content to use on their social accounts.
Brand Hashtags
Lay’s Potato Chips used them for their “Do Us A Flavor” contest, which encourage people to pitch their best potato chip flavor ideas. With the goal to engage users and collect ideas, Lay’s launched a brand hashtag campaign using #DoUsAFlavor. Contest submissions have been shared over social media and featured on the contest website. Some people got very creative. Not only does a brand hashtag drive participation and engagement, it will also organize all the posts that are tagged with it on a hashtag page. This is helpful if you’re using the hashtag to collect entries for a promotion or contest, as Lay’s was with the #DoUsAFlavor campaign. Brand hashtags are also a great way to raise awareness for campaign and initiatives. California’s Concordia University Irvine (CUI) used the tactic in the midst of an accreditation review from The Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), a non-profit that evaluates the quality and effectiveness of schools and postsecondary institutions. The school needed to maintain the accreditation to be eligible for financial aid and the ability to accept transfer units from other accredited schools. With the goal to engage and educate the campus on the importance of the WASC accreditation, CUI launched a brand hashtag campaign using #askWASC. For 11 weeks the school posted questions to their social channels—primarily Twitter and Instagram—and students used the hashtag to submit their answers as well as suggestions for campus improvements. The responses CUI received on social media allowed the school to identify strengths and weakness across campus, which were addressed in real-time. When students met with the WASC committee, CUI wasn’t caught off-guard by anything that was shared. In fact, the committee noted how impressed they were on how educated the campus was about the WASC accreditation and it’s importance. The awareness and engagement efforts were a success, and in the end, CUI was awarded a 10-year accreditation.
Hashtag Don’t
Don’t go too long or too clever
In general, if you’re creating a branded hashtag you should try to keep it short and sweet. Even though “#AvocadoToastLovers” might target a very specific audience, no one will use the hashtag because they just don’t want to type in that many characters. You also don’t want to try and be too clever or offbeat (#avocadotoasterstrudel) since you want people to naturally search for your tag. Hashtags are supposed to make things easier to find and engage with, but long, complicated hashtags can actually be more arduous. In this case, you’re better off with something like #avocadotoast or even, #avotoast.
Don’t have more hashtags than words
In fact, don’t even come close. Social media users often used an excessive amount of hashtags ironically or when making a joke. But many Instagram users have also caught onto the fact that more hashtags can mean more reach and likes. So, they’ve overloaded their photos with as many hashtags as they’re allowed—which is reportedly 30. You don’t want to use 30 hashtags on a single post. You don’t even want to use five hashtags on a single post. Even if you gain followers, it’s often the wrong kind of follower—spammers or people only interested in being followed back. It generally dilutes your message and comes off as desperate. Focus instead on being specific, which we already explained above.
Don’t hashtag everything
Hashtags serve to make your content discoverable to a wide audience. The truth is, not everything you produce is going to fit into that category. If your tweet, post, or comment isn’t adding any substance to the wider conversation, you might want to consider leaving the hashtag off. For example, if a news story breaks and you simply share the news, leave the hashtag off of it. If you write a blog post that analyzes the impact of that news, then absolutely use a hashtag when you share it. Using hashtags will allow you to make an impression on a wide social media audience. Make sure you’re sharing the best content, and making the right impression.
Holidays
Whether it's International Cat Day, National Siblings Day, or Haiku Poetry Day, it seems like almost every day, the internet is celebrating.
Scan Twitter and see what's trending on the left-hand side of the screen. You see an obscure holiday or observance day trending, and you think “Aw yeah… I’m celebrating THAT!”
Some of these holidays might be simply too silly for your brand to engage with (and we certainly don't suggest sharing content on social media and then tacking on a completely irrelevant hashtag for the sake of traffic -- that's just plain annoying). But others might not be. You could be missing valuable opportunities to take advantage of trending topics with fun and relevant "holiday" content on social media.
From food to politics to animals and everything in between, there is a plethora of observance days worldwide during which marketers can share content relevant to their industries, get involved in a movement, or simply generate more awareness.
At the end of this book, Fasturtle included a full year’s worth of holidays and popular hashtags that marketers have been using since the beginning of the hashtag.
Responding to Reviews
Good Reviews
If a good customer leaves a glowing five-star review, it can’t get any better than that, right? Actually, it can. Here’s why you should always respond to a positive review: ● It’s the polite thing to do. If customer gave you a compliment in real life, you would say thank you. It’s only polite. And with an online review, the compliment is public. So be extra nice! ● Everyone is looking. 92% of consumers now read online reviews (BrightLocal). The public, including potential future customers of the business, may read this review. Replying to the review is a chance to speak to these people too, and do some subtle marketing. ● It affects search rankings. By replying properly, you can improve the SEO ranking of the review, and help the review show up in search results for a business.
How to respond to a positive review (4 steps)
Step 1: Thank the customer for the positive review and be specific. Ensure the reviewer knows a real person is behind your reply by thanking them for something specific they said. “Thanks for leaving a review, and mentioning our marketing manager, Jessie. You’re right, she is always smiling!"
Step 2: Use the business name and keywords in your review response to the good review. Using the business name, category and location in your response will help the positive review appear in search results. “The team here at [Business Name] is thrilled to hear such good feedback, and we’re proud to be one of the coziest [coffee shops] in [city name]."
Step 3: Add a little marketing to your review response. Your reply is public and will be read by others, including future customers, so throw in some marketing! Mention a behind-the-scenes reason they had a great experience, or a new feature or promotion. “Did you know we just started a free coffee card?” Step 4: Invite customer to do something in your response. Ask the customer to return, use another service or spread the word. “Next time you’re here, you should try the [insert product here]!” “We hope to see you again soon, and bring a friend!”
Negative Reviews
Unfortunately, you can’t just ignore a bad review until it goes away. In fact, ignoring an unpleasant review can make things worse! Remember, ● You're not just replying to just the one reviewer. You're speaking to everyone who reads this review, including potential future customers. ● Replying is your opportunity to make things right. If a customer brought a complaint to you in person, you would try to make it right. The same goes for online reviews—despite the impersonal nature of online reviews, it’s not over just yet. You can turn this thing around! ● Replying shows other readers you are not shady or neglectful to feedback, and have taken steps to ensure this problem won't happen to the next customer.
How to respond to a negative review (4 Steps)
Step 1: Apologize and sympathize in your response to the negative review. Acknowledge the customer’s concerns. Even if they are unfounded, show sympathy that they had a bad experience. “I’m sorry to hear about your bad experience.”
Step 2: Insert a little marketing in your response to the bad review. Explain what your customers usually experience. “We’re normally known for our exceptional attention to detail, and we regret that we missed the mark.”
Step 3: Move the conversation offline. Provide contact info with someone at the business so they can discuss the problem in person. “My name is [name] and I am the [Owner / Manager]. If you’d like to discuss this further, please contact me at [phone number / email].” Step 4: Keep your response simple, short and sweet. Don't go into too much detail or ask any questions. This will prevent saying something that might cause the upset customer to add more negative feedback by replying to the review. Three sentences for your whole reply is a good rule of thumb.
BONUS: Don't include the business name or relevant search keywords. You don’t want this review showing up in search results!
Using Optimized Photo Sizes
Profile Picture: 180 x 180 (Displays 160 x 160 on Desktop) Image Guidelines ● Must be at least 180 x 180 pixels. ● Photo will appear on page as 160 x 160 pixels on desktop, 140 x 140 on smartphones, and 50 x 50 on most feature phones. ● Profile pictures are located 16 pixels from the left and 176 pixels from the top of your cover photo on desktop. ● Profile pictures are located 24 pixels from the left, 24 pixels from the bottom and 196 pixels from the top of your cover photo on smartphones. ● Photo thumbnail will appear throughout Facebook at 32 x 32 pixels.
