The Balance of Push and Pull Posts

The-balance-of-push-and-pull-posts-200x300
22Jun

What is the point of advertising and marketing? To promote one’s brand, correct? Sure, it is a simple concept to grasp. After all, we have been exposed to advertising our whole lives. Social media marketing, in theory, should be the same since it is all about promoting your brand. While this may be true in the grand scheme of things, the actual execution might not be what you expect. It requires a whole different approach than traditional marketing.

Social media requires a bit of tact and genuine content. You will want to generate updates that are not directly related to your product but are still applicable to your customer’s interests. If every single post you send out to your followers is a sales pitch, your online friends are sure to dwindle quickly.

Mixing engaging content into your updates alongside promotions is an innovative and non-direct way to get yourself noticed. What kind of posts should you create other than sales-oriented content? You can share relevant news stories, holiday greetings, polls, recipes, quotes, and more. These items will have the ability to stretch beyond your followers’ reach and connect to others on the internet. Shared posts need to give the impression that you want to share this update with your friends who are, of course, your customers. Your tone should be conversational and casual. Social media brings everyone to the same level, and your language should feel like that.

When planning your posts for the week ahead, you should realize that diversity is the key to success. Try not to have the same type of content right next to each other. Mix it up! For example, if you have a Facebook account and are writing two posts a day, you will want to make sure there aren’t two promotions next to each other, nor two news articles, quotes, etc. Switching things up will keep your posts fresh and fun.

What kind of content do you add to the mix? Comment below!

Click Here to Subscribe to Our Free Newsletter

 

Read More

Have Writers Block? Here’s the Secret to Developing a Constant Supply of Content Ideas

Content-Marketing
21Jul

As someone who is passionate about marketing, I love nothing more than having a solid list of approved resources to use when marketing on social media. In this post, I want to share how to concoct your own comprehensive list of content resources that you can add to and edit organically.

Businesses should have two sets of content resources that they use for marketing on social media sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google+:

1. Industry topics, news, and trends that you read

2. Information that your target market read to learn more about your industry

If the second set of resources is new to you, don’t feel left behind. Many marketers leave these by the wayside when formulating a social media marketing strategy. The problems with leaving out this set of resources is that you lose touch with what is important to your target market and just push your agenda down their throats, no matter how off-base it is.  Remember, your content needs to be engaging, and understanding what your audience wants is the first step towards engagement.

First, I want you to think about key problems that your product or service solves.  Get a pad of paper and write down five or more problems that your product or services alleviate.

For example, if I was an assisted living facility that specializes in Memory Care for people with Alzheimer’s and dementia, my list might look like this:

1. Alzheimer’s

2. Dementia

3. Aging Parents

4. Memory Care

5. Respite Care

All of the above directly relate to assisted living facilities with memory care units. Let me share another one.  How about a diet pill that suppresses hunger?

1. Eating Disorders

2. Overeating

3. Overweight

4. Obesity

5. Weight Loss

See how each of these is related to the diet pill?

Now, for each problem that your product/services solves, come up with 5-10 topics that can be associated with each problem.  For example, let’s use the diet pill again.  The problem it solves is being overweight/obesity.  So 5 topics that can be associated with the problems of being overweight are:

1. Diabetes

2. Lack of Energy

3. Low Self-Esteem

4. Loneliness

5. Heart Problems

Now identify at least one online resource that corresponds to each topic.  An online resource can be a website, newsfeed, or even a hashtag!  In the case of the diet pill, a health blog or an online fitness magazine could be a great resource, write down the name of the resource with the website address next to it for easy future access.

When you are done with this, start a list of websites that you personally visit to find news related to your industry.  Write down all of the websites that you go to for the latest trend and news with the website address written beside them.  Come up with 5-10 of these as well.

To help you get started, here are a few sites to try out:

1.  Alltop

2. Feedly

3. Hashtags.org

4. Quora

5. Buzzsumo

These lists are invaluable going forward because you need to generate content when using social media to market your business.  Having an approved list of resources is paramount to success.   These will help inspire your writing as well as help you easily find information to share with your target audience that will be valuable to them.

If you like this process, and would like some extra credit, expand your list to include opinion leaders within your industry.  These people share lots of valuable information that you could repurpose as useful tips for your audience.  In order to create an engaging social media strategy, knowing where you can go to pull fresh, engaging ideas for content is an absolute must!

Need Online Marketing Help?

Fill Out the Form Below and We Will Get Right Back to You!

[ninja_forms_display_form id=1]

Read More