How to customize your social media messages for business success
So you’ve taken the first step with social media and opened an account with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and maybe even Pinterest and Instagram. You’ve also spent some time posting regularly and have experienced some increased traffic to your website. But are you using the same message for each social media channel? If you are, you might not be getting the best bang for your buck.
Each social media channel has its own way of communicating. And social media users expect different messages on Facebook compared to Twitter or LinkedIn.
So how can you customize your messages for each social media account?
Glad you asked.
With the 140-character limit with Twitter you know you need to keep your posts tight. You can think of Twitter as a news source with headlines about what is getting attention at that time. It moves very quickly, so what’s news at 7:00 am will be different than what is making the rounds at noon.
These headlines usually have links that lead you to content such as landing pages, articles, websites and images. A Twitter post acts like a bit of a tease or quick peek into what you can expect if you follow the link.
Using a photo in your tweets is a great way to gain attention to your posts, so try to get those in as much as possible.
There are no character limits for Facebook, so you can provide more information in your posts. This doesn’t mean that you should publish an essay; try to keep your messages succinct.
Photos and videos also do well here. And your community of page followers can add their own photos and videos too. Sharing at its best.
Facebook offers you a great opportunity to engage with your customers. You can create instant buzz by asking those who “like” you to participate in designing your next promotion.
Say you have a retail store that sells shoes. You could post photos of three different pairs of shoes and ask everyone to like their favourite. Whichever pair of shoes wins, you will offer a 20% discount. And who doesn’t like a sale?
This network for professionals provides a very different experience for users compared to Facebook, so you should tailor these messages differently too.
Using the shoe store example, you probably wouldn’t want to offer a promotion on LinkedIn. But you could write an article for your blog about how the promotion worked, and what you learned from the experience. Then you could post a link to this article on your LinkedIn profile. It’s all about understanding your audience.
You probably noticed that I mentioned images work to gain attention. Instagram is the place to really feature your visual style and get that attention working for you. You can add both photos and videos with a brief description to engage your fans.
Instagram is especially popular with millenials. According to Salesforce, millennial Instagram users are 58.6% more likely to remember a great branded Instagram account over a TV commercial.
But even if millenials aren’t your target audience, Instagram can give your customers the inside scoop on your business. And who doesn’t like to see some behind the scenes action?
For example, maybe your shoe store has just received the new fall stock. This is a great opportunity to tease your followers with a nice shot of one of the new shoes slated for your fall launch.
Time to personalize
Now that you have a better idea about how to customize your social media messaging take a bit of time to tailor your posts. It’s time well spent. You don’t want customers to think that you are just phoning it in when it comes to your social media messaging. Show them you are engaged and invested in bringing out the best your company has to offer.