It’s 2023, and by now you know that social media feeds play a massive part in customer acquisition and brand awareness. But did you know that simply having a social media feed isn’t enough? Potential customers are using these platforms to vet your business before you even get a chance to show them what you’ve got, so if things are looking sloppy or abandoned, it can be even worse than not having an online presence at all.
Instead of shooting in the dark with your posts and crossing your fingers something sticks, we’ve put together a cheat sheet of the most important things to include in your social media content this year. If you’ve got these five things covered, you’re in great shape!
1. Branding
With short attention spans and no shortage of alternative options, you only have a few seconds to capture your audience’s attention and convince them to take action. Having a consistent look and feel to your social media feeds is a great way to put your best foot forward for potential customers, and secure a place in their mind for potential conversion down the road. This means applying your branding from everything to your profile image and Instagram story highlights to the tone in your captions and the style of your photos. Consistency is key!
2. Friendly Faces
We work with clients from a wide variety of industries, backgrounds and locales, and one thing is consistent across every single one – people care about people. Posts with people’s faces, particularly those who are directly involved in the business, outperform everything else by a landslide. While we believe you can take feed-worthy photos with just about any smart phone, we also know that not everyone has the time or artistic eye to pull it off. Hiring a professional photographer is well worth the investment if it means you end up with photos of yourself and your staff that you’re proud to share, and they often have special pricing packages for businesses.
3. Answers to Questions
If you already have a list of FAQs prepared, you’re ahead of the game! Use that as a starting point and create posts based on the answer to each question. If you haven’t written down your commonly-asked questions quite yet, take some time to think about what you’d like your ideal customer to know before they get to you. For example, if you spend a significant amount of time explaining to people how to place orders online, create a post that walks them through the process, step-by-step. Not only will you likely entice a few folks to visit your website and place an order without even speaking to them, but you’ll also create a valuable piece of content you can refer to the next time that same question comes up.
4. Platform-Appropriate Captions
As tempting as it is to post the same thing to both Facebook and Instagram, the fact is, that your audiences on each platform are very different. Even if both platforms are reaching the same people, the way they consume the content is heavily influenced by the platforms themselves. Instagram users are way less likely to slow down and read a lengthy caption, so short and sweet is often the way to go. Facebook is still the preferred platform for back-and-forth discussion, so including a question or prompt is much more effective than it would be on Instagram. Also remember that (as it currently stands) links in Instagram captions are NOT clickable, so be sure to swap those out for “Link in bio’s instead.
5. CTAs
CTAs, or Call to Actions, are our love language when it comes to excellent social media content. The social media feed itself is only a piece of the larger puzzle of your marketing strategy, and it isn’t doing it’s job unless it seamlessly integrates with the rest of your online presence. This means directing people to your website, Google Business page and e-newsletter sign ups on a regular basis. You can either be perfectly straightforward (Visit our website!) or a little more subtle (Did you know our menu is available online?) depending on the vibe you’re going for. Pro Tip: Remember to take a peek at your analytics to see who is coming from where.
There you have it, the 5 Love Languages of social media posts. Once you have these elements covered, you’re well on your way to making your social media presence work for you instead of against you. If any of this sounds intimidating, let us know! It’s one of our favorite things to talk about.