The types of content you share on social channels work together to communicate with your audience, and the most effective content strategies are those that are focused on bringing value to the audience, not in pushing sales.
Each piece of content should be related to your company's industry and do one of five things:
- inspire your audience
- inform your audience
- motivate your audience
- educate your audience
- entertain your audience
Each of these five things is beneficial to your audience in one way or another, and depending on the company some work better than others.
There are many types of content you can use that will accomplish those five goals, and ideally in the course of a week, for example, post content might achieve all five.
Consider the following types of content to include in your strategy:
Audio/Visual
Consider media such as videos and images. People love to be visually engaged. Consider creating unique infographics, photo postcards or videos. Stay away from "commercial" advertising videos and focus on videos that help your audience, such as how-to tutorials or web TV episodes. Entertaining (and audience-appropriate) clips from YouTube can also generate a good response.
Quotes
Look around for quotes by other experts in your industry. Consider adding these quotes to images to make them more visual. Sharing quotes from one of your own experts can be very effective, as well, and it magnifies your brand expertise.
Articles
Locate articles that would be of benefit to your audience. LinkedIn ; is a great resource, as well as other news sites. Blog directories like alltop.com grant access to large quantities of current articles.
It is also very important to create original articles that would be showcased on your company blog. These, more than anything, provide an opportunity to showcase your company's expertise and provide a valuable service to your audience. Post these articles on your company blog and share on social networks. This is also one of the best ways to direct people to your website.
There are many, many types of content that accomplish the five goals that will benefit your audience. For example:
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Illustrations
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Quotes
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Infographics
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Memes
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Articles
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How-to's
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Photos
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Videos
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Statistics
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SlideShare presentations
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Facts
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Stories
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Blogs
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Press releases
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News
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Jokes
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And more
Once you identify the types of content that work best for your company, posts must be created for unique audiences on each social network. The same content should not go out to every social network because users want different things.
Find out more about how to create content that will engage users on unique platforms by clicking here.
Remember that creating and distributing content is only one part of the social media communication process. In order for your social media to be effective, your company has to be listening to its audience. You must monitor what's happening, respond to their posts, engage with them, deliver superior customer service, and consistently tailor your strategy so that your content is most effective.
