Category Archives: Social Media

Prepping your Instagram posts to maximize local reach

Instagram for Local Reach Marblehead MA

Prepping your Instagram posts to maximize local reach

When deciding upon which social media networks to use for their local business, many small business owners ultimately include Instagram.  And for good reasons.  With over 600 million users, Instagram business pages that post quality content often see a high rate of engagement while building a strong online community.   Instagram offers a variety of creative ways to share content with your Followers, and continually updates its features, business insights, and overall functionality.

Given that Instagram is owned by Facebook, it’s important to note that both social media networks are ad-based revenue companies.  Therefore, paid advertising should certainly play a recurring role in your long-term Instagram marketing strategy.  However, if you maximize your posts for discovery, some organic reach is still possible!  

Here are five tips for prepping your Instagram posts to maximize local reach.  

  • Include your location

Since location-based posts become discoverable when Instagram users search by location, don’t forget to include this nugget of information.  To broaden your reach, occasionally change up the location by choosing your city, region, or state.  

  • Locally focused hashtags

Hashtags have long been a part of gaining new followers on Instagram, and even more so now that hashtags can be followed.  Do your research and document popular hashtags specific to your area.  

  • Combined hashtags

The actual name of your business or a hashtag created for your business or products are both great ways to reinforce your brand.  However, you can also include a hashtag that combines your business name or product with your location.   For example, a bakery located in Boston may include #bostoncoffee, to reflect both a popular menu item and their location.  

  • Exterior shots

Sprinkle your posts with eye-catching images of your storefront or street to help users easily recognize you.  Play around with the best times of days to capture natural light.  Interesting weather, sunsets, and sunrises are also fun, engaging images and videos to share.

  • Incorporate local events

Stay in tune with local events and happenings in your area.  An annual road race or charity walk, for example, presents a unique opportunity to show community support.  Even better if you or an employee is participating, or your business is sponsoring!  

Bonus Tip:

Save your Instagram Stories that include a geotag to your camera roll for repurposing 



Updating Your Website for the New Year

Originally posted in February 2018, updated January 2019

New Year New Website Digital Maids

Updating Your Website for the New Year

For many small business owners, the new year is a time to finally take on a growing to-do list.  Have you found time to update your website and social media business pages for the new year?  If you have not done so already, take twenty minutes to perform the following updates listed below.   Making these small changes sends a clear signal to your website visitors that you are open for business.

Website

Update the copyright year

Typically located in the footer, this is a quick way to your online audience on EVERY page of your website that you are an active business.  Although some website themes may update copyright information automatically, it is important to confirm.

Related to the copyright…

Header and footer 

Perform a quick review of all links and content in the header and footer.  Header and footer content is critical because it is highly visible and often links to your social media networks and other pertinent contact information.  Be sure all links are working correctly and contact information is accurate.  

Contact form

Update your contact form to incorporate the new year.  “How can help we reach your goals in 2019?”, for example, or “we look forward to working with you in 2019!”.   Do you have a specific time of year that is busy? Relay this information to potential customers, and articulate how best they can arrange time to meet with you. 

Holiday Content

You know that house that still has a Christmas or holiday themed wreath still hanging on their front door? Don’t be that house in the digital world.  Remove or update any holiday-related content or promotions, particularly on your homepage.  Consider replacing it with a show of appreciation – “thank you to all our customers for an amazing 2018.” If you don’t have time to draft fresh copy, repurpose existing content.  Your company history, for example, or a short summary your of your most popular products and services. 

Year in Review

Highlight your most important blogs or images of the past year with a simple Year in Review page.  This not only saves your visitors some searching but also presents a great summary of your business.  If your website is powered by WordPress, try using a photo gallery plugin to showcase images that represent the entire year.

Social Media Networks

If you do not have time to post new content to your social media channels, take a quick scan of the most prominent areas on your social pages and give them updates.  This includes:

  • Update any pinned posts and call to action buttons
  • Update any profile or cover photos that have a holiday theme
  • Review of your automated replies
  • Review of your website links, particularly for Instagram and Twitter bios.  Instagram and Twitter only give you one link, make the most of it!
  • Create a story on Instagram or Facebook with highlights of the previous year.  Then add to your profile to give it a longer shelf life.

