Tuesday Tips: Notice these Twitter Changes?

It might have been a good thing I didn't get to write today's Tuesday Tips until this morning because I just got to see an interesting change happen to Twitter in just a matter of minutes. In fact I saw a tweet about it before it changed over on my profile. Talk about  a fast moving change.

What used to be Twitter's favorite and star icon to favorite items has changed to like and a heart icon instead.  See the screenshot below for reference.

So gone are our Favorites and stars and welcome to hearts and Likes. Now, instead of favoriting posts, you get to <3 and like them. An interesting change. It will be interesting to see if Twitter puts out any information on the change.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your social media presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Post Pictures on Twitter

For those relatively new to Twitter and Social Media, this might be a surprise. For everyone else who has been around the block a time or two already know this - but you can post more than just words to Twitter, you can post photos and videos as well.

Today's tip: Post pictures to Twitter!

Now, after saying this, there are a few things to remember. You will lose a number of characters when you add an image to Twitter, so keep that in mind when preparing a post to go along with your photo.  Keep the tweet and associated hastags short and sweet.  Make sure the pictures are engaging - since Twitter now shows previews of images in timelines, it is important to make images engaging.

Most importantly - have fun with it.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your social media presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Don't Make These #Hashtag Mistakes

Are you making these common mistakes in your Tweets?  Check this list out and try to eliminate some of these common mistakes from your Tweeting habits:

• Using too many hashtags.  There should be 1-3 hashtags per tweet. Tweets with one or two hashtags have been seen to receive 20% higher engagement, according to Passion Digital.
• Using inappropriate hashtags. This can kill your target audience if you aren't targeting with the right tweets. Be sure to check out posts similar to the hashtag you are using to be sure what you're posting is relevant and similar.
• Using a Trending Hashtag when your post has nothing to do with that trending hashtag. It might be very tempting to do this, but if your post has nothing to do with a trending hashtag, just don't use it. Pro Tip: Don't try to create a post about every trending hashtag either just to get noticed. It's poor marketing and Twitter etiquette.
• Use appropriate hashtags with your pictures! Some people, myself included, often forget to hashtag their photos when they share them.
• Don't hashtag every word in a tweet. Refer to the first point in this post - that would be using too many hashtags and is a sign of a novice user. Pick important, relevant terms and hashtag them.
• Check what other posts are listed with your hashtag(s). It's often good to see what other tweets and conversations are being had with similar hashtags. You might even learn a thing or two.
• Do not hashtag more than two or three words combined. More than that becomes obnoxious and annoying. In that same line of thought, hashtagging all capitalized words is also obnoxious.

Hope these tips help!

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your social media presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Is Your Facebook Page Up-To-Date

We’ve talked about auditing your Facebook page in the past, but it’s probably time to talk about that again.

Have you recently checked, say in the last three to six months, to see if all the information on your Facebook page is current and accurate? If you haven’t, here are some areas to check:

1. Review About box and about page

The about box on the main page of your website tells your fans and potential fans about you. It includes a brief description as well as a link to your website. Make sure all of the information is current and the link points where you want it to go.

The about page contains a lot more detailed information, as seen below.  Verify and update all of the information or remove information you don’t want to appear there.

2.  Add your call to action

The call to action feature was added, if I remember correctly, in the last six months. If you haven’t taken time to set this up, now is a great time to do it.

3. Review scheduled posts or schedule posts for the upcoming months.

If you have posts scheduled, make sure they are still aligned with the direction you are going with your social media plan. It’s also a good time to schedule future posts, especially holiday well wishes, notifications of hour changes, sales or other information that may come up during the next few months.

4.  Update Milestones

Milestones are a great way to show achievements. It can be something as simple as a number of likes achieved, 5-year anniversary, 10-year anniversary, $1,000,000 in sales or anything you come up with. People like seeing the milestones made by companies they follow.

Optional:

5. Set a featured video

If you chose to set a featured video, it will appear at the top of your About box on your main page.  Adding a featured video is pretty easy. Simply select a video from your uploaded video, or upload a video, then you have an option to add it as a featured video.

