How to Create “Perfect” Social Media Posts

There is no sure-fire way to create a perfect social media post. BUT you can craft strong messages that improve over time. As they say, practice makes perfect! The following are some helpful tips to consider when crafting what to say/share/post on the most common social media platforms for businesses.

What to Share on Facebook:

• Provide information + a link. – Status updates that offer a snippet of interesting news along with a link to the full story encourage followers to click on the link to read more. Interesting or novel content also encourages more likes, shares, and comments.
• Include mobile friendly images. – Posts with images get the highest amount of engagement on Facebook. And since most access Facebook through a mobile device, the ideal image size for sharing is 800×600 pixels.
• Respond often + in a timely manner. – Respond to comments on your posts and engage relationships through conversational dialogue. It will strengthen your community as well as make your post more likely to show higher in people’s news feeds.
• Stay positive! – Positive posts are liked and shared more often than negative or neutral ones. It also helps inspire and engage your followers.

What to Tweet on Twitter:

• Provide information + a link. – Just like with Facebook, Tweets that offer a snippet of interesting news along with a link to the full story encourage followers to click on the link to read more. Interesting or novel content also encourages more Retweets.
• Shorten URLs – There isn’t always room within your 140 character limit to include the full url of the link you want to share with people. Use a link shortening service like Bit.ly or via a platform like Hootsuite or Buffer to shorten the links automatically for you. A shorter link leaves more room for you to speak your mind and for other people to reply and retweet.
• Include images. – Tweets with images also see a high amount of engagement. Make sure your message ties appropriately in to the image though.
• Include hashtags. – Hashtags are the # symbol followed by a common word or phrase. It is a way of tagging your Tweet into a category that other people might be searching for or talking about. Tweets that include multiple hashtags see more engagement than those who don’t.
• Use mentions. – Mention influencers and followers in your Tweet to encourage engagement and spark a conversation.
• Respond often + in a timely manner. – Again, it is important to respond to social posts and engage relationships through conversational dialogue. Don’t bother using mentions if you never take the time to respond back! Treat Twitter just like a live conversation you would have at a networking event.

What to Post on LinkedIn:

• Provide information + a link. – Again like Facebook and Twitter, posts on LinkedIn that offer a snippet of interesting news along with a link to the full story encourage followers to click on the link to read more. Content that is related to your network’s industry specifically also encourages more engagement.
• Participate in group discussions. – LinkedIn has some great industry-specific groups you can join for free. Some might have an approval process to go through before being allowed to join, but once you are a part of the group it is a great place to ask and answer questions related to that topic. It helps build your brand and influence within that industry.
• Share job postings. – Whether it is with your own company or not, sharing job posts on LinkedIn is appreciated by your network and can prove to be helpful when reconnecting with an old contact.

Tags: Digital Marketing • Inbound Marketing