Even if they’re not done perfectly, completing the above tasks sends the right message to your customers and prospects.  That you are present and open for business!

Tip – Save any holiday images for repurposing

 



6 Ways non-profits can thank sponsors on Social Media

How Non-Profits Thank Sponsors on Social Media

6 Ways non-profits can thank sponsors on Social Media

Corporate sponsorships play an integral role in non-profit fundraising and are usually critical to achieving financial goals.  Given their importance, acknowledging sponsors on your social media networks should be an essential piece in your overall social media strategy.  Ultimately, you want your sponsor to return for future fundraising initiatives.  Making your sponsor feel special is one way to make that happen. 

Social media networks continually add new features and functionality and these changes can be daunting to stay on top of.  Fortunately, however, these updates present fun and innovative ways to recognize the generosity of your sponsors.  If your current online thank you consists of visiting your sponsor’s website, grabbing their logo and posting a grainy, poorly formatted image, it’s time to show your gratitude with some of these suggestions:

Share their Social Media Page with your Followers

This is perhaps the easiest way to express appreciation while giving your sponsors social media accounts some added visibility.  In your accompanying text, be sure to capture why your sponsor is unique and/or an asset to the community.  Your followers will only need that magical 1-click to check out, and hopefully, follow your sponsor’s page.

Thank you via Stories

Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat all have a Stories feature – bite-size content that is only viewable for twenty-four hours.  Use this feature to give a thank you shout out.  If you are low on visual content, a selfie with fun and correlating stickers will do nicely.  Given the short lifespan of this content, make it light in tone, and crisp and to the point! 

Bonus – tag your sponsors Facebook/Instagram/Snapchat business page in your Story. 

Create a video thank you

Post a short video with the Chairperson or well-known board member of your non-profit communicating your thank you. This type of post can be memorable, particularly if you can share a little-known story, or spotlight the sponsor’s philanthropy. 

Bonus– If the sponsor’s organization is local, go the extra mile and create the video in their store or office. 

Promote product and services of your sponsor

Is your sponsor in the midst of promoting a new product or event?  Use your social media thank you to give it some timely online exposure.  For this kind of content, be sure to always post high-quality pictures or video.  You want everything about your sponsor – their products, their storefront, their employees – displayed in the best possible light. 

Share sponsor media highlights

Do you have a sponsor that distributes a lot of press releases, receives regular positive media mentions, or is periodically in the news? Share a favorable article with a caption that incorporates your thank you.

Create the post or review on their page

If your sponsor has a Facebook page, extend the shelf life of your accolades by posting directly to their page in the form of a visitor post or review.  When visitors come to check out the sponsor’s Facebook content, your comments will be seen.  In general, these types of posts greatly improve the validity of the page.

Yes, staying informed about the constantly shifting features of social media can be difficult.  However, each time a social media network introduces a new feature or type of content that can be shared presents a new opportunity for your non-profit to thank your sponsors.

Kick these 5 lazy Social Media habits

Digital Maids Create Better Social Media Content

 

Create better content by kicking these 5 lazy Social Media habits

The amount of online content is crushing all of us, particularly on social media.  On Facebook alone, 510,000 comments are posted, 293,000 statuses are updated, and 136,000 photos are uploaded every 60 seconds.  This explosion of content impacts both the businesses using social media for marketing as well as the users they are hoping to reach.

If you are a content marketer or small business owner managing your own social media pages, it can be tempting to take a few shortcuts in the hopes getting your content out ahead of the pack.  However, not all shortcuts are created equal.  Resist the urge to sacrifice quality!  Just like you, your customers have only 24 hours in their day.  Don’t clog their social media feeds with subpar content.   Reward their attention and time by giving them your best.  To up the quality of your content and overall social media presence, avoid falling into these 5 common lazy social media habits.