Cover Photo: 820 x 312 Image Guidelines ● Appear on page at 820 x 312 pixels. Anything less will be stretched. ● Minimum size of 399 x 150 pixels. ● Displays at 820 x 312 pixels on desktop and 640 x 360 pixels on smartphones. ● Doesn’t display on feature phones. ● For best results, upload an sRGB JPG file less than 100 KB. ● Images with a logo or text may be best as a PNG file.
Shared Image: 1,200 x 630 Image Guidelines ● Recommended upload size of 1,200 x 630 pixels. ● Will appear in feed at a max width of 470 pixels (will scale to a max of 1:1). ● Will appear on page at a max width of 504 pixels (will scale to a max of 1:1). Shared Link: 1,200 x 627 Image Guidelines ● Recommended upload size of 1,200 x 627 pixels. ● Square Photo: Minimum 154 x 154px in feed. ● Square Photo: Minimum 116 x 116 on page. ● Rectangular Photo: Minimum 470 x 246 pixels in feed. ● Rectangular Photo: Minimum 484 x 252 on page. ● Facebook will scale photos under the minimum dimensions. For better results, increase image resolution at the same scale as the minimum size.
Highlighted Image: 1,200 x 717 (Recommended) Image Guidelines ● Will appear on your page at 843 x 504 pixels. ● Choose a higher resolution at that scale for better quality.
Event Image: 1920 x 1080 (Recommended) Image Guidelines ● Facebook will scale down to minimum dimensions: 470 × 174. ● Shows in feed: 470 × 174.
Profile Photo: 400 x 400 (Displays 200 x 200) Image Guidelines ● Square Image recommended 400 x 400 pixels. ● Maximum file size 2 MB. ● Image types include: JPG, GIF or PNG.
Header Photo: 1,500 x 500 Image Guidelines ● Recommended 1,500 x 500 pixels. ● Maximum file size of 5 MB. ● Image types include: JPG, GIF or PNG.
In-Stream Photo: Minimum 440 x 220 (2:1 Ratio) Image Guidelines ● Minimum to appear expanded 440 x 220 pixels (a 2:1 ratio). ● Can tweet up to 4 images at one time. ● Can edit images if tweeting from Twitter iOS or Android app. ● Maximum to appear expanded 1024 x 512 pixels. ● Appears in stream collapsed at 506 x 253 pixels on desktop. ● Maximum file size of 5 MB for photos, and 3 MB for animated GIFs.
Profile Picture: 110 x 110 Image Guidelines ● Appear on your profile at 110 x 110 pixels. ● Square photo: make sure to maintain an aspect ratio of 1:1.
Photo Thumbnails: 161 x 161 Image Guidelines ● The thumbnails will appear on the page at 161 x 161 pixels. ● Square photo: make sure to maintain an aspect ratio of 1:1 ratio.
Photo Size: 1080 x 1080 Image Guidelines ● The size of Instagram images has been increased to 1080 x 1080 pixels. ● Instagram still scales these photos down to 612 x 612 pixels. ● Appear in feed at 510 x 510 pixels. ● Square or rectangle photos: make sure to maintain an aspect ratio between 1.91:1 and 4:5 ratio. ● Smaller featured header images appear as 204 x 204 pixels, and larger featured header images appear as 409 x 409 pixels.
Personal Profile Picture: 400 x 400 (Recommended) Image Guidelines ● Recommended between 400 x 400 and 20,000 x 20,000 pixels ● Minimum 200 x 200 pixels ● Maximum file size 10MB. ● Image types includeL JPG, GIF or PNG.
Personal Background Image: Between 1000 x 425 and 4000 x 4000 Image Guidelines ● Recommended between 1000 x 425 and 4,000 x 4,000 pixels ● Maximum size 4MB. ● Image types include: JPG, PNG or GIF.
Banner Image for Brand (Company) Pages: 646 x 220 (Minimum) Image Guidelines ● Minimum 646 x 220 pixels. ● Maximum 2MB. ● Landscape Layout. ● Image types include: PNG, JPG or GIF.
Standard Logo: 400 x 400 Image Guidelines ● 400 x 400 pixels recommended (300 x 300 minimum and resized to fit). ● Maximum 4 MB (Square layout). ● Image types include: PNG, JPG or GIF.
Square Logo: 60 x 60 Image Guidelines ● 60 x 60 pixels (resized to fit). ● Maximum 2MB. ● Image types include: PNG, JPG or GIF.
Hero Image: 974 x 330 You can use this space to choose a picture that speaks to your company in order to attract some great potential employees.
Image Guidelines ● Minimum 974 x 330 pixels. ● Maximum 2MB. ● Landscape Layout. ● Image types include: PNG, JPG or GIF.
Profile Picture: 165 x 165 Image Guidelines ● Appears at 165 x 165 pixels on home page. ● Appears at 32 x 32 pixels on the rest of Pinterest. ● Maximum 10 MB (wouldn’t allow me to upload anything larger). ● Image types include: JPG and PNG for profile pictures.
Pin Sizes Image Guidelines ● Pins on main page appear as 236 pixels (height is scaled). ● Pins on a board appear as 236 pixels (height is scaled). ● Expanded pins have a minimum width 600 pixels (height is scaled). ● It’s recommended to use an image aspect ratio of 2:3 to 1:3.5
Board Display Image Guidelines ● 222 x 150 pixels (large thumbnail) ● 55 x 55 (smaller thumbnail)
Google +
Profile Picture: 250 x 250 (Recommended) Image Guidelines ● Minimum 250 x 250 pixels. ● Recommended to use larger photos. ● Maximum file size 100MB. ● Maximum dimensions not listed (we were able to upload at 5,200 x 5,300 pixels). ● Image types include: JPG, GIF or PNG.
Cover Image: 1,080 x 608 Image Guidelines ● Recommended 1,080 x 608 pixels. ● Minimum 480 x 270 pixels. ● Maximum 2,120 x 1,192 pixels.
Shared Image: 497 x 373 (displays as) Image Guidelines ● Appears in home stream and on page at a width of 426 pixels (height is scaled). ● Minimum width of 497 pixels (will scale the height for you). ● Maximum upload 2,048 x 2,048 pixels. ● Shared Link – 150 x 150 (thumbnail).
Shared Link: 150 x 150 (Thumbnail) Image Guidelines Shows in the feed and on page as 150 x 150 pixels (pulls in photo from linked site).
Shared Video: Width of 496 Pixels Video Guidelines ● Shows in the feed and on page as 497 x 279 pixels.
That is a lot of image sizes to remember! No wonder so many social media experts just pick a few social media platforms and stick to what they know. That may work for your small business or might work if you can afford an in house social media marketing team to leverage photo size optimization for the best performance on a few channels, but why not spend $595/mo have all the information detailed managed for you by a social media marketing expert. Touch HERE to get started today! Sharing Industry Information (Thought Leadership) Becoming a thought leader, an individual who drives innovation and new ideas in a given industry, is an objectively valuable path for any professional.
All this might seem overwhelming, but if you break it down into a series of steps, it’s much easier to grasp.
Build Reputation Personal brands rest at the heart of many marketing strategies, and thought leadership is a natural extension of the ability to build a reputation. Start out by enhancing or restructuring your existing social media profiles, especially LinkedIn and Twitter, with detailed descriptions of your credentials and career accomplishments. You’ll be using these as foundations of your strategy and key channels for social networking. Then, establish your own blog or blog on your company’s site and start writing on a regular basis. You’ll want to establish a nice archive of at least 30 posts before you go any further, and make sure you’re updating your blog at least once a week. Syndicate your blogs on your social networks and get involved in groups and chats as you see fit. This is a preliminary step, so don’t go over the top at this point. Instead, focus on laying a foundation.
