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2018 Social Media Marketing Planning Guide [Curated Content]

2018 Social Media Marketing Guide

Plan for Social Success in 2018

[This guide was originally published by Simple Measured]

Like the feeling of pulling your “ugly but hilarious” holiday sweater from storage, the arrival of our 2018 Social Planning Guide signals a new year is on its way. Planning next year’s social strategy across teams can feel daunting, but our guide and editable worksheets will have everyone working together.

The Simply Measured planning guide helps you to:

  • Identify and incorporate trends that will keep your messaging current in 2018
  • Outline and capture the social metrics that reflect success for your business
  • Map your social strategy clearly and concisely using our editable worksheets

Download your Social Media Marketing Guide Here

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Boosted Posts vs. Facebook Ads

boosted posts vs. facebook ads

Scratching your head about whether to ‘boost’ a post on Facebook or to utilize the power of Facebook ads?  Boosting a post is sometimes ‘simple’ but not always the best answer to get to the folks that really matter to your brand!  Remember, Facebook is not a spray and pray proposition. Getting into the newsfeeds is getting harder and harder for ranking capability.  Soooo…get ready to dig into your pocketbook, whether boosting or using Facebook ads.

Boosting a post on Facebook, let’s face it, is easy-peasy, as opposed to going behind the scenes and utilizing the awesome tools on Facebook Manager. All you have to do is hit the ‘boost post’ button and off you go, right?  WRONG. Hang on ‘pardner…

In the past, boosting did not have many of the attributes that Facebook Ads Manager had, but now the Boost post button might not be such a bad strategy after all.  You can now actually re-target and optimize your boosts to actually drive traffic for developing your brand followers!  

There are some key factors that come into play when boosting your posts.  You must consider:

  1. What is the goal for the boost?
  2. DO NOT boost a post that does not benefit you, such as a resource post that does not lead back to your website, as an example.
  3. Again, boosting is not a ‘spray and pray’ proposition.  Make sure that you are targeting your demographic for the post.
  4. It’s all about the Facebook Pixel!!!!  In order to get the best traction, make sure that you have installed the Facebook Pixel (it’s FREE) on your website so you can get your tracking enabled.

So why is Facebook Manager a greater preference for ads?  Let’s be frank, candid and honest…Facebook Ads Manager does have a learning curve…no doubt…but it does have the ability for in-depth targeting, which is a HUGE coup! AND AND AND…if you are an organizational freak, the only way to keep completely organized with your ad spend is to create campaigns within Facebook Ads Manager.  You don’t have that ability with boosting posts.

For example, if you want to stay organized on Ads Manager for ‘campaigns,’ you can organize your campaigns strategically:

  • App installs
  • Engagement
  • Brand Awareness
  • Reach
  • Traffic
  • Video Views
  • LeadGen
  • Messages
  • Conversions
  • Product Catalog Sales
  • Store Visits

If you are merely ‘boosting’ a post, you do not have the ability to categorize your ‘boosted posts’ into strategic campaigns on Facebook to examine analytics per campaign goals.

So, to wrap it up quick and easy…boosted posts will help you develop a fan base and reach, and ads can actually help you transition your brand’s presence into tangible brand outcomes!

Stay tuned for more info…lots to share!

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Twitter Tactics

How can you get the most out of Twitter for your business?  We get that question A LOT!  Twitter can be confusing and some may be stumped on how to use Twitter.  When getting started with Twitter, it’s best to take baby steps and then grow from there.  Once you get your feet wet and splash around a little you can’t help but take a swim in the deep end.

Starting Out…

When first with Twitter, use it for two things:

  1. Gather information
  2. Share information

Gathering Information:

Twitter can be extremely valuable for gathering information on a number of topics.  To do this effectively you will want to follow these steps:

  • Follow credible sources who deliver valuable content about the topic you are interested in.  Topics can range anywhere from sports scores, business trends, world news, marketing tactics, etc.
  • As you identify the sources you want to follow, add them to lists in order to sort the feeds by category or topic.  Using lists will help you keep all of the topics you want to follow organized
  • To create a list, follow these steps:
    • Visit your “Lists” section of Twitter by clicking the gear icon drop-down menu or by clicking Lists on your profile page.
    • Click Create List.
    • Name the List & create a description.
    • Mark the List as Public or Private.
    • Save the List.
  • Now that you have your list created, you can easily add sources to the list by:
    • Click on a Twitter user’s profile
    • Click on the person icon drop-down menu on the profile.
    • Choose add or remove from Lists.
    • Choose the List you would like to add the person to or uncheck the List the person was already a member of.
  • Add as many people to your various lists as you would like
  • Check your lists often to get the latest news from your trusted sources

Sharing Information:

Twitter is a great way for you to position yourself as an authority on a certain topic, field or industry.  The trick is to share “tweet-able” information, share it often and on a consistent basis.  A good rule of thumb is to share 21-70 Tweets a week.  That is a minimum of 3 Tweets a day or a maximum of 10 Tweets.  It seems like a lot, but there are a couple of things to remember:  

  1. You are Tweeting sound bites of information that link back to a bigger story (your website, blog, landing page, or another social platform that has more detailed info).
  2. There is only room to Tweet up to 280 characters which is not a very large amount of content.
  3. If you do not maintain a constant flow of information, a single message will get lost in the Twitter-sphere minimizing your opportunity to be found by others.