Retweet without reading

According to a recent study, 6 out of 10 social media users share links without reading them.  Yikes!  How can you expect to be influential if you don’t know what you have shared beyond the title?  Some organizations are considering ways to combat this type of thoughtless sharing.  For example, Facebook is currently looking into letting users know how widely a link has been read when it is shared.  If you’re going to share, first read the article, and even better, offer your Followers value in the form of adding your key takeaway or insight.

Not formatting images

The optimal image dimensions for posts in Facebook’s newsfeed differ from Instagram or Twitter.  In fact, each social media network has its own recommended height and width for sharing images.  Take the time to format your images accordingly.  Apps such as Canva and PicMonkey will help simplify the process.  Ditto for copy and captions.  A caption crafted for maximum Facebook exposure probably won’t play well on Twitter. Take the time to write in the style best suited to the platform your Follower are using.

All thumbs up and hearts, no comments

Yes, liking other users post is an important component of engagement and building your online community, but go the extra mile or keyboard stroke and comment or react.  What about the image or post initially grabbed your attention?  It is also worth noting that Facebook now ranks reactions higher, which impacts your Insights.  So let other users feel your engagement.  With persistence, what goes around comes around! 

Auto sharing

You know those Twitter accounts that simply automatically share all of their Facebook status updates?  Do you read them?  Chances are, no one is reading yours either.  Creating and posting all of your content for one social media channel and then auto sharing it to all of your other networks should not be your sole strategy.   In some ways, it’s not respecting the other networks and its users.  A social media scheduler such at Hootesuite or HubSpot can help you create and schedule unique posts tailored for each of your networks.

All media, no social

Social media is two words.  Many businesses focus so much on the media, they forget the social piece.  When you receive a lot of comments on your Instagram post, do you take the time to respond or acknowledge? Not every post has to be an overt promotional sell.  Take the time to share gratitude, a personal side, or humor.   Ultimately, the attentiveness that is required to be successful in real life social situation holds true for thriving in social media.   

Like all forms of marketing, social media works best when you heed even the smallest of details. 

 

Instagram Caption Tip

If your marketing strategy opts for longer captions on your Instagram posts, be sure to break up the text with line breaks.    Large, long blocks of text can be tedious to read on Instagram, and your Followers may end up skipping over your well-written caption.

See below on where to find the Return button on an iPhone to make your Instagram captions as visually appealing as they are creatively written!

Instagram Caption Tip Digital Maids Marblehead MA

BONUS!

Add hashtags as a comment to present a clean, easy to read caption.  This way, when you share your Instagram photo to your other social media channels, the hashtags will stay on Instagram, and only your great caption will be shared.

 

Customizing your LinkedIn Profile

Make it easy to connect on LinkedIn by customizing your public profile URL

What’s easier to remember, www.linkedin.com/in/sheilaheff or www.linkedin.com/in/sheilaheffernan-21a1b836 ?

Ditch the assigned numbers and make your LinkedIn profile more memorable and shareable by customizing your profile URL.

Select Profile>Edit Profile>Update your public profile settings.

LinkedIn Tip Digital Maids Marblehead MA

BONUS!

Don’t forget to add your customized link to your email signature!

 

 

Facebook Image Sizing Cheat Sheet

When you manage a Facebook Business Page, knowing the right size and dimensions for your images goes beyond just your profile picture.  How will your images display when you create an Event, share a link, or sponsor a story in the news feed?

This comprehensive Facebook Image Cheat Sheet, courtesy of TechWyse, is a huge time saver for Page Managers.   When it comes to Facebook,  high quality visual content is vital.  Be sure your images display to their maximum potential both on the desktop and mobile.

 

[ Source TechWyse Internet Marketing ]

Facebook Places in place of Yelp?

Digital Maids Facebook Places Screenshot

Facebook Places facebook.com/places

 

Whether you’re a frequent traveler, occasional traveler, or infrequent traveler, you’ve probably used Yelp to help acclimate yourself on where to go and what to do.  And why not?  It’s a convenient, easy to use tool for getting quickly up to speed on a new area or destination.   Increasingly, performing some type of online research regarding any type of travel related activity, including dining, lodging, and shopping, is the new norm.  According to a recent study on American consumerism, Americans not only use the Internet to stay connected to work, family and friends, 57 percent use social media networks for recommendations.

