Step 2: Mix In 20 Social Media Posts
September 13, 2014
CONSUME CREATIVELY
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Recently we published a 10 Week Blogging Success Recipe outlining 8 steps for jump starting your blogging efforts. As promised, we’re breaking down each of the 8 steps into individual posts to fully explain each direction in detail and provide examples.
If you would like to review the entire recipe or are interested in a particular step, the links below will direct you where you want to go.
The second ingredient the recipe calls for are 20 social media posts. Watch the video below for a quick overview of this step.
Mix In 20 Social Media Posts
The second step of the 10 Week Blogging Success Recipe challenges you to plan and publish 20 social media posts based off of your 10 blog posts. In order to accomplish this, you’ll need to post to your social media accounts twice for each blog post you write.
10 blog posts x 2 social media posts per blog post = 20 social media posts
If your business isn’t already active on social media, now’s a better time than ever to get started. Having trouble figuring out which social media sites are best for your business? No worries. We’ve got you covered with some great resources.
- Which Social Media Network is Best for My Business?
- Who’s on Facebook?
- Who’s on Twitter?
- Who’s on Pinterest?
- Who’s on LinkedIn?
- Who’s on Instagram?
Planning
There are five important pieces of information to plan out at this stage of the recipe.
- Post Dates – Choose the dates you’ll post to your social media accounts.
- Where to Post – Check the boxes to indicate which social networks you’ll share content on.
- Why People Need to Read This Post – Write a sentence previewing your blog post content that is likely to attract your followers and compel them to click on the link.
- Title of Post – Although the title may not be finalized at this point, pencil one in to help distinguish this post from the others.
- Link to Post – Once you’ve created and scheduled your blog post, copy and paste a link to that post in the appropriate place on your planning template so you know which URL to include in each social media post.
Planning out these pieces of information ahead of time will save you time and effort once you’re sitting at the computer scheduling out the social media posts.
Writing & Publishing
Whether or not you’re new to using social media for business purposes, the social media posting best practices listed below will keep you on track with the success recipe.
Alter the Language for the Second Post
Since you’re creating two posts for each blog article, you’ll want to craft the message differently for each social media post. The variance helps to keep your social media content interesting and appealing to more people.
Publish the Posts on Different Days at Different Times
This will help you reach more viewers. Not everybody is in the same place online at the same time. Plan for at least two days in-between the social media posts. If you schedule the first one during the morning hours, consider scheduling the second one in the afternoon to catch viewers active online later in the day.
Link to the Blog Post Each Time
If you don’t link your social media messages to your blog posts people are going to have a hard time finding your content. A direct link from each of your social media posts to the related blog post is a must.
Schedule Social Media Posts to Release AFTER Your Blog Post Has Been Published
Sharing links to content that doesn’t actually exist online yet is a big no-no. Perhaps you’ll want to schedule all of your blog posts to publish to your website on Mondays so that you can post to your social media accounts and direct people to that blog post on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Keeping this best practice in mind figure out a schedule that works for you.
Distribute Your Posts Across All Mediums
Don’t forget to follow this step. You’ve done all the work of planning and writing, so now it’s time to actually tell your social media following about your content. If you checked off the boxes for Facebook, Twitter and Google+, be sure to post your messages to those platforms.
Example Plan for Social Media Post #1
Example Plan for Social Media Post #2
Social Media Serving Suggestions
- If Twitter is one of your social media networks you plan to publish on, I suggest writing this social media post first and then elaborate the content for the other networks. Twitter limits you to using 140 characters while the other sites allow for longer updates. However, studies show that shorter posts are generally more successful, so just because you CAN use more than 60,000 characters in your Facebook status doesn’t mean you SHOULD.
- If you’re a go-getter and are looking to boost your social media presence even more, one way you can do that is by posting more than once per day. In addition to the 20 planned posts, consider scheduling posts linking out to other sources or interesting articles you find while researching for your own blog posts. These types of social media posts, where you share content from other sources, are important to creating and maintaining a healthy social media mix. You actually build your own credibility by sharing information from outside sources with your followers.
Ready for Step 3: Blend Together 5 Blog Post Emails?
Check out the 10 Week Blogging Success Recipe for a complete outline of the recipe ingredients and directions.
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Who Manifested This Madness?
This fabulous human, that's who.
Monica Maye Pitts
Monica is the creative force and founder of MayeCreate. She has a Bachelor of Science in Agriculture with an emphasis in Economics, Education and Plant Science from the University of Missouri. Monica possesses a rare combination of design savvy and technological know-how. Her clients know this quite well. Her passion for making friends and helping businesses grow gives her the skills she needs to make sure that each client, or friend, gets the attention and service he or she deserves.