So What’s “Tweetable?”

We are glad you asked!  Below is a list of some generic ideas to get you started:

  • Industry trends
  • Tips
  • Events
  • Statistics
  • Recommendations
  • Best tools for your industry
  • Links to your blog post
  • Pose questions (this is a great way to encourage engagement)
  • Attention-grabbing graphics
  • Video
  • Quote
  • Poll
  • Follow appreciation post
  • Short and sweet “how-to”
  • Data
  • Something funny

Now that you get the idea of what types of things you should post, it’s time to put a plan into action.  An efficient way of releasing multiple Tweets a day is to use a bulk scheduler like Hootsuite or Buffer.  Visit this blog post to get more information about bulk schedulers.

Happy Tweeting!

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3 Twitter Image Sizes You Need To Be Aware Of

You know the old adage “A picture’s worth a thousand words”, well, that holds true on social media too! The best image with the wrong dimensions can completely derail your plan for the perfect post and kill your quest to go viral.

Make note of these image sizes to ensure you are putting your BEST foot forward on Twitter:

Header/Banner Image:
This is the image that runs across the top of your Twitter profile.

For best results aim for an image that is:

  • 1500 x 500 pixels
  • A recommended file size of 10 MB
  • File format JPG, GIF, or PNG

Profile Picture:
Your profile picture is the square image that sits on the left, bottom side of your header photo.

For best results aim for an image that is:

  • 400 x 400 pixels
  • A recommended file size of 100 KB
  • File format JPG, GIF, or PNG

In-Stream/Newsfeed Image:
This is the image that accompanies your “tweet”.

For best results aim for an image that is:

  • Minimum to appear expanded 440 x 220 pixels
  • Maximum to appear 1024 x 512 pixels
  • Appears in news feed collapsed at 506 x 253 pixels
  • Maximum file size of 5 MB for pictures and 3 MB for animated GIFs

Happy tweeting!

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Utilizing Scheduling Tools

Hootsuite:

HootSuite is a social media communications dashboard used for online brand management. It publishes to social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, and WordPress. It also publishes to Flickr, Tumblr, and YouTube via HootSuite Apps. It is also a Twitter client. We LOVE Hootsuite mostly because of the Twitter management, it keeps everything super organized and easy to manage.

Hootsuite is a social media management platform, created by Ryan Holmes in 2008.[6] The system’s user interface takes the form of a dashboard, and supports social network integrations for Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Google+, YouTube, and much more.[7]

Buffer:

Buffer is an easy way to share content to your Social Media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and will send you a notification for Instagram. Buffer is a strong tool to utilize in your social media marketing strategy.


What it does is simple. Posts in your queue will be sent out automatically by Buffer, according to the posting schedule that you put in place. You can create a custom schedule if you would like, you can upload manually like we do and choose the days and times you would like your posts to go out to certain platforms.

All you need to do is select the social media platform you’d like to customize the posting schedule for, select the Settings tab at the top, and then select Posting Schedule. From here, you can choose which timezone is best for this account and customize the days and times your posts should go out. Select the days you’d like to include and add the individual times you’d like your content to be shared.

It’s like your magic box you can use anytime to fill with great Tweets, Facebook stories or LinkedIn updates. Just drop them in and you don’t have to ever worry about when it will be posted, it’s all taken care of by Buffer for you. Buffer is FREE up to 3 social media platforms and then VERY affordable after that.

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3 Steps to a STRONG Personal Brand

What is a personal brand?  

A personal brand is a feeling, an emotion and an expectation about who you are as a person and and a professional.  Your personal brand tells people what your character is and what they can expect to experience when working with you.  

How Do You Build A Strong Personal Brand?

Our 3-Step process will help you identify what your personal brand looks like.  Once you identify what your personal brand is, it will be your job to nurture, grow and tweak it along the way.

STEP 1:  WHO YOU ARE

Identify 3-6 core values that describe you.  Core values are those things that drive you and make you who your are.  They can be anything from trustworthy, respectful, innovative, leader, etc.

  1. _____________________________________
  2. _____________________________________
  3. _____________________________________
  4. _____________________________________
  5. _____________________________________
  6. _____________________________________

Power Tip:  

Need help?  Use Google to do some research!  Type “List of core values” into the Google search engine and see what comes up.  Select core values that really describe who you are and how you want people to perceive you.

STEP 2:  WHAT YOU DO

Write out a descriptive statement of what problem you are able to provide a solution to.  

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The point of this descriptive is to illustrate how you think and want people to perceive you.

STEP 3:  THE VALUE YOU PROVIDE

Strong personal brands deliver value ALL THE TIME!  With everything they do, there is always a piece of value available.  Two value-focused brands that quickly come to mind are:

Facebook:  Provides people the opportunity to connect with friends, family, and businesses everyday!