However, there are many that would prefer to see recommendations and reviews from people they know and opinions they feel are bona fide – friends, family, colleagues, neighbors.   Who hasn’t read a review on Yelp and paused momentarily to consider its authenticity?  Yelp continually tweaks its algorithms to ensure posts from trustworthy reviewers appear first, and it does offer the option for users to connect their Yelp profile with their Facebook account.  But in most scenarios you don’t actually know the person providing the review. This may cause you to pause yet again and wonder if you share the same likes and dislikes as the reviewer.  What if their idea of spicy is not your idea of spicy?  The pausing continues.  The wondering continues. Can you trust this review?

This is where Facebook Places, Facebook’s location based check in service,  can provide recommendations, reviews, and Check ins a more reliable, familiar setting  – they’re from your Facebook friends, which, hopefully, is people you know and trust, even if you’re not entirely sure of their definition of spicy.

To start, go to https://www.facebook.com/places or simply enter the destination in your Facebook search box:

digital maids facebook places screenshot

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Immediately, you will see which of your Facebook friends have Checked in to your destination, as well as a variety of activities organized by category, including Eat, Drink, and Sightseeing.

 

Digital Maids Facebook Places Screenshot

 

On a mobile device, it will appear something like this:

Digital Maids

To delve deeper, select “See More”:

Digital Maids Facebook Places Screenshot

 

From here all the pertinent categories will be listed on the left, and all subcategories can be filtered and further searched and refined.

Digital Maids Facebook Places Screenshot

You can easily click to a Business Page of interest, providing more opportunity to scan posts, upcoming events, menus, or Page reviews from the Facebook community.

In short, Yelp has great breadth and reach, and is ultimately easier to navigate.  But Facebook Places is a viable addition for those who don’t like the anonymity sometimes associated with a Yelp review.  For extensive consumer research, add both channels to your online investigating arsenal to get an informed opinion.

Business owner tip:   Don’t forget to make it easy for Facebook Places to find you.  Be sure to 1) use the Check in option in some of your posts (see screenshot below), 2) make sure your business category is up to date, 3) confirm your Page has been verified by Facebook and 4) enable user reviews and Check ins.

Digital Maids Facebook Places Screenshot

 

Do you use Facebook Places?  What are you feel are its pros and cons?  Comment and let us know.

Three helpful tips for Facebook Page admins

“Change is the only constant in life” – Heraclitus

Words to live by, and no one understands this observation more than a social media manager.   Like all 21 “relevant” social media channels, Facebook never stops tweaking, updating, and altering its features and functionality.   If you manage a Facebook Page or Pages, this means how you interact and use your Page today could very likely be different tomorrow.

Here are three recent changes Facebook recently made to their Business Pages to be aware of:

 

Liking another Page as your Facebook Business Page

You’ve probably noticed that Facebook revamped its settings in regards to how you access the newsfeed of your Business Page.  You no longer login as your Page to view the newsfeed of your Business Page like you do your personal newsfeed.   Now you select “View Pages Feed” to view, like, and interact with Pages your business has liked or is following.  This link can be found under the profile picture.

Digital Maids Facebook Business Page Tips

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To like or follow new Pages as your Business Page, go to the Page, and select the three dots located at the bottom right of the cover photo.  From that drop down menu, select “Like As Your Page”

Digital Maids Facebook Business Page Tips

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you manage multiple Pages, you will see another drop menu.  Select the correct Page and save.

This recent update may have been made to reduce multiple logins, but it is a significant modification for businesses that regularly network and interact as their Business Page, and has not been well-received by the Facebook user community.

 

Instant Replies

If your Business Page receives numerous private messages, it’s always a good practice to acknowledge to the sender that their message has been received.  Instant Replies does just as the name implies – sends an automatic reply to any initial messages.   Given that’s it auto reply, be sure to add a personal tone to your message.

