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My second session of the first day of Inbound14 was intended to be about buyer personas with Julie Kukesh. However, even with coming 15 minutes early it was full.
My backup was Guy Kawasaki and Peg Fitzpatrick’s no-bullshit session on creating the perfect Social Media post.
The session didn’t disappoint. Here are my notes on the session and other thoughts.
Pass The Re-Share Test
The most important concept is that you pass the re-share test. Everything you post should be eligible for a re-share. It should be so informational that they will re-share it to their followers.
The equivalent is that you tell your friends about something you’ve tried or double your tip at a restaurant.
Look at Google+ Ripples. If you don’t get out of your own circles and into other big circles you haven’t succeeded on Google.
On Twitter, you should always look for @mentions or via the new Twitter Analytics dashboard.
Be valuable
Every post should contain value in some form or the other:
- Information
- Analysis
- Assistance
- Entertainment
Use the NPR model when defining whether your social media posts are valuable. Look at your Twitter stream and ensure that you are not just promoting yourself. Always be reviewing your own list.
Don’t post about yourself or post about your company all the time. It’s most likely not interesting for your followers.
If Guy is writing books, he can’t also create content for blogs/social. He specifies the value of curating content.
Be Bold
This is a controversial topic.
As social media marketers, we should be bold. You should take a stand. It’s our responsible.
It gets tougher as a brand, but you can always take stands on specific areas.
Guy Kawasaki shared an example of him taking a bold stand on Gun Control. He goes against the grain as being part of the group that is against the NRA.
You will take heat for taking a stand, but you should always be pissing somebody off on Social Media. If you’re not pissing someone off you are not using Social Media correctly.
Have a zero tolerance for trolls. Block people according to a one-strike and you’re out policy.
Be brief
- Fifty character headline
- Three-sentence body
- Active voice
Think about people who are skimming through quickly. Use bullet points on Google+. If you overthink a social media post, you usually tend to kill your post.
Guy; One of the most underestimated things used in Social Media is bullet points or numbered lists. The blog post gets valued higher by Guy if he sees bullet points or numbered lists.
Credit your source
Always link back to the original content. You should always be thinking about reciprocity. A huge part of the content you share on social media will be from other authors.
Make sure you mention them and credit them, so they are aware of what you are doing.
If you are not sharing other people’s content, why should people share your content?
Out of a top 10 list, Canva will share one of the tips and link to the rest of the article. Don’t take the entire post and take credit for the content.
Always credit the original author the most. Even if you don’t find the content from the original post, then just credit the original author and perhaps the latest person you shared it.
Always include drama (image)
Never go with the standard link image that gets shown on Google+ or
Twitter Tip; Add an image and tag people in that photo without taking up character count. Very useful to tag up to eight extra people without mentioning them inside your tweet and thereby take character space.
# Embrace hashtags
Hashtags tie your content with other people.
Don’t just randomly select hashtags. Be appropriate. Be valuable. Be helpful.
- Twitter; Always use one hashtag.
- Facebook; Should be working, but it’s iffy. Canva uses it though.
- Google+: If you put in two hashtags, publish it and then go back and see what the third hashtag Google+ has guessed for you to use. Google is usually right about the suggested hashtags.
Schedule and spread out your posts
Guy’s favorite subject and tip to get more out of social media.
You need to spread out and schedule your posts to obtain the maximum amount of posts.
Guy shares his content four times 8 hours apart. He tested to see if it works using Bit.Ly:
- Only one post = 1,000 clicks.
- Four posts = 6,000 clicks.
If someone is noticing four posts in your stream within 24 hours it’s not your problem. That person should get a life or find a way to get more followers himself.
Guy Kawasaki recommends using Buffer to share posts on Social Media.
Peg Fitzpatrick recommends SproutSocial.
Keep calm and post often
Guy Kawasaki has a very frequent posting schedule on social media:
- Twitter; 25 posts a day
- Google+; 10 posts a day
- Facebook; 10 posts a day
Guy does get complaints from this heavy posting, but he also gets results. He doesn’t care about the complainers and just tell them to stop following him. He has the UFM acronym; Unfollow Me.
Again, Guy shares an example of sharing the same post four times on Google+ within minutes by mistake. All the post received the same amount of shares/+1s. No complaints, just success.
Cross-post
Both recommends to cross-post your posts on all the various social media. Don’t hold it to only one platform.
Incorporate CTAs from the different platforms into the other platforms. For instance, use Pin It if you are sharing an image.
Check with an“incognito” page
You will be able to see the way that the post is being shown to other people.
You will be surprised to see that other people think
Recommended services from Guy and Peg:
- Buffer; Cross-posting and social media analytics tool
- Social Bro; Twitter analytics tool
- Sprout Social; Cross-posting and social media analytics tool
- Tailwind App; Pinterest optimization software
- TweetDeck; Twitter tool for real-time tracking, organizing, and engagement
Great content sources used by Guy and Peg:
- Alltop
- Feedly
- Holy Kaw
- NPR
- StumpleUpon
Overall it was a great session full of energy and an engaged audience.
