We field many questions about using social media in content marketing efforts. They tend to be about which social media channels to use, how to use them and how to make the best use of them.  Here are three recommendations we share frequently to help you be more effective.

Summary:

Don’t worry about where you’re not. Pick, focus and learn. Number two, house your content on your own website so it can be scalable. Have it be optimized for visibility and search engines, and then use those social channels to distribute rather than to house the content that you create.  And number three, build your audience. One hundred people that are really crucial to the future of your business is a far more important audience than a social channel with a hundred thousand people with a pulse.

1. Pick & Focus

There’s a lot of social media channels out there. There’s a lot of different audiences out there. There’s a lot of different ways in which one channel is better for business than another. So how do you choose? Do your homework, pick and focus on one or two and be good at it.

Be consistent, learn, connect with the audience.  Don’t try to be everywhere.  Don’t try to be on seven or eight social channels. Unless you’ve got the time (which most of us don’t), the staff (which most of us don’t), and quite honestly, the experience to know how to use them all at the same time.

You can find one or two social channels that can be relevant to the type of people and the type of business you are and really focus in and use those well.

Test and learn if you wish, try a new one if you wish.  But really, don’t feel bad about not being everywhere. It’s better to focus on one or two channels and really be good at it and learn than to be guilty about where you’re not.

2. What Topics Do I Use And Where Do I Put My Content

The best topics for social media come from the questions and conversations you have each day with your customers and prospects.

When it comes to the topics and content you create, it’s best to share it on social media and not have it live only on social media.

Remember that you don’t control what’s going happen on the social platform.  It’s best to have your content live on your website and shared on social media.

Having your content live on your website means a couple things:

First, it’s ready for you to use at any time through any social channel that you choose. The content you’re creating should be distributed through social channels. That’s the purpose of using those audiences.

Second, the website allows you to create content optimized for search visibility. That’s just a fancy way of saying it’s going be there when someone’s gonna be looking for it.  So you want your content to help you out in more ways than one.

When you put the content on your website, it’s optimized for your audience, it’s optimized for your topic. And so Google and other search engines are going to hopefully categorize that and have it ready when the folks that you wanna do business with are looking for you.

There’s a side benefit in that you become scalable, and the social channels become the distribution arm to bring people back to the website rather than being the house in which all this lives.

3.  Measuring By Building Your Own Audience

When you use social media, television, radio, or digital, you’re essentially renting someone else’s audience.

You’re also paying for someone else’s value.

So build your own audience and create your own value.

Use those channels to get visibility and to connect with people that you wanna do business with. Have a plan to bring them back in and become part of your audience. And you can do that through lead forms, downloads, workshops, events, all that kind of stuff where you can get information from the people that would be prospects.

But rent the audience via social media or paid media for building your own audience. Talking consistently to 100 people that could really be good customers or clients for your business will yield much greater results than trying to chase somebody down just because they have a social media account.