Be sure to add a description to your Featured video that way people know what it's about when they go to watch it.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your social media presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Linking in Tweets

Have you ever wondered where to put your links in your tweets?  I know I have and I have experimented with several different ways, but it seems like passion digital has done some research on the topic and they concluded the following:

Get your links in early. Put your key message before your link. Any after thoughts, opinions or additional commentary should go after the link. Intersparce your hastags as well both before and at the end of your tweet, just remember not to use too many hashtags.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your social media presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Show Restraint

Many people new to social media for their brand make one common mistake: they spread themselves too thin and put their brand on social networks that don't support their brand like it should.

Don't make the same mistake - or if you have made the mistake, now's the time to scale it back. Learn which social media networks your patrons are on then embrace those. In addition, when considering adding new social media networks to your marketing plan, make sure the network will effectively support your brand's promise to your customers as well as your customer's perceptions of the brand. If the network doesn't do these things, don't participate on it.

So the ultimate tip here is, exhibit restraint when you start using social media for your brand. Start with 1-3 social media networks then grow from there if it is appropriate.

Good luck!

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your social media presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: If you do Direct Sales, Consider a Facebook Group

While the title may sound counter-intuitive to my normal posts talking about Facebook Pages and such, Facebook groups are a great way to market and insure a lot higher rate of viewing than many pages do. If you are an author or a direct sales person (like Avon, Scentsy, Jewelry in Candles, etc.) groups may be of benefit to you.

Keep in mind, I'm not saying to go solely with a group - a page will help as well, but having a group will also help spread the word and increase interaction.

Facebook Group have a distinct advantage in that members can chose to receive direct notifications about updates to the group. They may receive daily updates or updates only from specific members, such as you. You can also limit the group to where only you can create posts and your clients can respond to them.

Facebook groups are great for games and contests as well as special sales.  If you haven't considered a group, check some of them out - you might be surprised how useful they can be.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Why Spell Check is Important

As we mentioned in our first post almost a little more than a year ago - Tuesday Tips: Spell Check Before You Post - nothing is more embarrassing than to quickly type up a Facebook post, Twitter post or create a graphical image and post it, just to see a few minutes to an hour later that you made a huge spelling mistake and the spelling and grammar police are out to get you.

There are other reasons, besides avoiding embarrassment, that make spell checking important.  Some of those reasons include:

• It makes you, and subsequently your brand, look intelligent.
• It makes you appear to be careful and conscientious of your posts.
• By correct spelling and using the right words, it helps your followers to easily understand you (because yes, using the wrong homophones can create confusion at times).
• It's good for feedback - because let's be honest, you don't want to end up with negative feedback just because of a spelling mistake.

There are many other reasons as well. Check out these articles on why spelling correctly on social media sites is important:

• 7 Reasons Why Spelling and Grammar are Important on Facebook, Twitter and other Social Media Sites
• Ruining Social Media Credibility with Bad Spelling & Grammar
• Spell Check your Business Tweets

Are you looking for a spell checker or grammar checker for your browser? Check this one out from Grammarly - available as a Chrome Extension.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Optimize for Mobile

While Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, Pinterest, etc. are all styled and optimized for mobile, is the website your posts are directing them to optimized for mobile? If the answer is "I don't know" or "I'm not sure" then chances are the ultimate answer is no and you may not be seeing conversions and traffic because of this.

If you were waiting for mobile to arrive before tweaking your site, you've waited too long. Mobile is here to stay with smart phones, tablets, netbooks, laptops and more. Studies have shown that mobile engagement is often higher from mobile devices than traditional desktops and laptops - something to think about.

If your website isn't optimized for mobile - now's the time to fix that. If you can't fix the entire site, perhaps design a mobile friendly site that you can direct your Facebook page to or a landing page that will detect if they are using mobile then send them to the mobile site.

Keeping your site mobile friendly will help you gain and retain users.

With every step you take – think about mobile.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Recycle Old Content

A regular piece of advice is to post content several times a day to your social media networks in an attempt to gain more viewers - or so that those that miss your first post catch a later one. This is good advice but many people think that this means having several new pieces of content on their site to promote every day - which isn't necessarily true.

