“Ahhhhhh F*** I have no idea how to do this”
Does your social media and the word analytics make your feet skips some steps? Is this article already to tech and marketing heavy? Hang in there. This will make your life a lot easier.
Don’t worry first and foremost you’re not alone. We’ve all been there – wanting to throw in the towel with social media for your business. Ok so you’re reading this because you either; love your social and want to level up what you’re doing OR you hate your social media but know you need it to stay connected. Guaranteed you’ve felt the frustration regardless of your love or hate for social media marketing.
Well good news, these tips will make your life easier!
Knowing who you are and aren’t speaking to is essential to building and growing with your community. Get yourself an Ideal Customer Avatar (ICA) and check in with her/him monthly! The more connected you are to this ICA and the deeper understanding of her happiness, inspirations, fears and anxieties the better.
Start by paying attention to what they’re saying (and not saying) on Instagram. Who are they following and what content are they sharing?
Top Tip: Do not skip this and let your ICA develop and grow on a regular basis.
Now this is always a fun one for. Features are the highlights of the product or service you’re selling eg burn 600 calories doing headstands or learn this Beyonce choreo. Whereas benefits make emotional connections and speak to the feeling during or after the event has happened. Eg 2minutes in, I realise I’ve actually overcome my fear of headstands. Or, Imaging struttin’ around with attitude and confidence knowing you nailed that choreo. Always remember you need to connect with WHY your audience are there not WHAT you can offer. That comes later.
Top Tip: Know your audiences why
Find 3 accounts you love and analyse what they are doing well. What they’re not doing well. Look at what their audience is responding most too. Read their comments and explore why this person/brand are successful
Top Tip: Pay attention to the imagery, video, copy and styles you like. What draws you to them and why?
Have you heard of Canva?
This is my number one tool as a business owner. This is an incredible graphic design platform where you can design everything and anything from fliers, video titles, slideshows, presentations, business cards and so much more. The best part – they have 1000’s of templates for you so you don’t need a degree to design beautiful, branded content.
Top Tip: Get Canva Pro NOW (not sponsored just a huge fan and couldn’t live without it)
Bank It Baby. Start with curating loads of content. Curation is when you find other people’s content and repurpose/reuse it to provide value to your audience. You MUST always credit the creator.
Oh damn that’s a scroll stopper. For the next week or two save every single post on IG (or any platform) that makes you stop scrolling. There’s are called scroll stoppers and they’ve grabbed your attention for a reason. After a week you’ll be able to see a theme and have a better idea of what’s catching your eye. You’re also building your Content Bank boom baby two-for-one.
Also get yourself an IG downloader app. I love InSaver as it saves your download list so again you have an easily accessible Content Bank. ALWAYS credit the video source or say something to the effect of “tag the artist please” if you’re unsure.
Before posting anything ask yourself what will my audience gain from this. Not what will I gain from this. Value add content is essential to gaining your following and keeping them.
Top Tip: Get yourself ahead a few weeks so you have space to create freely
Start a never ending note.
This is HUGE and something I’ve always done personally and professionally – start a monthly note in your phone and whip it out immediately when you have a burst of inspiration. Write and write and write. Don’t let those powerful words fade away. Jot them down while they’re fresh and youthful. Then come back to them when you have time to explore them further.
Top Tip: Don’t let your powerful words escape you
When I was starting my agency I researched SOOOO many social media schedulers. And let me be honest… there’s no “best” or “worst”. From my research, it all depends on how much you want to spend.
For those of you who aren’t sure – a scheduler in this context is a digital tool that allows you to schedule social media content and posts as well as report on account activity. There are loads more features but that’s it in a nutshell.
Write down each task you need your perfect schedule to take care of then start a few free dummy accounts to play the field before you commit to just one. Basically it comes down to personal preference and how quick and easy you find each platform.
Sproutsocial, Canva Pro, Hubspot, Hootsuite, Planoly to name a few.
Top Tip: Check out Canva Pro. There’s no point separating your design and scheduler if you can avoid it.
Note – I haven’t tried Canva scheduler it as our agency uses SproutSocial
Yes social media can be a lot like the current Covid-19 guidelines – unclear, trial and error and no one answer for everyone. So it’s our job to get comfortable not having all the answers AND posting anyway.
Make your life that much easier with these Social Media Tips. Focus on these key areas and dedicate time to preparation. The more organised you are the easier it will be.
With social, when you’re speaking to everyone you’re speaking to no one. Make your job easy, get to know your audience and forget the rest. Create your content bank, it’ll give you the breathing room to creative freely.
And finally, NEVER forget there’s a human at the other end of that screen.
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