Work With Influencers Once you’ve established a baseline reputation, start reaching out to potential mentors and other influencers in the industry. They should be relatively easy to find if you’re pushing your content socially, and some of them might find you naturally without you lifting a finger.
Once you find a handful that are willing to work with you, stand back and observe. Talk to them about what’s on their minds. Watch how they operate their own businesses. Read what they push to their blogs. The goal here is to learn from them, and to learn to think how they think. After all, you’re going to be emulating them by step five.
Network Continue working with your influencers and mentors -- that should never fully go away -- but once you’ve become more familiar with the territory and the quality of your blog posts goes up, you can start networking with a heavier hand. Get involved on as many social media platforms as possible, and reach out to new people regularly. Attend in-person networking events and seek out speaking opportunities at live events, take pictures and tag your new friends and businesses as your business! The more people that are in your network, the more authority you’ll have, and the weightier your words will be.
Get Published Your blog and social media content is only the beginning. By this time, you should have a steady stream of regular readers who occasionally comment on and share your blogs. It’s time to take things to the next level. Start publishing guest posts on other industry-related blogs, and once you're comfortable, start seeking publication on wider, more authoritative sources.
For example, you could get yourself published in an industry magazine or on one of the leading publication channels online. You’ll want to get work published on a wide range of different sources, and the more often you do it, the bigger your audience will grow.
Drive Ahead At this point, you’ve established your reputation as an authority in the industry, and there’s only one more step to take: you have to become a leader, and to do that, you have to do new things. Start making bolder claims in your articles, and making bigger predictions about the future of your industry. Drive change and innovation in your own business, and publicize those efforts. With your authority already established, people will immediately begin to see you as a bona fide thought leader. Share other thought leading content by establishing an RSS Feed. RSS feeds enable publishers to syndicate data automatically. A standard XML file format ensures compatibility with many different machines/programs. RSS feeds also benefit users who want to receive timely updates from favourite websites or to aggregate data from many sites. This tool allows for thought leaders to be informed quickly, and can gauge where the trend is going, hopefully being able to identify an opportunity to deliver new, leading messages through social media and customer service.
Don’t try to follow all these steps in a day. Developing a personal brand and becoming a thought leader is a process that takes years, even if you put your full effort into it. No matter how much it might seem that way, nobody becomes a success overnight. You’ll have to work hard, and consistently, if you want to attain the coveted yet unofficial title of “thought leader. Using Live Video You have mastered the photo post, the Tweet, and the collected a source of great thought-leading articles for your content calendar. Then you have mastered the ability to monitor and reply to incoming messages and reviews. Finally, you have created a few messages to post on key phrases you see on social media in order to draw more engagement and business. The way of the future is Live Video. Below, we review the major Live Video platforms and share tips and tricks to help you leverage this new and exciting option for connecting with your potential customers.
Facebook Live
Facebook Live, the social network’s live broadcasting feature, is certainly generating lots of buzz lately. And that’s perhaps in part because it is one of the platform’s highest priority initiatives—and even a pet project of Mark Zuckerberg himself.
Per Facebook’s figures, on average, users watch a live video more than three times longer when it is live. Facebook also says users comment over 10-times more frequently on Facebook Live videos than other videos.
Conveniently, Facebook also offers its own best practices for Facebook Live, which include: going live with a strong WiFi or 4G connection, writing “catchy” descriptions, responding to commenters (and using their names), broadcasting for at least 10 minutes, and using a closing line to signal the broadcast’s end.
Facebook also recommends focusing on content like “hot topics”, Q&As, breaking news, interviews, performances, behind-the-scenes, and demonstrations.
But beyond this—and beyond widely held marketing platitudes about creating relevant, engaging on-brand content that fulfills consumer needs—what else do marketing professionals recommend for brands considering Facebook Live?
Snapchat
Live Stories draw 10 million to 20 million pairs of Millennial eyeballs every day. Whereas Snapchat Discover is still figuring out who it is and which content works best, live stories are intuitive. After all, individuals were already (and still are) making them. The platform is compelling precisely because it’s interactive, it’s temporary, and it’s a glimpse into another life—just like television was for previous generations.
Our Story allows Snapchatters who are at the same event or a specific location to contribute Snaps to the same community narrative. See something amazing? Submit a Snap to Our Story and it could appear in a Story curated by Snapchat.
Here’s how to submit a Snap to Our Story:
1. Tap the capture button to take a Snap. 2. Tap the arrow icon in the lower right hand corner of the screen. 3. Tap ‘Our Story.' 4. Tap the arrow icon to send! Please Note: To contribute to an Our Story, you will have to turn on location services. Location accuracy depends on things like your Wi-Fi and cellular connection, your device’s OS and maker, and other factors.
You can share a live video to connect with your followers in real time. Once a live video has ended, it's no longer visible on Instagram.
To start a live video:
1. Tap in the top left of the screen or swipe right from anywhere in Feed. 2. Tap Live at the bottom of the screen, then tap Start Live Video. Your followers may be notified when you start a live video. 3. The number of viewers appears in the top right of the screen, and comments appear at the bottom. Tap Comment to add a comment, and tap and hold a comment to pin it to the top so that viewers can see it more easily. 4. To turn comments off, tap then select Turn Off Commenting. Keep in mind that any keyword filters you've turned on will also apply to comments on your live video. 5. When you're done, tap End in the top right then tap to confirm.
Keep in mind that you may not be able to share a live video if your account was recently created.
15 Live Video Tips
1. Don’t Use it Just Because It’s There
As a result of both celebrities and media brands experimenting with Facebook Live and generating attention, marketers may think they have to rush out to embrace it because everyone else is doing it. But what happens when that experiment gets 13 people to attend the first live event? Is that going to cost justify the effort you put into it or not? The answer to that question is, ‘Yes it can, if that target audience fits one of two profiles.’
Those profiles are a brand’s best customers as part of a customer retention effort, as well as influencers. Nobody but Facebook reaches 1.6 billion people, and even brands with tens of thousands of likes will be lucky to get a small audience for their first Live experiments. Live Video isn’t going to replace a brand’s digital ad budget for the coming year.
2. Have a Clear Purpose
Make sure you clearly identify why you are diving into Facebook Live before taking the plunge. Do you have a big event or product launch that you want to do something different for? Do you have a PR crisis you are trying to respond to? Do you want to connect to your customers on a deeper and more personal level? Whatever it is, pick your topic and stick to it. Try not to let the topics of conversation stray too far away from you.
3. Think of Live as Part of the Marketing Whole
The best marketing programs are integrated so think of live video as another arrow in marketers’ quivers. Some audiences won’t have time to see the live experiment, but may encounter marketing programs in another channel that can tie back to it and reinforce it. Don’t eliminate other channels, but think about live as a compliment.
4. Approach Live Like You’re Throwing a Party
Facebook Live broadcast is similar to a real-life event in terms of pre-event prep and promotion and it will be a long-standing brand asset, so it should be taken seriously. At the same time, it shouldn’t be completely scripted or it will come off as inauthentic. You want it to be spontaneous, but you want all your ducks in a row.
5. Set the Stage
Background noise can make or break a live video. Broadcasting live from a big event is perhaps not the best idea as viewers may not be able to hear what you’re saying, negating the entire premise. In addition, scan your background to make sure there’s nothing visible that might inadvertently compromise privacy or confidentiality.
6. Go With the Flow and Experiment
Brands have to be comfortable with not knowing everything that might happen during a live broadcast. Marketers need to set realistic goals, benchmark and work to grow, testing and learning along the way. Not every piece of content can and will be a winner, but that’s part of the learning process.
7. Brace for the Worst, Hope for the Best
Anything can happen during a live broadcast, so brands must anticipate the worst – as well as how they will potentially respond. When you are fielding questions on Facebook Live, you only have a few seconds to come up with an answer. This process is far easier if you create a list of possible topics before you begin the stream. This way, you can answer difficult situations with pre-prepared answers that still adhere to your brand’s voice. The last thing you want is to say something you didn’t mean on a live stream that lands you, or your company, in hot water.
