How to shine on socials!

 

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the task of creating fresh social media posts every week.  This usually happens when you lose focus.  These are our top ten tips to help you to create content that connects.

1: Know your audience inside out

I bang on about this endlessly – but that’s because it’s not just useful; it’s the foundation for all your marketing.  If you know your target audience’s demographics, interests, and online behaviour, know when they're active, what content they engage with, and which platforms they prefer it will guide your entire strategy and help you create content that connects.

2: Maintain consistent branding

Use the same logo, colour scheme, fonts, and tone of voice across all platforms.  This creates a congruent brand experience that helps customers recognise your business instantly, whether they see your post on Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn (or see your brand anywhere else).

3: Follow the 80/20 rule

Share valuable, entertaining, or educational content 80% of the time, and promotional content only 20% of the time.  This keeps your audience engaged without making them feel like they're constantly being sold to.  Share your top tips, behind-the-scenes content, customer stories, and helpful resources.  Remember that the more value you deliver, the more engaged your connections will be.

4: Post consistently with a content calendar

Plan your posts in advance, it’s much easier to create good content, when you work in batches.  Whether you use a spreadsheet, Google docs or something else to plan, using scheduling tools like Buffer, Hootsuite, or one of the many other schedulers enables you to upload your posts in one hit and then you can focus your social media activity on responding to likes and comments and engaging with others.

5: Use high-quality visuals

Invest in good photos and graphics, even if you're using your smartphone.  Natural lighting, clean backgrounds, and authentic images of your products or team perform better than stock photos.  Visual content gets significantly more engagement than text-only posts.

6: Engage authentically with your community

Respond promptly to comments, messages, and mentions.  Ask questions in your posts to encourage interaction, share other people’s content to enhance your reputation as a smart curator, and participate in relevant conversations.  Social media is meant to be social – treat it like a two-way conversation, not a broadcasting channel.

7: Leverage local and relevant hashtags

Research hashtags that your target audience actually uses, including location-based tags if you serve a local market.  Mix popular hashtags with more niche ones to expand your reach, while connecting with engaged communities.  Avoid overusing hashtags – quality over quantity.

8: Share behind-the-scenes content

People love seeing the human side of the businesses they follow.  Share your work process, introduce team members, show how products are made, or give glimpses of your workspace.  This creates emotional connections with your audience.  At the end of the day people engage with people, not organisations.

9: Monitor your analytics and adapt

Use platform insights to track which types of content perform best, when your audience is most active, and which posts drive the most engagement or website traffic.  Reviewing performance at least weekly will help to drive your strategy and focus on what actually works for your specific audience.

10: Stay current with platform updates and trends

Social media platforms constantly evolve their algorithms and features.  Stay informed about changes and new opportunities like Instagram Reels, LinkedIn newsletters, or emerging platforms.  However, don't chase every trend – only adopt new features that align with your brand and audience preferences.

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Consistency builds trust and keeps your brand top-of-mind.  Aim for a realistic posting schedule you can maintain long-term rather than burning out with daily posts.

Social media success doesn't happen overnight.  Focus on building genuine relationships with your audience, providing value consistently, and staying true to your brand voice.  Quality engagement from a smaller, targeted audience is often more valuable than having thousands of followers who aren't interested in your business.

‘I don’t agree with that’

If you’re going to be visible online, every single thing you post will influence how people perceive you.  You can’t decide who sees what; every word may have an impact.

It doesn’t matter if you’re posting on your business accounts or personally, particularly as a solopreneur or small business owner, you’re going to be judged.  And it all affects your reputation.

Does this mean that you need to be vanilla in all things?  No.  But it does mean that you need to engage brain, before fingers!

It’s all about values

Your business reflects your values.  People buy people, not organisations.  If a customer chooses your business as a supplier, it will be because of a personal experience either they or someone they trust has had with you or one of your team.

Good service is expected, but how it’s delivered makes a big difference.

Online it’s harder to portray your values consistently, we all have our off days and have to deal with people who have rubbed us up the wrong way.  But post when you’re not in the right headspace and those emotions can manifest in your words.

Unfortunately, regardless of your privacy settings, if someone wants to see what you’ve posted – they’ll find a way.  Most platforms these days are public and, other than Facebook, it’s difficult to post content without it being available to everyone.  Even on Facebook with an ‘only friends’ setting, you’d be surprised at who can see what you’ve posted.

Think first, post later

We all have opinions – and nobody expects that everyone will agree with ours, just because we think we’re right.  However, there are ways of presenting your opinions that will encourage reasonable debate, rather than vituperative rants.

And, when you see something that someone has posted and your first response is ‘you need your head examined, that’s a load of rubbish’.  STOP!

Even if you have evidence and can make a case, think about the impact a triggered response might have on people’s opinion about you. 

A good rule of thumb is to write your initial response – NOT on the platform, just in case you accidentally hit ‘post’.  Instead, write it in a text document, save it and do something else for an hour or two.  If you still feel strongly, re-read your response, considering how people who don’t know you might interpret it.  You may decide to make some edits, or that it’s not important enough to post about.  Or you may go ahead, but at least you know your post isn’t an emotional knee-jerk reaction – it’s been thought through.

You have a right to disagree with people, it is a free country.  But, put your case rationally and reasonably and you won’t muddy your reputation.  Also remember that sarcasm is just as bad as a rant!

Don’t let the idiots get to you!

There are some people whose main reason for posting online is to trigger a reaction.  Some of them are evangelical about their cause or issue, but there are some that post just to see what happens.

Yes, you can delete posts, but you can’t guarantee the someone hasn’t already taken a screenshot and shared it in their WhatsApp group!  Once it’s there, it’s almost impossible to get rid of it altogether.

‘But I posted that on my personal account’, is not an excuse for damaging your business reputation.

How long should a blog article be?

 

This is definitely a ‘how long is a piece of string?’ question!

Daily blogger Seth Godin has written blogs that are a single line – and others that are in excess of 1,000 words.

Not everyone is a natural writer and when someone says ‘you need to write 500 words’, that’s sometimes a good reason not to get started!  Of course, there is now AI that can help – but even the smartest AI tools are not able to read your mind and don’t have your insight into your area of specialism.

Yes, you can create your own GPT and train it with your material – but you need material to do that.  Chicken and egg!

My take on creating content is that:

1. It must have value
2. It should be as long as it needs to be to say what you want to say
3. It should be in your voice.

Today people are inclined to scan content rather than read it, so shorter can be good, if you just want to make a point.

HOT TIP:  To improve engagement highlight with bold or italic (or both) your key points.  Don’t use underline as a highlight as, if your article is published digitally, people expect underlined text to be a link.

Get the habit

Writing blog articles is a habit – like social media - it’s part of your marketing.

Have a notebook for ideas.  When something pops into your head and you think ‘that would make a good blog’, jot it down.  By the time it’s time to write your next blog you’ll probably have forgotten it.

Schedule time to write.

Write in batches – once you get started, it gets easier.

That’s it!