What kinds of content to publish and share
A common (and understandable) mistake that many people make as they’re diving into social engagement is to limit their content to promotional updates. This is reflective of the traditional marketing world in which all outbound push messaging is just that, but things have changed; now we build our marketing efforts on trust, engagement, and community.
There is, of course, a time and place for marketing and promotional messages, but don’t limit yourself. Consider broadening your scope a bit. This will make your content more appealing and lessen the burden of creation. Some options for types of updates may include:
Adjacent content
Adjacent content: It’s a pretty safe bet that if someone is following you they’re interested in what you offer. It’s an even safer bet to say their interests don’t stop there. Share content that’s tangentially relevant to your business or something involving common interests of your audience. For example, if you are a clothing retailer, you could post about up-and-coming beauty trends or news from a major designer. These topics quite likely directly align with the interests of your audience.
Tips and Tricks
Tips and tricks: Add value to the conversation by sharing content that will make your customers’ lives easier (bonus points for tips and tricks that help them use your products or services).
Responses
Responses: Not every update has to stem from original ideas of yours; you can bounce off the ideas that other people are already posting. Social media relies on conversations, so jump in and be a part of them. You can even look for Twitter chats that are relevant to your brand and dive in. (This is also a good way to get your account and brand more visibility.)
Non-promotional company information
Non-promotional company information: If your company does amazing volunteer work in your community, don’t be shy about sharing it! If there’s a rather impressive showing at the company Halloween party, you definitely want to share that. Giving a sneak peek into the culture and community within an organization goes a long way to building relationships by humanizing the brand. Social media provides a fantastic way to go about this.
Jokes
This is a tricky one, and it’s more of a branding question than anything else. First of all, know what your brand is and what kind of personality it embodies. If humor is not a part of that, you might avoid this type of post. It can backfire and be incredibly awkward. If you are going to try humor, safety first! Ensure you’re not unintentionally sharing something that could be offensive by testing it amongst your colleagues, friends, or even family. Always err on the side of caution with sensitive topics; a disaster can be really painful. Once you’ve made sure the humor is acceptable, make sure it’s actually funny, because a bad joke is just embarrassing.
Engagement
Fostering engagement as a brand comes in two flavors. The first is responding to users mentions, questions, commentary, etc. In the beginning of a community’s development it’s critical for a brand to be very present and active, and this means responding to most user commentary and all of their questions. The volume at this stage in the game should be fairly manageable for most.
The second flavor of engagement is that which results from a solid data-driven content strategy. By looking at things like search queries and social conversations, you can begin to build the foundation of a solid content strategy. As you’re sharing this content throughout your community, you should collect data on how your audience reacts to it and engages with it. Consider all of this data to be feedback on how you’re doing. You might re-evaluate the timing of your updates, the format or sentence structure you use (are you asking questions, making bold statements, etc.), and even the type of media you’re using.
Ask for help
Ask for help: Want your community to help or participate in a particular way? Sometimes it’s as simple as asking. If you’ve earned their allegiance by building value and investment into the relationship, you can ask for survey participation, product feedback, or whatever else you need. Maybe you need help supporting or sharing a new program or piece of content. You’ve made the relationship investment; they will often gladly reciprocate.
Keep it simple
Keep it simple: Too many options may as well be no options. If your audience isn’t on a certain network, why would you promote that sharing option on your content? Conversely, if your main focus is B2B, you may (for example) not need to include Pinterest as a sharing option. Look at your social audience and match up your offerings with their behaviors.
Cross-promote for discoverability
Cross-promote for discoverability: There’s nothing worse for a user than not being able to find your content, and cross-promotion is an easy way to help keep that from happening. Ensure your blog is linked to from your social properties. Keep all of your profile names the same across all social channels (utilize a service like KnowEm to be proactive on this one), and cross-promote your accounts. And (this is super-important): Develop and sell a unique value proposition for each account. Think about it—why would a customer need to or want to follow you on Twitter, if they already follow you on Facebook? Make sure you give them a reason.
Gamify
Gamify: People enjoy competition and like being rewarded for achievements, and adding game-like elements into your marketing mix can help you motivate a community. Foursquare is one effective example of this, moving its users through mayorships and badges. You can identify ways to incent your own community in ways that align with your business goals, making engaging with your brand fun. This can be a great way to increase the number of answers your community is providing in a help forum—add levels and achievements for answering questions, for high-quality answers, or for sharing out unanswered questions. Match up behavior and goals with reward systems. Companies like Badgeville and BigDoor have products that can help you use virtual rewards. These efforts can build on your existing social marketing, increasing sentiment, retention, and loyalty, all while decreasing churn, acquisition expense, and customer service costs.