8. Don’t be a Me Monster
Beyond just interacting with viewers, brands must be sure their live content isn’t entirely self-centered. Don’t just talk about yourself and your business – make sure the topic you address is of interest to the audience generally. It’s okay as the speaker to mention your point of view, but it can’t be just you, you, you.
9. Accentuate the Positive
Brands should maintain an optimistic tone. The Internet is a place that naturally breeds negativity, some of which will make its way to your Facebook Live stream. Stay positive. Know that your stream is being watched and engaged with because people like your brand or your company. The vocal minority can seem a loud bunch, but they are still a minority. Keep your eye on the prize and focus on your stream.
10. Harness the News Feed
Facebook’s News Feed has emerged as a way for brands to generate big viewership in small windows. Think about how TV plays out. You have the ability around a live broadcast like sports to have a large audience watching at the same time. On the Internet, it’s not as easy. You have a massive audience exposed to a video, but it’s typically over an extended period of time. Live, you are leveraging your existing audience. 11. Choose Your Audience Wisely
Beyond just letting fans know there will be a live broadcast, take time to consider who precisely your broadcast will target.
12. Timing is Everything
Brands need to also carefully consider where their target audience lives to ensure they select the right time zone to reach the largest possible segment.
13. Consistency Matters
Consumers respond to structure – even if they may think otherwise. If you go live at a consistent time, on consistent days, you create expectation and anticipation. This allows you to build your audience over time.
14. Repeat Your Mantras in Moderation and Ask for What You Want
In addition, because viewers are constantly joining streams in progress, periodically remind viewers who you are and what you’re doing. This opens you up to a larger audience, but also gives you a fresh influx of viewers throughout, which keeps the conversation going.
15. Experiment While it’s Free
It might not be free forever. Plus, your audience will remember this experience as something truly special.
We just went over the basics of many platforms, the types of content you can share, and strategies for developing content using tools. Let Fasturtle, a Google Partner, deliver an arsenal of online solutions to give you a competitive advantage. Our team of consultants will give you the keys to unlock the secrets to success on social media. Through support, consultations, updates and reporting, Fasturtle is your go-to social media gurus. Our So Shell Scheduler is the state-of-the-art dashboard to assist your business in creating, editing, scheduling and responding on all of your social media channels! For $595/mo, Fasturtle’s Social Media Management team will apply the best practices to scale for your business. Or, for $195/mo, you can have access to the So Shell Social Media Dashboard to unleash your full potential. Touch HERE to get started today! Chapter V: Reports and Insights
We all have heard the social media adage “Content is King.” Quality content that matches your audience’s needs and desires is important. However, the real magic is in reporting and optimization. Your audience will tell you what content is preferred and what services you offer are more effective through monitoring your social media performances and ad delivery. Here are some important key terms to know when working with a marketing expert on social media performance in order to help your business unlock the secrets to optimization.
Key Performance Indicators
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are metrics that marketing experts and business owner should be watching in order to understand the success of a campaign and can optimize through A/B testing, audience tailoring, and ensuring best practices are being implemented in use of social media marketing through organic performance, paid direct response or lead generation, and viral outreach. There are two main business objectives that all advertising falls under: Brand Awareness and Direct Response. Although the two are not mutually exclusive and one can be achieved while fulfilling the other objective, it is important to know what is the primary objective and to know how each will affect your short-term and long-term business goals.
Brand Awareness
Brand Awareness is the extent to which a brand is recognized by potential customers, and is correctly associated with a particular product. Brand awareness is typically the primary goal of advertising in the early months or years of a product's introduction. The metrics that need monitoring during a brand awareness is audience size, engagement percentage, and total reach.
Audience Size
No matter what stage your business is in, you'll want to start or continue to grow your social media audience. The more people you can reach on social media organically and through advertising, the better your launch and your on-going sales will be. Whether your ads gain Followers or PAge Likes, your brand will gain repeated audience members as long as you target appropriately and shape your future content with their interests in mind. Engagement Percentage
Engagement ads help you share information about your business with people. You can use them to extend your posts beyond your channel and inspire people to take action. And with insights like how many people liked, shared or commented on your ad, these ads help you understand the kinds of stories and content your audience likes, so you can create more of what they love. These ads are important because brands stumbleupon brand cheerleaders that may spread the gospel for you virally! Engagement is usually reported as a percentage of total actions (likes, shares, clicks) versus the size of the audience. Some platforms call this metric CTR (All) or “Click-Through Rate of all Actions”.
Reach
Increasing Reach is tricky. Not only do marketers need to know what demographics and interests their Followers and Page Likes have, but they need to understand the properties of the people just outside of their circle that your brand could fulfill a service that bridges the gap! Seeing these areas of opportunity is the most difficult, and most lucrative ability of social media.
Direct Traffic
What Is a Conversion? Conversion in advertising means that an action is verified from the effects of advertising. Common conversions can be time on site, three page loads in a visit, an item has been added to an online shopping cart, and purchases. Beware the snake oil salesmen! An increasing amount of ad agencies and marketers are inflating conversions by changing the definition to something that is not valuable to a business owner, and they are doing it without communicating effectively. Time and time again our team has been on a screenshare with marketing partners where a conversion is being reported for “30 seconds spent on a website” without asking their client, “is 30 seconds on your website worth something to your business?” Below are some valuable conversions defined, so you know what to ask or report on to savvy business owners and honest marketers alike.
Clicks Traffic from an ad to an external website. Please make sure your marketing team is not inflating this number by including internal links on a site or clicks for extraneous actions on social media as a result of your ad. You do not want to be paying for actions that do not lead to business. Leads Information collected from an interested individual or team that may be used for email contact lists, phone calls, or retargeting ads for your business’ services, information, or products.
Online Sales Bonafide money in the bank as a result from an ad they saw online. Usually tracked with pixels installed on your website, online sales conversions can report on “Cost Per Conversion” and can get so granular that experienced marketers can predict how much money you will make from your investment. This is the best case scenario and what every business owner that uses digital marketing is trying to obtain or optimize.
In- Store Visit Bonafide human beings in a physical location in response to an ad they saw online! This is the new kid on the block and is trackable on platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat through geo-location tracking.
Peak Times
Maybe your ads are showing at times that your audience is not on a platform, or the platform you are showing your ads is not the best platform to sell your specific product or service.
Core Demographics Interests, purchase behaviors, geographical location, age, sex, relationship status… these are all the options we must consider for any online ad targeting and voice creation. Understanding how to read these metrics and segment wasted money will help your business earn better relevancy scores, lower cost-per-clicks, and more impressions delivered per each dollar you invest in your online presence.
As you now know, there are still many questions you may have about key performance indicators and how to optimize your content, targeting and schedules to ensure you are delivering the most effective digital strategy for your business. Let Fasturtle, a Google Partner, deliver an arsenal of online solutions to give you a competitive advantage. Our team of consultants will give you the keys to unlock the secrets to success on social media. Through support, consultations, updates and reporting, Fasturtle is your go-to social media gurus. Our So Shell Scheduler is the state-of-the-art dashboard to assist your business in creating, editing, scheduling and responding on all of your social media channels! For $595/mo, Fasturtle’s Social Media Management team will apply the best practices to scale for your business. Or, for $195/mo, you can have access to the So Shell Social Media Dashboard to unleash your full potential. Touch HERE to get started today! Chapter VI: Optimization
Not all age groups and genders perform the same. You may discover that you’re wasting your money on unprofitable age categories or that you’re missing opportunities by not dedicating enough budget to a gender that is generating the majority of sales for a given target method. The best way to analyze age group and gender performance is to log into your ad manager and click on Reports. But maybe you are running ads on the wrong platform or not enough platforms? There are so many ways to deliver your ads that more brands and choosing to diversify their social media presence by aligning the right campaign with the optimized platform and ad type.