Google:  Delivers information instantaneously!  It costs you nothing to do research from the comfort of your own home!

Make a list of all of the pieces of value you offer to your target market:

    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________
    • _______________________________________________________________

 

 

Putting it ALL Together

Now that you have a clear picture of:

  • What makes you who you are
  • The solution you provide
  • The value that you offer…

You begin to see what your brand looks like.  From here, you can go anywhere!  With every piece of marketing you do, the product you deliver or conversation you have, you can design it all to reflect how you want people to perceive you, your business, and the product or service you deliver.

Take It One Step Further…

Put your brand to the test.  Work with a trusted colleague, mentor, or friend, someone who will give feedback, and tell you what you NEED to hear, not what you WANT to hear.  Ask them how they honestly see your brand and the product you deliver.  If they are unable to identify the problem you solve, how valuable your product or service is or if they are unable to identify any of the 6 core values you listed above to describe you and your business, you have some work to do.  You must either change one or all of the steps above or you must change yourself.  

Personal branding is a marathon, not a sprint, and, it is definitely a journey.  You will need to constantly work at it and improve it each and every day.

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Personal Brand or Personal Image. What’s The Difference?

Many times people use the terms personal brand and personal image interchangeably but, they shouldn’t.  There is a BIG difference between the two!  Once you understand the difference between them, it will make a difference in your business.

Let’s dive in…

Personal Image:  

Everyone has one!  It what helps people form a mental picture of you.  Here are some characteristics of a Personal Image:

  • Sense of humor
  • How you talk, the language you use, the accent you have
  • Sense of style
  • Favorite color
  • Your overall preferences of what you like and what you do not like

Personal Brand:  

A personal brand is how people perceive you and it sets the expectation of how you will conduct business with another professional.  Your personal brand:

  • Sets you apart from others in your industry
  • Broadcasts your skill set
  • Describes your work ethic is
  • Provides insight into your character and values
  • Illustrates the expected level value you provide

Think of your personal brand as your professional reputation on steroids.  Your personal brand is the emotion, thought and an idea that is conjured up each and every time your name and business name are mentioned in your target market.   What do you want that thought or idea to be for you and your business?

Now that you know how important your personal brand is, you must protect it at all costs by delivering a consistent message each and every time you interact with your target market whether it be on social media, through a marketing program, during a meeting, consultation or a deliverable product.

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Google Analytics – Top Three Reports Your Need to Run

Google Analytics Reports

Do you know if writing your blogs and sharing them is actually leading to more traffic? Is it helping you reach your business goals?

Maybe not yet, but I wanted to share some help reports through Google Analytics that will help you to see the benefit of the blogs you are writing. We use Google Analytics on nearly all of our client websites because it is free, it is user friendly, and even though some of the data is hidden, it allows us to make clear, actionable changes based on how users are interacting with a website.

Which Google Analytics reports should you run?

Report 1: Audience >> Location/Technology/Mobile Reports

BIMS Presentation – Introduction to Google AnalyticsHere take a look at the Location, Technology, and Mobile reports which will tell you:

  • Where your site visitors are coming from. If you are targeting a very specific location, you will want to make sure visitors are actually coming from here. Or, if you run a specialized campaign on Google Adwords for a conference, for example, you’ll be better understanding if these folks actually came to the site.
  • The Technology and Mobile reports allow you to see if folks are using one browser or device over others. This could sway marketing decisions in the future.
    google analytics reports to run google analytics reports to run

Report 2: Acquisition >> Source/Medium Report

  • The Source/Medium report shows which sites drive traffic to your blog.
  • Within this report you can dive down to Keyword to see how your blogs are translating to organic traffic.

google analytics reports to run google analytics reports to run google analytics reports to run

Report 3: Behavior >> All Pages

  • The All Pages report will show you which pages people are viewing the most frequently.
  • It can give insights into other topics you should be blogging about.

google analytics reports to run google analytics reports to run

Each of these reports can be altered to provide more detail, but these will provide a good start to understanding how visitors get to and interact with your website and blog.

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APPS Are the Answer!

Have you ever seen a business or someone who seems to be able to churn out social media content effortlessly?  You know the the type!  They’re the ones who seem to have a newsworthy tweet on Twitter, an amazing image with the perfect caption on Instagram, a super-cool infographic on Pinterest and an ultra-engaging post on Facebook…on the daily!  How can they possibly do it all AND do their job?

Let’s face it, writing, creating, organizing, graphic design, and scheduling social media posts can be a DAUNTING task.  The good news is, it doesn’t have to be!  As a matter of fact, we know the secret to becoming super-human when it comes to social media.

What’s the secret to effective social media marketing?  A good plan and a collection of APPS to help you get the job done!

3 Apps We Can’t Live Without!

To stay on top of our social media to-do list, we rely on certain apps that we access daily.  After you take them for a spin, we think you will understand why we believe they are the best for helping to create and manage social media efforts efficiently and effectively:

  • Create amazing graphics with Typorama
  • Bulk schedule your social media posts with Hootsuite
  • Stay on top of Facebook engagement with Facebook Pages Manager

Enjoy!

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