While new content is helpful, creating several pieces of new content daily, especially if you are a small brand or small blog, is damn near impossible. If I was perfectly honest, I'd say that creating a post a day six days a week is quite trying and I barely manage it some weeks. I manage it poorly on other weeks when my posts aren't scheduled out in advance. Yet, even scheduling in advance, it can be hard to have more than one post available to share daily.

This is where today's tip comes into play: recycling old content.

When I want to drive more content to my site, I will often share old posts via Twitter and Facebook. I'll take a look at what was most popular that week or what was most popular in the last year and retweet those posts with a different post than before.

A lot of recycling content is presenting it with a different wrapping. Instead of just linking it how it appears in Twitter - create a different statement, like "Why is spell check important? Check these tips out?" or "Have you seen the most popular blog post on my site? Check this one out on spell checking." There are many ways to re-present old content.

Alternatively, there are also many ways to rewrite old content. Keep in mind, you definitely do not want to repost the same content over and over again as new content - that kills SEO and unique article rankings in Google and most search engines - but finding new ways to say what you said before is always a great way to drive more traffic to your site.

What are ways that you have recycled content?  Leave your answers below!

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Proof is in the Pudding

We've talked many times in the past that quality content and conversations with current and prospective customers is more important than a large quantity of posts - and this is very true. Today's post talks a bit more about that - with the proof being in the pudding, as the saying goes.

You need to write and share interesting and amazing content that your followers will be inclined to share - either because they like it, found it useful or think others will find it useful.

It is important that if you are making certain claims about your product that you can provide proof of what you are claiming. You also need to establish that your brand is the authority in what you are talking about.

This takes time, but providing consistent, quality posts, images, videos, etc. will eventually establish these factors and help your brand and social media along in the future.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Be Consistent

Another tip we've mentioned in the past is be consistent.

Today's tip takes the being consistent a bit further. The advice comes from Donna Moritz, Founder of Socially Sorted (@SociallySorted via Twitter).

“Start out right by being consistent on the platform that you own — begin by creating content on your blog that solves the problems of your ideal customer, include a shareable image in each post, and then share that post on just 1 or 2 social platforms to begin with.”

That's exactly what I've done with this blog. I started out with a blog that receives consistent (most of the time) posts on set days and shared those posts to Facebook, Twitter and Google+. Later on I will add to Pinterest when it is appropriate.

So set up a posting schedule for your blog and try to stick to it - sometimes this may mean scheduling posts ahead of time - but don't be too hard on yourself if you miss a post here and there. The important part is to schedule what is feasible for you and not schedule too much to where it is overwhelming. And then remember to share the posts as they post.

Good luck!

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Look at Previous Content to See What Did Well

It’s a good habit to, occasionally, take a look at your previous posts on social media to understand what worked and what didn’t work. 

You can do this once a month or once every three to four months depending on your posting frequency. Look at the posts that had the most interaction and try to figure out why it had more interaction than other posts. Was it because of the tone of the post? Perhaps it’s from hashtags you used or posting on something that was a trending topic.

If you don’t want to do the research yourself, there are several programs out there that can analyze your previous posts which will tell you what type of posts have been successful for you in terms of social sharing.

Keep in mind, you want to analyze each social network separately as some things work well on one network but not on another. Track this and remember it for future posts.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Share useful tips

Today's tip came from a post that was made to Constant Contact's Facebook Page.

“Try to be informative and share some useful tips.”

Robert Connell-- *Posted on Constant Contact Facebook Page

Some of the most successful website and business fanpages are successful because their social media managers post tips to the pages and not just what the company is up to, what you can buy, etc. Useful tips, especially those in graphical form, get shared more often than non-graphical posts.

So if you sell books, maybe post a few tips on how you published your book or edited it, decided on the title etc. If you sell jewelry, provide tips on how to maintain the shine and natural good look of jewelry so it doesn't tarnish. If you run a construction business, post tips on how people can maintain the work they just had done on their home.

It's not hard to be informative and share useful tips with your users - it just takes a little planning and thought.

Good luck!

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Forget what you know

Sometimes the most important thing to remember when taking on social media as a new way of marketing is to forget what you know about traditional marketing because social media marketing is a different beast - sorta.