Choosing Medium
Facebook / Instagram Right-Hand Rail Ads – When it comes to the different options Facebook provides, the right-hand rail ad is one of the most basic to choose from. While it may not provide the best performance in terms of click-through-rates, it is significantly less expensive than other available options and can be conducive to retargeting on Facebook. These ads are only visible on the right side column and permit the display of a title, image, short description, and URL.
Link Ads – Link ads are the most common of available Facebook ads. These are homed in the right column, on the mobile platform, and most importantly, in the Newsfeed. The ad allows for a large image, text descriptions, headlines, a URL, and Facebook interaction (being liked, commented on, or shared). Generally, they are effective in grabbing a user’s attention, and as a result, often perform well.
Multi-Product / Carousel Ads – Since its release, the carousel format has become a popular choice among product ads. The ad permits the display of up to five products within a single ad – each with its own picture, link, and title – giving users the ability to scroll through all listed items. The carousel is mainly visible in both mobile and desktop Newsfeeds, as well as on the right hand side – although, here, the ad layout is slightly different. Giving audiences the ability to see an array of products is immensely beneficial, but also helps to determine which products are doing better than others so you can adjust advertising displays accordingly.
Lead Ads – Simple and exactly as the name implies, Facebook Lead ads are a great way to garner leads. They provide a method in which gathering information from potential customers, such as an email address, is straightforward and non-invasive. They allow users to easily sign up for information and company offerings without leaving the site. Lead ads are displayed in mobile and desktop Newsfeeds.
Canvas Ads – One of the newest, and perhaps most intriguing, ads in Facebook’s arsenal is the Canvas Ad. The ad type, which is only available on mobile, was designed to provide prospective customers with an immersive ad experience by implementing interactive elements like animations, carousels, product catalogs, images, and videos – all within a single ad. While Canvases are presented to audiences through standard Newsfeed ads, they are completely different from the ads most have familiarized themselves with and can be more attractive to prospective customers than other ad types. Canvas Ads are the same cost as a standard Newsfeed ad and can be created through Facebook’s self-serve creation tool.
Dynamic Ads – Presented in a number of different ad formats, Dynamic Ads (formerly known as Dynamic Product Ads) allow businesses to retarget specific audiences, creating relevant and timely ads based on products and pages people have visited on their website or app. To do this, you’ll need to implement Facebook’s pixels on specified pages of your site or application. After setting up a Dynamic Ad, data can be drawn to present prospective customers with relevant ads based on aspects such as products browsed in the past or keywords searched.
Photo Ads – Early adopters of the Instagram platform will be familiar with this ad type, as it takes after the network’s original business model: photo sharing. The photo ad type, simply put, is a promoted image. It assists in visualizing your brand’s story or personality through static imagery. The majority of its structure mirrors that of organic posts, consisting of a photo and a description to utilize. The key difference is it also has a call-to-action, sending users to an offer or landing page.
Video Ads – Video ads offer virtually all of the same features as its photo counterpart. The main difference being, as you probably guessed, a video format in place of the static image. Video ads provide visuals, audio, and up to 60 seconds of play time (up 30 from its original limit). Text descriptions and call-to-actions are readily available as well.
Product Cards – Generally considered one of the best for retailers, this format gives brands the ability to display their content or product in an informative way. The Card type is designed to showcase a brand’s products with an image, description, and a designated area for other aspects you may want to include, such as price or product rating.
Summary Cards – These cards are suited for a variety of different ad offerings. Whether it’s promoting blog content, news articles, product pages, or business descriptions – the Summary Card is designed to give users a preview of the the content before clicking through to the website. The ad consists of a title, description, thumbnail image, and a direct link to your website.
Summary Card with Large Image – The format provides the ability to display a single, large image or a gallery of photos. The Summary Card with Large Image features a large, full-width prominent image alongside a tweet. It is designed to give the reader a rich photo experience, and clicking on the image brings the user to your website.
Lead Generation Card – Collecting highly qualified leads is a pivotal component of a retailer’s business model. Twitter’s Lead Generation Card is designed to assist in doing so through this expanded Tweet, allowing users to easily share their information with a business. When the ad is expanded, users see a description of the offer and a customizable call-to-action; which will already have their information pre-filled and ready to submit.
Website Cards – Generally used to increase site traffic, drive sales conversions, or a host of other specific actions, the Website Card is focused on, as the name implies, getting users onto your site. Designed with the intent of implementing an image, description, link, and call-to-action, this ad type is one of the most commonly used.
Player Cards – Marketing campaigns that include the use of music, videos, and GIFs can utilize the Player Card. Users have the ability to watch content within the Tweet without being re-directed elsewhere. The ad type can be particularly effective, as it attracts attentions and allows users to interact with the content.
Conversational Cards – One of Twitter’s newest ad types, Conversational Cards, aims to make it easier for users to engage with and spread a brand’s message. Implementing many components from other card types, the Conversational Card distinguishes itself by including a call-to-action that prompts a user to choose a customizable hashtag. When a CTA is pressed, a pre-populated brand message is opened and users can personalize and share it with their followers.
LinkedIn Display and Text Ads - These ads appear up in a number of places, such as the user’s inbox and on the side and bottom of the homepage. Self-service display ads give you the ability to include an image or video, as well as ad copy.
Sponsored Content - Once your page creates an update, you have the ability to pay to have that update distributed to a larger audience on the LinkedIn network. Where other ads show up on the sides or at the tops of pages, sponsored content appears right in the user’s news stream, which will typically lead to more engagement.
Premium Display Ads - These display ads feature the same targeting features as the self-serve ads. However, they differ in both the placement and size of the ads that you’re able to serve your audience. There are four different display ad formats available for these marketers.
Follow Company Ads - These are ads that appear on a user’s page in order to encourage them to follow your company. There are two main reasons that you’d want to create these types of ads. You can create them to increase your brand’s credibility on the social network, or you could do it because once someone is following you, you can use a Company Update to promote content to them for free.
Recommendation Ads - These ads appear on a number of different locations and can help advertisers showcase a specific product. The ad shows the company name, the product, the amount of people who have recommended the product, and buttons for users to recommend or share the product.
Join-Group Ads - Groups are a great way to get communities to engage with one of your products. If you’re looking to increase the amount of users you have participating in a group, this is the way to do it. These ads will show the name of your group, a brief description of the topics that will be discussed, and a clear call to action button asking users to join.
Pinterest Promoted Pins – A user on Pinterest is presented with a single news feed that is littered with pins based on selected interests. Promoted pins are similar to organic pins, with the exception that they are paid for by retailers to gain exposure. These paid pins increase visibility to relevant search results, category feeds, and offer placement across more user feeds. Charges are accrued each time an ad is clicked.
Cinematic Pins – Cinematic pins have many of the same offerings as the standard promoted pin format, but instead differ in the visuals it can display. Instead of a static image, advertisers are able to apply an animation that interacts with the user’s movement as they navigate the page.
Buyable Pins – Buyable Pins are Pinterest’s latest addition to their ad formats. These pins give users the ability to purchase an item from the ad without ever having to leave the Pinterest site. The ad, which was only featured on mobile until recently, has now been brought to desktops as well. Currently, Buyable Pins are only available to select retailers and businesses using platforms like Shopify, Demandware, BigCommerce, IBM Commerce, and Magento. With plans of integrating more platforms in the future, businesses will have to get on the list for Buyable Pins until they become widely available. Snapchat
Snap Ads - Snap Ads begin with an up to 10-second vertical video, and then offer the option to add an interactive element one swipe away.
