social content optimization

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SOCIAL CONTENT OPTIMIZATION

Content that Resonates

July 2015

MAXWELLPR + ENGAGEMENT

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Who We Are + What We Do

• We help companies build national consumer brands

• We’re driven by the why behind the what

• We specialize in PR + Influencer Engagement + SocialSam BurtonSam@MaxwellPR.com

Niki Inouye @nikimaeNiki@MaxwellPR.com

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What We’ll Cover Today

What is social media optimization

Why you should optimize your social content

How to measure your content’s performance

Best practices and ways you can improve your engagement

OUR GOAL: Give you the tools to help you increase your brand’s social media engagement

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Chasing Likes or Building Community?

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The Payoff of Content Optimization

• Higher engagement

• True two-way communication

• Learnings that support other marketing tactics

• Content that shows up organically and more often

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Common Misconceptions • Followers are more important than engagement

• Promoting every post will increase engagement

• Engagement automatically increases with fan growth

• Spending more on boosting content will increase engagement even more

• Posts aren’t seen unless you advertise

• Hashtag, hashtag, hashtag

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METRICSMeasurement + Monitoring Best Practices

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Signs You’re Doing Well

• You’re attracting your target demographic

• Engagement is hitting or exceeding benchmarks

• People are talking to each other

• Your posts are getting shared and retweeted

• Other brands and influencers are “playing” with you

• Your analytics are telling you when and with what people are engaging

• Your content is inspired by a core set of topics and you know what’s working

• You’ve found your voice and there’s a consistent tone and visual feel to your posts

• You’re experimenting - with CTAs, visuals/video, etc.

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Measuring Social Engagement Channel Engagement Type Engagement Equation Industry Average

Individual post virality

People Talking About This (PTAT)/Post Reach 2.6% – 2.7%

Individual post engagement

(Total post likes + total post clicks + total post shares) / total impressions x 100

6.1 – 6.5%

Individual tweet engagement

(total clicks + total retweets + total replies + total follows + total favorites) / total

impressions x 1001 – 2%

Monthly repin rate(total monthly repins /total monthly pins) /

followers/1,000Food brand average:

0.7-1%

Monthly page engagement rate

(total monthly likes + total monthly comments) / # of posts) / # of followers at end

of month0.5 – 2%

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Brand Checkup

• Understand your existing community

• Determine what’s working• What CTA’s/formats get the most engagement?

• What do people love to Like the most?

• Compare against competitors

• Set a benchmark for improvement

• Use these findings as a starting point to test and optimize

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Common Problems: What to Check

Problem Solution

Your fan base isn’t aligned with your target audience

Target your ideal demographic through advertising OR adjustmessage/tone to fit actual audience

Your target audience isn’t engaging with one of your social channels

Not every channel is appropriate for every audience (e.g. Baby Boomers aren’t really on Instagram) – de-prioritize channels that don’t fit your target demographic

Nobody is seeing your content –post reach is low

Create engaging content in tandem with boosting content – at least for a month to build momentum

Your competitors are outgrowingand/or out engaging you

You may need to up your advertising spend, but more so they’re probably doing a better job with content. Take a closer look at themes and post style of those who have a similar target audience.

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OPTIMIZATIONGoing from Good to Great

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What to Test + Optimize

• Content topics

• Voice

• CTAs

• Posting

• Visuals

• Hashtags + Links

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Focus Your Content Via Catalysts

• Identify 4-6 core topic categories

• Develop ed-cals based on these topics• Categorizing content helps ensure key message points are

touched upon each month – and makes sure content is varied

• Monitor• Look at what content is receiving the most (and least)

engagement and optimize accordingly

Best Practice Tip: When developing your monthly/weekly editorial calendars, also indicate the catalyst for each post to help keep you on track with frequency. Once the month is over, go back and measure engagement to see how the catalysts are performing!

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Hone Your Voice Your voice shows the community who your brand is. Stay true to your brand and…

• Showcase personality

• Use humor only when/if it’s appropriate

• Speak with authority, if follows your brand guidelines

• Fits your community – masculine vs. feminine

• Engage and encourage interactionwithin your community

Best Practice Tip: Create a brand manifesto that is shared internally to ensure consistency across channels (social, customer service, PR)

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Prompting Engagement

• Invite fans to play – all you have to do is ask – they WANT to show off their knowledge or skills

• Incorporate effective CTA’s and test new ways to prompt engagement• Ask for a photo share

• Ask a response to a question

• Incentivize a response

Best Practice tip: Use only ONE question and pose it at the end of a post so that it’s the last thing your fans read and the first thing they respond to!

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Timing• The best time to post varies for every brand, and often depends on:

• Time zone

• Target audience age

• Fans’ life stage (New mom? Working? Student?)

• With organic social posts seeing less reach in the Facebook newsfeed, it’s important to post content when your community is open for engaging

Best Practice Tip: Don’t forget about testing posts on weekends and in the evening – it’s when a lot of people have time to be on social media (especially Instagram!)

Data available in Facebook Insights!

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Post FrequencyHow often a brand should post depends on engagement, and the ability to commit to creating new and quality content - don’t post just to post!

Facebook Instagram Twitter Pinterest

How often to post?

3-5X per week 3-5X per week 1-5X per day 3-5X per week

How long do posts live?

~90 minutes in the newsfeed

6-48 hours 24 minutes +3 ½ months

Best Practice Tip: In addition to engagement, keep an eye on “negative feedback” in Facebook Insights and unfollows – they’re good indicators of when you’re posting too much, or posting content that your fans aren’t interested in

Data available in Facebook Insights!

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Post TypeVary content types (text, link, photo, video, etc.) to see which content resonates best with your audience for each catalyst. Try:-Text -Video -Quotes-Link -Photo -UGC

Best Practice Tips

Facebook Instagram Twitter Pinterest

• Keep content short (~80 characters or less)

• Images and native video typically see the highest level of engagement

• Utilize user-generated content (re-gram) and behind-the-scenes photos

• Don’t be afraid to take pictures on your iPhone,users are used to it!

• Test different imagery types to see what gets the most engagement within your community

• It’s okay to post the same content multiple times within the week to increase the chance that followers will see it

• Keep tweets short enough that users are able to retweet with context without going over characters

• Vertical images perform best – a majority of users are looking at their social channels on a mobile device

Data available in Facebook Insights!

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Amplify Your Content

• Make content on your website more sharable to increase WOM

• Tag, engage, retweet and follow influencers to increase your following and build valuable relationships

• Utilize hashtags (and emojis!) – this is the best way to get your content seen on Instagram and Twitter

• PAID: Boost content that is already engaging to further increase reach and drive additional engagement

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Timeline for Testing

• HOW LONG DO YOU TEST?• Know what’s working/what’s not

• Engagement levels rise

• WHEN DO YOU STOP?• You don’t.

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Resources to Stay Up-To-Date • Analytics/Reporting:

• SocialPiq

• Track Maven

• Simply Measured

• Sources to follow for news and trends:• ShortStack

• Mashable

• PR Daily

• Maxwell FreeThink

• Where to go for inspiration:• Competitors

• Bloggers

• Media outlets

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Questions?

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THANK YOU!Sign up for our monthly newsletter at www.maxwellpr.com

Sam Burton – sam@maxwellpr.com

Niki Inouye – niki@maxwellpr.com