5 Steps to Writing Effective Social Media Content

How many likes and shares did your latest post get? We’re sure the result could have been better if you chose a proper social media content strategy. But you’ve made a mistake. No worries! We will tell you how to start to write effectively and engage social media users with killer posts.

• Know your audience

As a marketer, you have already known about the necessity to know your audience. This helps to effective use advertisement and attract leads. Perhaps, you already have an image of your ideal buyer persona, and that’s just great! If you don’t, you need to fill this gap now.

There are many approaches to creating a buyer persona, but we would recommend you to choose the most detailed done with indicating the names of relatives, childhood hobbies, and even preference in food. In this way, it will be easier for you to understand people who buy your products and services. And of course, this will help you get to know people who read your content!

• Each post should be well-structured

It does not matter whether you write long-reads or one-sentence posts, the structure should always be preserved. We don’t tell you that each post should look like an essay with the introduction, main body and conclusion although you need to know how to write a conclusion as this is the part of the post where you can put call to actions and persuade the readers to buy something.

Any post should have the lead. This is the first sentence that should draw the attention of the readers by all possible means. It can be provocative and sarcastic, it can be a question or an anecdote, but the person who scrolls the feed must pay attention to it.

If we are talking about Instagram or Twitter, you are to remember about proper usage of hashtags. In Instagram, you can put all of them to at the end of the post or in a comment, while in Twitter it’s better to insert them directly to the text.

• Visuals are the keys to success

If we have already started to talk about scrolling a feed, we need to draw your attention to the necessity of visuals. Recall the last time you have scrolled the Facebook feed. Did you pay attention to brand posts that do have images or videos get more likes and shares? When we go to the page of a brand, we always expect to see something extraordinary, not just the plain texts.

The latest statistics shows that Twitter posts with images are retweeted 150% more frequently than posts without visual content. Just imagine how many leads you lose when you write posts without pictures!

Some marketers think that the image inserted into the text should be a unique one, just like the content itself. However, there are no such requirements to pictures and images, so you can just use visual content that you like!

Keep in mind some simple rules, and you’ll notice the difference:

• An image should be without watermark
• If you use photos, it’s better to add the name of photographer
• If you take infographics or diagrams from other websites, give the links to them

• Keep it concise

No one will read your post if they are full of ideas that are not connected to each other. Make sure that your post is not only interesting to read, but also easy to catch the main message.

Follow the golden rule of marketing: stick to one idea per one message. In this way, your posts will be concise even though you have a lot to say.

Before you start working on the post, it’s better to write an outline or a plan. This will help you to define what aspects you will cover in the posts, and what of them are not so important.

• Follow the trends

Content marketing is changing all the time. New trends appear, and if you want to keep the pace, you are to follow the trends of graphic design, texts, and even emojies.

Stories are great example of that. Although they last for 24 hours only, they are a strong marketing tool and the great way to communicate to your audience. This is a type of video content that becomes more trendy each day. Every Instagram user watches stories, and you can reach your audience by this channel as well.

Content marketing can rise your brand to the top positions if applied correctly. You should never ignore the possibilities of content, as they are far stronger than advertising an cold outreach. High-quality content can increase brand-awareness, attract leads, and even sell. In social media, it also helps to build strong relations with your audience, and this is what you can never ignore if you want to be successful.