Sponsored Geofilters - When Snapchatters in the location(s) of your choice take a Snap, they’ll be able to see your Geofilter and use it to explain where, when, and why they took the Snap.
Sponsored Lenses - Sponsored Lenses offer a completely new take on brand activation, offering not just an impression, but “play time” — the time Snapchatters spend playing with the interactive ad you’ve created. When Snapchatters are finished playing, sending Lenses to friends or posting to Stories is just a tap away!
Perfecting Headlines
Other than an image or video attached to a social media ad, the next important piece of copy that will determine how many desired reactions you will receive from your ad is the Headline. The best advice is that marketers need to follow suit with the click-bait kings Buzzfeed, Upworthy and Gawker by following these social media friendly guidelines for Headlines: ● You HAVE to write 25 headlines for every piece of content ● You WILL write some really awful headlines ● Once you start getting desperate, you think outside of the box ● You MUST write 25 headlines ● #24 will be awful. Then #25 will be a gift from the healdine gods and will make you a legend. ● Accept that not every headline is perfect. ● You MUST write 25 headlines. ● With practice, you will write 25 headlines in 15 minutes and then you may lower your limit. ● Write 25 headlines.
Your headline needs to follow the Four U’s in order to receive a higher relevancy score during the initial bid for cost per click and cost per thousand impressions. This will lower your cost and increase your reach, just by checking that your headline follows these four points: 1. Urgent 2. Unique 3. Useful 4. Ultra-Specific
Strong Links
Part of the deciding factors that exist to ensure your social media ads perform well is the strength of the site that the ad is linked. On page optimizations such as URL structure, sitemaps, page titles, keyword relevancy, usability, search results presentation, headers, content, keyword variance, content length, image optimization, outbound links, page load speed, layout, and readability all help ensure that your ad bids beat the competition and that social media users find the ad useful for obtaining information, services, or products.
Free Backlink Sources
External websites pointing to your site is a very good signal for SEO. But according to the Google webmaster team, low quality links are not helpful for search ranking because backlinks are best from high PR domains and pages. I found some high quality sites where you can get high quality backlinks without paying money. Many marketing companies sell backlinks building services for an amount like $100, $200 or $500, but according to Google, buying backlinks is kind of spam and it may give your website a punishment of Google ranking. Manual link building is the best way to get quality and premium backlinks without paying money.
Before you’ll start building links from below sources, note that some sources will automatically add a no-follow tag in your website link and some not. There are some sources that say no-follow links still provide authority with SEO benefits. To check whether a source adds no-follow tag to external links or not, just search any public post on the site, find an external link and inspect the link element (Right-click > Inspect).
Getting backlinks from your industry sources is the best technique to build links. However, these sources will help in the meantime.
Unique Backlinks Sources 1) Google+ Profiles (PR: 9) If you don’t have an Google+ profile or business page, so please go create it and write something in your profile about, the story and introduction section. While writing, add your site links and get dofollow inbound links.
You should write a large description on the ‘about’ section and link more text to your site. Also, inform your staff and workers to link back from their Google+ profiles to get more links from Google+.
2) SlideShare (PR: 8) SlideShare is community of presentation, where people upload and share slides built with PowerPoint, PDF, Keynote or OpenDocument. If you have a LinkedIn account, then go upload a presentation and link back to your site from profile and description field.
3) Dailymotion (PR: 8) Dailymotion is a video-sharing website and an alternative to YouTube. It’s easy to get backlinks from Dailymotion, just upload your YouTube videos on Dailymotion and add your website links in the description field.
4) Dribbble (PR: 7) Dribbble is a community for designers, and you need an image or design shot to upload and link back from the description field. Use Flaticons and Free photo stock to create a designer like shot in Photoshop.
5) Academia.edu (PR: 8) Academia.edu is the only social networking website whose domain extension is .edu. Upload documents, papers related to the research and add external links in the document. Your document will automatically preview in HTML on the site.
Social & Media Sources 6) Reddit (PR: 8) Reddit is a social network of external links, and community member can easily submit web content links such as article, images, videos and more. Write a text post to get better backlinks benefits from Reddit.
7) Digg (PR: 7) Digg is a news aggregator and getting links from Digg will need a high quality article related to the latest news. Digg didn’t add no-follow tag because publishers are their main content.
8) Imgur (PR: 6) Imgur is an image hosting website and a brilliant source to get free GIFs. Share an image or GIF on Imgur and add links in the image description field. You can create an animated GIF from video and share on the site.
9) Flickr (PR: 9) Flickr is a photo and video hosting website and this is a useful source to get free images for web contents. Many blogs and sites use Flickr images for their article and products content and link back to the creator’s website. Share some images on Flickr and add links in the description field.
10) DeviantArt (PR: 7) DeviantArt is a community made for Artists and designers. Submit an Art or publish a journal entry to get a link back from the source. Email verification is required in order to write a journal entry.
Free Blog Sources 11) WordPress.com Create a free blog with WordPress and publish posts related to your website with your site links. If you don’t have any idea, simply explore WordPress.com blogs and read some top posts.
12) BlogSpot Blogger is a most popular free blogging platform made by Google. Simply create a free blog with blogger and publish posts with your website links.
13) Tumblr Tumblr is a microblogging platform and social network lets you create a free blog and share posts.
14) Weebly Weebly is a good way when it comes to creating and launch a free website, store or blog. Use this platform to get backlinks for your site.
15) Wix Wix is the other way to create free blogs and add Do-follow links in your free blog pages.
Community & Forums Sources 16) Quora (PR: 7) Quora is a question and answer website where you can ask questions related to any industry such as Technology, Health, Science, Shopping, Services, Internet, and more. Ask a new question in Quora with your website link.
17) WordPress Support Forum (PR: 9) Wordprees.org support is a really high quality source and it useful for marketing and blogging websites. Moderators are very strict, so please ask a genuine question related to WordPress, Themes and Plugins.
18) Apple Support (PR: 8) Apple support is a community to ask and find questions related to the Apple products. It’s required Apple ID to ask a question in the community. You can easily create an Apple ID without a credit card.
19) Microsoft Answers (PR: 8) Microsoft Answers is a community and a forum for asking and answering questions related to Microsoft products, such as Windows, Office, Devices, and more.
20) Stack Overflow (PR: 7) Stack Overflow is a question and answer website for programmers, where you can ask and find questions related to programming languages. Put your links in question or answer field.
This is only a small part of Search Engine Optimization that we have shared in this book that any social media manager could manage. Truth be told, there is so much information available to optimize your business’ searchability, it would require several ebooks to teach all of this information. If your business needs Search Engine Optimization, please look into the packages available from Fasturtle HERE. Deciding Paid Budget
Before you spend another penny on Facebook advertising, you need to have a plan of action. Otherwise, you’ll be flying blind with no clear idea of where you want to go.
To see consistent results, identify where in your sales funnel you can leverage Facebook ads. Answer these four questions to help define your strategy: ● What’s your objective for Facebook advertising? For example, do you want to generate new leads for your business, sales for your ecommerce store, or subscribers to your blog? ● Do you have existing or consistent website traffic? ● Do you have an email list? If so, is it active and how many people are on your list? ● Can you create unique content about your business/industry? Let’s now look at three Facebook advertising strategies you can use based on your answers to these questions.
Provide free content to warm up your audience. Content marketing is one of the most effective ways to differentiate your business and warm up cold audiences. Provide free valuable content that entertains, educates, or inspires your ideal customer. You could use videos, lead magnets (guides, checklists, coupons etc.), or blog posts, for example.
Expanding Reach
Once a campaign has gone live, you’ll want to dive into all of the available data to measure and optimize for performance. In Facebook’s Ads Manager, you are provided with results on the most useful data to your campaign. All of the garnered statistics can be broken down by campaign, ad set, or a specific ad in particular – with the ability to categorize based on what’s of importance to you.