To turn on Instant Replies for your Page:

  1. Click Settings at the top of your Page
  2. Click Messaging in the left column
  3. Below Instant Replies, click to check the box next to Enable Instant Replies to quickly respond to initial messages
  4. Below Your Reply, enter your Instant Reply message
  5. Click Save

 

Digital Maids Facebook Business Page Tips

 

Note that Instant Replies should never fully replace authentic interaction with your audience.  They should be considered an initial acknowledgement of the message.

 

Boost your Call To Action

Looking to book an upcoming event or simply let prospects know how best to contact you?  If you have already set up your Facebook Call to Action (CTA) button to reflect this prompt, you can now promote your CTA button.   Select the arrow located at the end of your CTA, and then select Promote.  From there, you will see all the familiar ad options and fields, including budget, audience, and duration of promotion.

Digital Maids Facebook Business Page Tips Call To Action Button

What’s great about this feature is that in some scenarios a timeline post can’t effectively communicate what your CTA has already communicated – yet the only people seeing it are the ones who proactively visit your Page.   By promoting it, the CTA appears in your targeted audience’s newsfeed.

 

What else is new?

What recent Facebook Business Page changes have you noticed, embraced, or both?

 

 

 

With so much social media, can I ditch my website?

If you arewebsite vs social media a small business owner managing multiple social media channels – a Facebook page, or Instagram and Twitter presence, for example, in addition to your company website, you may wonder, does my company still really need a website?  Facebook in particular continues to improve the functionality and overall look and feel of their business pages, all in the hopes to keep you posting in their space.

Two criteria must be considered when making these kind of decisions for your small business.  Money and time.  Is it within the budget?  Is it worth my time?

Although it is tempting to turn off the website and take it off your to do list, especially within the context of these two questions, there is still value to be found in maintaining a company website.

 

CONGESTED NEWSFEEDS

If it seems crowded on the social media scene, it is not your imagination.  Facebook recently reported nearly 1.5 billion million active users.  Twitter, often aptly compared to an endless cocktail party of mixing and mingling,  has similar high numbers, 307 million users.

Given this extraordinary potential reach, having a consistent presence that is an extension of your brand is an essential piece of any comprehensive content marketing strategy.   And if you are to B2C organization, an active social media page sends a strong signal to your customers that you are accessible and responsive to their needs.

However, the possibility to reach millions of potential customers comes with staggering competition.  Facebook alone has 50 million business pages.   This partially explains why Facebook is constantly tweaking its newsfeed algorithm, and that Twitter may soon follow suit.   It is an ongoing effort to not overwhelm and ultimately turn off its users with content deemed worthless.   For businesses hoping to gain exposure through their Facebook business page, the continual shake up of the newsfeeds means that even your followers will most likely not see all of your posts.

HAVING YOUR OWN ADDRESS

Most small businesses owners I have the pleasure to work with have a strong sense of purpose when it comes to managing their work and envisioning their product.   Most often, this drive and commitment is what brought them to take the risk to go out on their own.   It is also why it can be difficult to alter that vision in order to fit into the prescribed parameters of a social media platform.  Cover photos are impactful and will surely raise brand awareness, but maybe not all the images you want to showcase are ideal for a 851×315 layout.

With over 21 “important” social media channels constantly evolving and surely more on the way, there are vast opportunities to broaden your reach.  But your website, that domain you bought, is just that – your domain.  Reward your users from the moment they enter it with robust, informative content.  Take advantage of not having to conform to the constraints of another platform to really communicate to users your value and distinctiveness.

SEARCH

Although search within social media platforms are becoming smarter, your potential client is still most likely trying to find you through a search engine.   And when you comb through all the tips and infographics on how best to boost search engine results (SER), when does a consistently updated company website not make the list?

 

BEST SCENARIO

1) A regularly maintained Facebook or [insert your customers most you used social media channel(s)] that reflects your content marketing strategy and brand + 2) a consistent landing page + 3) an easy to register for mailing list will create some content continuity for search engines and people both on and off of social media.

What do you think?  Is it worth it to maintain both a website and social media presence?