If your organization has begun incorporating social media into its marketing plan you need to hunker down and get organized. Social media marketing success revolves around creating an effective and well-planned strategy. Merely posting the occasional blog or sporadically updating your Facebook account will neither develop a strong online presence for your brand, or connect with prospects. The initial time investment will be larger than one might expect, but that investment will produce results if you stick to it.
Here are some tips to help define a game plan, keep you organized and ensure your social media efforts produce the results you want.
1. Pick Your Poison
The first step is to decide which social media platform(s) will work best for you… Facebook? Twitter? LinkedIn? Blog? eNewsletter? You’ll need to figure out where your audience resides, which combination reaches the broadest base and how much time you can devote to social media marketing each week.
2. Content Is King
Finding enough content is always a challenge but remember, the point of social media as a marketing tool is to create a dynamic medium that can deliver YOUR UNIQUE SKILL SET to an interactive, engaged, audience. If you can’t deliver fresh, compelling content 3x per week, scale back your efforts to 1x per week. Make every effort count, don’t get caught up in counting all your efforts.
3. Organize It. Map It. Stick To It!
Just like your personal life, you’ll need to develop a social MEDIA calendar. It’s the only way to ensure you continue to provide reliable content that is valued by your audience.
A social media calendar is just what it seems, a spreadsheet that maps your social media strategy over the course of time. You can create your own spreadsheet or you can use some available online tools such as the Google docs-based social media calendar template.
A. Start by tracking industry events such as conferences, release dates, association or industry events etc. Define content and frequency around those important dates.
B. Create a schedule for your content… Tuesday for personal commentary, Wednesday for industry news, Thursday for best practices, etc.
C. Select your medium by day… Tuesday for Facebook and Twitter updates, Wednesday for eNewsletter releases, Thursday for blogs and Twitter, etc. Plan to use the same content topic per day per medium to re-enforce the message.
D. Define Your Content—But Be Flexible
Decide in advance which topics will be discussed on which days. Regularly annotate the calendar with interesting factoids, relevant links or photos, and keywords as you gather them, so when the time comes to write up each topic, you’ll have reference notes on the calendar itself. Taking the time to put together an editorial calendar every 6 weeks, and updating it on an ongoing basis, will save time in the long run and ensure you spread the content evenly over time.
Most importantly, be prepared to change your planned content calendar to accommodate breaking industry news, guest bloggers, etc.
E. Remember To Interact With Your Audience
Initiate polls, ask for commentary—create a forum for discussion. Often, your audience can provide better content than you can.
SOURCES:
• Communications Conversations by Arik Hanson
• Basics of the Social Media Editorial Calendar by Stephanie Schwab: Socialologist
• Social Media Examiner: 5 Easy Steps to a Winning Social Media Plan, By Emily Soares Proctor