The bulk of the data will report the campaign information you hold most relevant, such as total ad spend, completed objectives the campaign has generated (clicks, conversions, likes, etc), the average cost of campaigns, and the frequency – the number of times an ad has been displayed to a unique visitor.
In analyzing specific ads, you can compare the metrics of each to others in the same campaign and optimize accordingly. A campaign analysis provides data on things like low click-through-rates, low impressions, or even in determining if the cost is too high when weighed against actions being earned.
While the value in the breakdown of data and metrics will vary depending on importance to your advertising strategies, Facebook’s reporting tools are designed to help facilitate answers to many of the questions you may have regarding a campaign’s performance.
Thank You From Fasturtle
Social Media is the future of business marketing. It allows for brands and businesses to make the world a better place by enabling communication with potential customers for a low cost, while customers can communicate how a business can serve their needs more effectively.
Just by reading this information to the end, you have demonstrated understanding of the social media’s significance as a tool to grow your business and the impact it can have on the world. Your business needs more leads, more calls, more creative engagement and more digital marketing strategy. Let Fasturtle, a Google Partner, deliver an arsenal of online solutions to give you a competitive advantage. Our team of consultants will give you the keys to unlock the secrets to success on social media. Through support, consultations, updates and reporting, Fasturtle is your go-to social media gurus. Our So Shell Scheduler is the state-of-the-art dashboard to assist your business in creating, editing, scheduling and responding on all of your social media channels! For $595/mo, Fasturtle’s Social Media Management team will apply the best practices to scale for your business. Or, for $195/mo, you can have access to the So Shell Social Media Dashboard to unleash your full potential. Touch HERE to get started today!
Content Calendar
Here it is! We promised you a calendar of marketing holidays to help you create exciting and fresh content to help connect your brand to new potential customers.
January
2: Science Fiction Day #ScienceFictionDay 4: National Trivia Day #NationalTriviaDay 5: National Bird Day #NationalBirdDay 8: Clean Off Your Desk Day #CleanOffYourDeskDay 11: Human Trafficking Awareness Day #HumanTraffickingDay 13: National Sticker Day #NationalStickerDay 15: Martin Luther King, Jr. Day #MLKDay National Hat Day #NationalHatDay 18: Get to Know Your Customers Day #GetToKnowYourCustomersDay 20: Cheese Lovers Day #CheeseLoversDay World Day of Social Justice #SocialJusticeDay 24: National Compliment Day #NationalComplimentDay 25: Community Manager Appreciation Day #CMAD Opposite Day #OppositeDay 28: Data Privacy Day #PrivacyAware
February
2: Groundhog Day #GroundhogDay World Wetlands Day #WorldWetlandsDay 4: World Cancer Day #WorldCancerDay Super Bowl Sunday #SB52 5: National Weatherperson’s Day #NationalWeatherpersonsDay 7: National Send a Card to a Friend Day #SendACardToAFriendDay 8: National Boy Scouts Day #BoyScoutsDay 9: National Pizza Day #NationalPizzaDay 11: Inventors Day #InventorsDay 13: Mardi Gras #MardiGras World Radio Day #WorldRadioDay 14: Valentine's Day #ValentinesDay 16: Chinese New Year #YearOfTheDog 17: Random Acts of Kindness Day #RandomActsOfKindnessDay 18: National Battery Day #NationalBatteryDay 19: Presidents Day #PresidentsDay 20: Love Your Pet Day #LoveYourPetDay 21: International Mother Language Day #IMLD
March
1: National Peanut Butter Lover's Day #PeanutButterLoversDay 2: National Read Across America Day #ReadAcrossAmerica & #DrSeuss 3: National Day of Unplugging #NationalDayOfUnplugging 4: National Grammar Day #NationalGrammarDay 6: National Dentist's Day #DentistsDay 7: National Be Heard Day #NationalBeHeardDay National Cereal Day #NationalCerealDay National Pancake Day #NationalPancakeDay 8: International Women's Day #BeBoldForChange National Proofreading Day #NationalProofreadingDay 9: Popcorn Lover's Day #PopcornLoversDay 10: National Pack Your Lunch Day #NationalPackYourLunchDay National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day #NWGHAAD 11: National Worship of Tools Day #WorshipOfToolsDay 12: National Girl Scout Day #GirlScoutDay Daylight Savings #DaylightSavings 13: National Napping Day #NationalNappingDay 14: Potato Chip Day #NationalPotatoChipDay Pi Day #PiDay 15: World Consumer Rights Day #WCRD2017 16: National Freedom of Information Day #FreedomOfInformationDay 17: St. Patrick's Day #StPatricksDay World Sleep Day #WorldSleepDay 18: Awkward Moments Day #NationalAwkwardMomentsDay 19: National Let's Laugh Day #NationalLetsLaughDay 20: International Day of Happiness #InternationalDayofHappiness World Storytelling Day #WorldStorytellingDay First Day of Spring #FirstDayofSpring 21: International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination #RacialDiscriminationDay World Poetry Day #WorldPoetryDay 22: World Water Day #WorldWaterDay 23: National Puppy Day #NationalPuppyDay 24: Red Nose Day #RedNoseDay 25: Earth Hour Day #EarthHour Tolkien Reading Day #TolkienReadingDay 26: National Spinach Day #NationalSpinachDay Purple Day #PurpleDay 28: American Diabetes Association Alert Day #AmericanDiabetesAssociationAlertDay 30: Doctor's Day #NationalDoctorsDay National Take a Walk in the Park Day #NationalWalkInTheParkDay 31: World Backup Day #WorldBackupDay Transgender Day of Visibility #TDOV
April
1: April Fools Day #AprilFools 2: World Autism Awareness Day #WAAD 3: Find a Rainbow Day #FindARainbowDay 4: Hug a Newsperson Day #HugANewsperson 5: National Walking Day #NationalWalkingDay 7: World Health Day #LetsTalk 10: National Siblings Day #NationalSiblingsDay Encourage a Young Writer Day #EncourageAYoungWriterDay 11: National Pet Day #NationalPetDay 12: International Day of Human Space Flight #InternationalDayOfHumanSpaceFlight 14: Equal Pay Day #EqualPayDay 16: National Wear Your Pajamas to Work Day #PJDay 17: Haiku Poetry Day #HaikuPoetryDay 18: National Columnist Day #NationalColumnistDay National Tax Day #TaxDay 20: National Look-Alike Day #NationalLookAlikeDay Get to Know Your Customers Day #GetToKnowYourCustomersDay National High-Five Day #NH5D 22: Earth Day #EarthDay2017 23: National Picnic Day #NationalPicnicDay World Book Day #WorldBookDay 25: National Telephone Day #NationalTelephoneDay World Malaria Day #EndMalariaForGood 26: National Administrative Professionals Day #AdministrativeProfessionalsDay 27: National Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day #COUNTONME Denim Day #DenimDay 28: Arbor Day #ArborDay 29: International Dance Day #InternationalDanceDay 30: National Honesty Day #NationalHonestyDay National Adopt a Shelter Pet Day #AdoptAShelterPetDay International Jazz Day #JazzDay
May
