"The only thing we have to fear is a ninja dragon with elbow lasers."
"I’ve been using an electric toothbrush, but I think I’ll go acoustic for my next album."
"What’s that thing sneaking up behind you? No peeking!"
"Great minds think alike. I assumed you were thinking about Skittles, too."
These are just a few posts on the Skittles Facebook page. Quite funny, and they highlight a point I want to make: When it comes to social media, content is king.
According to social media consultant, Jeremiah Staes, "People tend to tune out pure marketing messages in social media. The best way to break through that challenge is to be compelling, so that people in diverse yet somewhat connected social circles actually enjoy your stuff and share it themselves."
Generally, social media content should follow the 80/20 rule: At least 80% of your posts should be informative, interesting or entertaining, and about 20% can be used to sell your products or services. If you can wrap sales copy in an attractive package (as the last post I included from Skittles does with humor), all the better. You should spend more time talking withpeople than you do talking at them—folks go onto social media for conversation, entertainment and education, not to read sales pitches. To be effective, content on social media needs to be appealing, relevant and regular. Otherwise, your audience will become bored, disconnected or confused—and winning back these people will be very difficult if not impossible.
Do-it-yourself social media without a content plan, including allocating the time to post at least weekly, and without dedicating a professional writer, is a recipe for frustration and anemic results. The problem is that most corporate people: a) are busy just getting their normal work done and don’t have time to regularly think up and write the kinds of posts people are likely to share b) most are not professional copywriters and c) even the best writers may not understand how to write specifically for social media. A lot of businesses set up Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and a blog because they know they "should" and because they don’t want to be left behind by technology. However, many don’t have a good content plan that will engage their audiences, build trust with their community and customers, strengthen their search engine ranking (SEO) and lead to measurable results down the road. (Go to www.incytemarketing.wordpress.com for more great tips on social media, blogging and search engine optimization.)
A professional social media writer is constantly studying and keeping up with the rapidly-changing trends and technical tweaks in the social media world and in yourindustry, evolving your content strategy accordingly. Not only that, he or she keeps up with the conversations on your sites and responds in a timely manner, with feedback that keeps the buzz going and growing. The professional knows how to use keywords, links, photos, and videos to boost online presence and SEO ratings. They will also skillfully comment, post on and link to outside social media pages and blogs to actively spread your brand messaging to a broader audience than just your fan base, and to increase your following.
Some of our new clients engage our services with the idea that they will take over their social media management once they "learn the ropes." However, most observe the intricate strategy we put into a successful social media marketing program and how efficiently we work, and decide to leave it to the specialists; they see the potential returns of killer content combined with solid strategy as well worth the small investment.
I have to go now. Something is sneaking up behind me, and it’s either a ninja dragon with elbow lasers…or my 7-year-old son with a Nerf gun. Either way, I think I’m in trouble.
For more information, contact Kelly Walker at Incyte Marketing:
kelly@incytemarketing.com