Danielle Cormier, Social Media Community Manager for Constant Contact advises people who are new to social media marketing to "Forget what you know about traditional marketing, use social media to focus on getting to know your customers.”

And the advice makes sense. Once you learn the ins and outs of social media, you can start incorporating traditional marketing into it, but remember that there are still things that are unique to social media where traditional marketing won't work for it.

Just something to keep in mind as you learn the ins and outs of social media.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Talk With People

This advice is probably one I have a hard time with especially on brands that I help out with on Social Media because I do tend to do more talking to people than with them.

However, the advice below is pretty good advice:

“Don’t talk to people, talk with them.”
Catherine Russell, content writer
*Posted on Constant Contact Google+ Page

This goes back to advice given a few weeks ago about being authentic. Talking with people rather than to them makes you more authentic and gives your brand a voice. Remember that talking with people will also increase their engagement rates, so not only does it make the brand look good and get seen more, it creates and impact on the fanbase as well.

So do your best to talk with people. I know it's something I'm going to work on to do better.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Don't Overthink It, Just Do It

Most of the time, our biggest fears is failure. We make excuses as to why we don't want to jump off the cliff that is social media and often times the biggest thing I hear from people who want to delve into social media but haven't yet is that either they "don't know what I'm doing" or "I am going to break something.

My answer to those folks is a quote from a Social Media Professional:

“You’re not gonna break stuff, just get started!”
Joey C, Creator, GoodMorningGloucester.com
@Joey_C

It sounds simple because it is simple. The first thing you can do is just get started and learn as you go. Most social media managers learned from the bottom and jumping in feet first. There was no school or degree for social media. There were no classes to teach you what to do and let's be honest, social media changes so often and so fast that sometimes those classes are out of date.

So don't be scared. Just get started.

Then check this blog out for tips, hints and questions.  As always, if you have questions, I'd love to answer them. Feel free to leave them in the comments for any blog and I will either answer there or answer as a separate blog post.

Enjoy!

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Advertise to Current Fans

This advice may sound silly, but with the drastic decrease in the amount of content fans see from your page, if you have a marketing budget, you should promote some of your posts to your current fans.  Doing this will increase your reach (especially if they like or share the posts) and potentially get you more fans from their likes and shares.

According to Facebook, advertising to current fans will increase you reach by 3-to-5 times what your fanbase is. I'm not sure if this stat is still accurate, but it would definitely be interesting to see.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Experiment With Promotions/Discounts

As is true with any form of marketing, sometimes you have to experiment to see what works.  A good piece of advice to experiment with promotions or discounts that are only available to your Facebook fans.

There are a number of ways to do this, from contests that they are only able to enter after liking your page, to a special app that gives them a coupon code after they like the page.  There are several options available and a little research via Facebook support or Google should turn up a plethora of apps advice and suggestions.

I'm steering away from recommending any apps because 1) I don't use any of them myself as my pages don't have anything to sell to offer promotions 2) I'm trying to remain unbiased and by recommending an app makes me biased.

All of that said, consider some offerings for your followers and try it out. It might bring you more fans and more sales.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.

Tuesday Tips: Share Social Media Links on Marketing Materials

You've taken the time to set up your Facebook page, Twitter account and maybe Pinterest or other accounts, but you aren't getting many followers.  Chances are it's because no one knows you have those things available for them to follow you on. Today's society is very social media driven and if they see that you have a Facebook page or other social media, chances are they will look into it and follow/like/etc.

What this means for you is you need to update your marketing materials, including but not limited to your business cards, receipts, emails, signs, window art, kiosk art, etc.  You can include just your address, or if you're really tech savvy, add a QR code that takes them to the social media platform where they can easily like you and go from there.

Once you have the marketing materials redone, be sure to pass it out and let people know verbally that they can find you on these social media platforms.

Every bit of promotion helps and sometimes hearing it and then seeing it will get them to follow you.

Tuesday Tips are a series of tips released on Tuesday each week regarding a hint or tip to help you manage and market your Facebook presence better.  You can find all the Tuesday Tips by clicking on the Tuesday Tips tag below.