1: May Day #MayDay International Workers Day #IntWorkersDay 2: Thank a Teacher Day #ThankATeacher World Asthma Day #WorldAsthmaDay 3: World Press Freedom Day #WPFD2017 #PressFreedom 4: World Password Day #WorldPasswordDay Star Wars Day #StarWarsDay International Firefighters Day #InternationalFirefightersDay 5: Cinco de Mayo #CincoDeMayo Space Day #SpaceDay 6: National Nurses Day #NursesDay 7: National Lemonade Day #NationalLemonadeDay 9: Europe Day #EuropeDay 10: National Receptionist Day #NationalReceptionistDay 12: National Limerick Day #NationalLimerickDay 14: Mother's Day #MothersDay 15: International Day of Families #FamilyDay 16: Love a Tree Day #LoveATreeDay 17: International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia #IDAHOT2017 19: National Bike to Work Day #BTWD Endangered Species Day #EndangeredSpeciesDay 21: National Memo Day #NationalMemoDay 24: National Scavenger Hunt Day #NationalScavengerHuntDay 26: Heat Awareness Day #NoFryDay 27: National Hugging Day #NationalHuggingDay 28: Hamburger Day #NationalHamburgerDay 29: Memorial Day #MemorialDay #MDW Paperclip Day #PaperclipDay 31: World No-Tobacco Day #NoTobacco
June
1: Global Day of Parents #GlobalDayOfParents International Children’s Day #ChildrensDay 2: Leave The Office Early Day #LeaveTheOfficeEarlyDay National Donut Day #NationalDonutDay 4: Civic Day of Hacking #HackForChange National Cancer Survivor’s Day #NCSD2017 5: World Environment Day #WorldEnvironmentDay 6: Higher Education Day #HigherEducationDay 8: World Oceans Day #WorldOceansDay Best Friends Day #BestFriendsDay 14: World Blood Donor Day #GiveBlood National Flag Day #FlagDay 18: Father’s Day #FathersDay 20: World Refugee Day #WithRefugees 21: National Selfie Day #NationalSelfieDay World Music Day #WorldMusicDay International Yoga Day #InternationalYogaDay First Day of Summer 23: Take Your Dog to Work Day #TakeYourDogToWorkDay 27: National Sunglasses Day #NationalSunglassesDay 29: National Handshake Day #HandshakeDay 30: Social Media Day #SMDay
July
1: National Postal Worker Day #NationalPostalWorkerDay 2: World UFO Day #WorldUFODay 4: Independence Day 7: World Chocolate Day #WorldChocolateDay 11: Cheer Up the Lonely Day #CheerUpTheLonelyDay 12: Malala Day #MalalaDay 15: Give Something Away Day #GiveSomethingAwayDay 17: World Emoji Day #WorldEmojiDay 18: Nelson Mandela International Day #MandelaDay 20: Get to Know Your Customers Day #GetToKnowYourCustomersDay Moon Day #MoonDay 28: Talk in an Elevator Day #TalkInAnElevatorDay 30: International Day of Friendship #DayOfFriendship
August
1: Respect for Parents Day #RespectForParentsDay 2: National Coloring Book Day #NationalColoringBookDay 8: International Cat Day #InternationalCatDay 9: National Book Lovers Day #NationalBookLoversDay 10: National Lazy Day #LazyDay 11: National Sons and Daughters Day #SonsAndDaughtersDay 12: International Youth Day #YouthDay World Elephant Day #WorldElephantDay 13: International Lefthanders Day #LefthandersDay 15: National Relaxation Day #NationalRelaxationDay 16: National Tell a Joke Day #NationalTellAJokeDay 19: World Photo Day #WorldPhotoDay World Humanitarian Day #WorldHumanitarianDay 20: National Radio Day #NationalRadioDay 23: National Hug Your Boss Day #HugYourBossDay 26: National Dog Day #NationalDogDay National Women’s Equality Day #WomensEqualityDay
September
4: Labor Day #LaborDay National Wildlife Day #NationalWildlifeDay 5: International Day of Charity #CharityDay 6: Read a Book Day #ReadABookDay 8: Stand Up To Cancer Day #KissCancerGoodbye International Literacy Day #LiteracyDay 10: National Grandparents Day #NationalGrandparentsDay 11: National Day of Service #911Day 12: National Day of Encouragement #DayOfEncouragement National Video Games Day #NationalVideoGamesDay 19: Talk Like a Pirate Day #TalkLikeAPirateDay 21: International Day of Peace #PeaceDay Miniature Golf Day #MiniGolfDay 22: Car-Free Day #CarFreeDay Hobbit Day #HobbitDay First Day of Fall 25: Family Day #FamilyDay 26: European Day of Languages #EDL2017 27: World Tourism Day #WTD2017 National Women’s Health and Fitness Day #FitnessDay 28: World Rabies Day #WorldRabiesDay National Good Neighbor Day #GoodNeighborDay 30: International Podcast Day #InternationalPodcastDay
October
1: International Day of Older Persons #UNDOP International Coffee Day #InternationalCoffeeDay World Vegetarian Day #WorldVegetarianDay 2: International Day of Nonviolence #InternationalDayOfNonviolence World Habitat Day #WorldHabitatDay 3: National Techies Day #TechiesDay 4: World Animal Day #WorldAnimalDay National Taco Day #NationalTacoDay 5: World Teachers Day #WorldTeachersDay 6: World Smile Day #WorldSmileDay 10: World Mental Health Day #WorldMentalHeathDay 11: International Day of the Girl #DayOfTheGirl 12: World Sight Day #WorldSightDay 13: National Train Your Brain Day #TrainYourBrainDay 14: National Dessert Day #DessertDay 15: Global Handwashing Day #GlobalHandwashingDay 16: World Food Day #FoodDay Bosses Day #BossesDay Clean Your Virtual Desktop Day #CleanYourVirtualDesktopDay 17: International Day for the Eradication of Poverty #EndPoverty 19: Get to Know Your Customers Day #GetToKnowYourCustomersDay 20: World Statistics Day #StatisticsDay 21: Reptile Awareness Day #ReptileAwarenessDay 24: United Nations Day #UNDay 25: Greasy Foods Day #GreasyFoodsDay 29: Internet Day #InternetDay 30: National Publicist Day #NationalPublicistDay Checklist Day #ChecklistDay 31: Halloween #Halloween
November
1: World Vegan Day #WorldVeganDay National Authors Day #NationalAuthorsDay National Cook For Your Pets Day #CookForYourPetsDay 3: National Sandwich Day #NationalSandwichDay 4: Stress Awareness Day #StressAwarenessDay National Candy Day #NationalCandyDay 5: Daylight Saving Time Ends #DaylightSavings 8: National Cappuccino Day #CappuccinoDay Science, Technology, Engineering, and Medicine (STEM) Day #STEMDay 11: Veterans Day #VeteransDay 13: World Kindness Day #WKD 14: World Diabetes Day #WDD 15: Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day #CleanOutYourRefrigeratorDay America Recycles Day #BeRecycled 16: International Day for Tolerance #ToleranceDay 17: International Students Day #InternationalStudentsDay 19: International Men’s Day #InternationalMensDay 20: Universal Children’s Day #UNChildrensDay 21: World Hello Day #WorldHelloDay National Entrepreneurs Day #EntrepreneursDay 23: Thanksgiving Day #Thanksgiving 24: National Day of Listening #DayOfListening 25: Small Business Saturday #ShopSmall 26: National Cake Day #NationalCakeDay 27: Cyber Monday #CyberMonday 28: National Day of Giving #GivingTuesday 29: Electronic Greeting Card Day #ElectronicGreetingCardDay 30: Computer Security Day #ComputerSecurityDay December 2017 1: World AIDS Day #WAD2017 National Pie Day #PieDay 3: International Day of Persons with Disabilities #IDPWD 4: National Cookie Day #NationalCookieDay 5: World Soil Day #WorldSoilDay 6: Microwave Oven Day #MicrowaveOvenDay 8: Pretend to Be a Time Traveler Day #PretendToBeATimeTravelerDay 10: Human Rights Day #HumanRightsDay Nobel Prize Day #NobelPrize 11: International Mountain Day #InternationalMountainDay 21: Crossword Puzzle Day #CrosswordPuzzleDay First Day of Winter 29: No Interruptions Day – Last Work Day of the Year #NoInterruptionsDay 31: New Year’s Eve #NYE