Social media marketing is a lot to take in. When you look at a company like Taco Bell, which has created such an engaged and enthusiastic follower base, you might ask yourself: "Where do I even start?"
The best social media brands didn't emerge overnight. To get on their level, you'll need to break the project down into smaller, more manageable parts and embrace a long-term strategy.
Below, we'll summarize five infographics which tell you just about everything you need to know about social media marketing so you can get started with one aspect at a time.
How to create viral content
The first infographic is called How to Get Your Blog Post Shared 1000 Times. It breaks the process of content creation down into steps so you can get started yourself.
The infographic recommends creating an engaging title, making your content easy to share (by including social media buttons), and optimizing it for Google so users will find it through organic search.
It also goes over what you can do to give your content more exposure when it's ready.
It says you should share it manually on several social media channels, send it out to your email list, and practice social listening so you can find other thought-leaders and share your content with them.
One thing we'd like to add about this infographic is that some steps are much easier than others.
Creating a compelling title requires just a few minutes of brainstorming, but learning how to use Google Analytics to track your content takes time and patience.
How a business should act on social media
Although many people think they know social media etiquette implicitly, it's really something that you have to learn. Unless you want to risk making a huge blunder, you should read this infographic titled The Top 8 Social Media Etiquette Tips for Businesses.
The infographic states a few points that you should be mindful of. For example, it says that you should listen to your target audience and refrain from promoting your products directly.
It also goes over a few don'ts, such as badmouthing your competitors, measuring your success purely in terms of statistics and metrics, and abusing hashtags.
We'd add that your social media etiquette should reflect that of your target audience. If you're marketing to baby boomers, for example, then you probably should stay away from the latest memes.
But that exact behavior might be perfect for a younger audience. It all depends on your market segment.
How to plan a social media marketing strategy
Planning a social media marketing strategy is overwhelming. If it's your first time, then you'll have to learn a lot about specific platforms, posting guidelines, social ads, and much more.
This Social Media Checklist infographic breaks the entire process down for you. First, it helps you define your target audience and come up with a content strategy. Then, it gives you specific tips for each social media channel.
For each site, the infographic prompts you to enter more specific information in regard to your posting and engagement strategies.
Once you're finished, we recommend adding all that information to a calendar so you know what you should be doing each day. This is called an editorial calendar, and it helps keep you on track to reach your goals.
How to use visual content to your advantage
Videos, infographics, pictures, and GIFs are all more engaging than your average blog or article, but also require more time and effort if you're making them on your own.
The engagement still outweighs the costs, however, and that's why businesses are posting more visual content than ever.
This infographic called It's all About the Images explains how you can create and share visual content to reach your marketing goals.
It illustrates how visual content affects articles, press materials, e-commerce sites, social engagement, and search engine optimization campaigns.
You can use this information to get more out of your marketing efforts. The infographic, for example, states that articles with relevant images get 94% more views than articles with no images.
That means that you can almost double your traffic by adding a picture somewhere in the body.
Is that worth the cost of finding or creating a relevant picture? That's for you to decide.
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How to create posts specifically for social media
Finally, this infographic explains how you can create posts for social media. Unlike the viral content infographic, which focused more on the process of content creation, this goes over how you should share content on specific sites.
For example, the infographic goes over all the elements of a Facebook post. It says you should provide a link to your content, add a mobile-friendly image, provide just enough information to warrant a click from your followers, and keep things positive to promote sharing.
On Twitter, however, the infographic recommends giving a clear CTA, sticking to correct grammar despite the character limit, using shortened URLs, using questions and facts to engage users, mentioning influencers, retweeting, and adding an image to your posts.
Each social media channel is different, and the infographic explains how you should adjust your tone to match each one.
This explains why some businesses experience high levels of engagement on Facebook but can't gain any traction on LinkedIn. You need to adjust your strategy to match each platform.
You have all the time in the world to create a successful social media marketing campaign.
These infographics will help you get the ball rolling. For more marketing infographics, contact us today.
