Throughout February, we’ve equipped you with everyone’s need-to-know starter kit for making social media work for you. By now, you know why you need a social strategy and how to begin one, including the process of narrowing down which mediums will be most beneficial. But what is now going to set your social feed apart from all the rest?
There are a million other accounts in the world marketing products and services similar to those you’re offering to an audience that overlaps yours. How are you going to stand out? Unfortunately, merely having a superior purpose behind your social media isn’t likely to garner attention. Amid the data-based elements one should consider before signing up for social media, they must also strategize how they will attract users with knockout content.
These are the three steps you can start today and incorporate across all social platforms to help you have a more exciting feed that allows individuals to find, notice and follow your content.
1. Stick to a Style
Utilize a set of presets, templates, fonts, photos or color codes. The “or” is an important point to note in this step because depending on the social medium, not all of these aesthetic elements will apply. Presets, for instance, are mainly relevant on Instagram, where a cohesive look to photo feeds matter. Take one look at marketing guru Jenna Kutcher’s feed, for instance, and after comparing hers to others, you’ll find out that well-used presets are one of the crucial elements that set her photos apart.
Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest or LinkedIn on which you are posting, using consistent templates, fonts and text colors when sharing visual content is a key component to helping your social voice stand out. If every photo or video shared has a different filter or font overlay, not only will the feed look messy as a whole, but users scrolling by won’t be able to easily distinguish your content from the rest, which is the goal.
To see an example of how consistent templates, fonts and colors help curate a company voice, take a look at our Instagram.
2. Define Your Voice and Use It
How does your company, brand or organization’s social media presence represent you? If you don’t readily have an answer to this question, this would be a great time to engage in a brand brainstorming exercise.
You may know the basics of what you offer and do. For instance, if you are a university, you know that you educate students to help prepare them for their future. Hopefully, this goal is shared among all higher education institutions. But to pinpoint what personality traits, goals or distinctions set you apart from the rest, you’ll have to dig a little deeper.
Start by writing down single words that you would use to describe what you represent on social media. Think beyond what you do and concentrate more on who you are and personify what you’re selling.
Going back to the example of a university, words like large, small, homey, global, innovative or classical may come to mind. A large, global and innovative university should have a very different social presence than a small, homey and classical one.
For real-life inspiration, take a look at Old Spice’s Twitter feed and Glossier’s Instagram. Both of these brands do very well for themselves on these respective platforms. Despite both offering hygiene and beauty related products, Old Spice and Glossier have entirely different audiences and brand personalities.
Old Spice maintains a self-aware sense of humor throughout their posts and generates their advertisements based on the way their products make users feel: manly. Glossier, on the other hand, has a light-hearted and simple brand voice that seeks to attract customers through showing them the beauty of easy self-care, something reflected through their product packaging and social media feeds alike.
While it’s great to look to other feeds for inspiration when first determining what you want your social voice to be, remember that social media users can detect ingenuity from a mile away. Users crave authenticity, so whatever voice you settle on, make sure that it fully and honestly reflects who you really are as an organization.
3. Be Timely
No matter your voice or what you choose to represent online, curating timely posts is crucial to helping your feed gain attention. When appropriate, post content pertaining to current events, social issues, holidays, birthdays, events or any present happening that will add appropriate relevance to your feed.
Dog subscription box company Bark Box does an excellent job of this on their Twitter feed.
They are always on time in posting about relevant happenings, such as National Love Your Pet Day, putting their own spin on popular memes before the trend goes away and even finding ways to tie back popular TV shows such as “The Bachelor” back to their brand.
Creating content based on current events and trendy topics is a natural SEO-booster that in giving users different relevant reasons to find your feed will also allow them to find, notice and follow what you’re posting.
Social media is an art as much as it is a science. The brands and voices doing best online are the ones that have narrowed themselves into their niche and remained consistent. By being timely, finding your voice and sticking to the elements that set you apart, your social media presence can be better than impressive—it can be engaging.