Dl social by chad dempster

Social Marketing Manual Driving Loyalty Mission Statement: To be useful to our dealers and their customers with information to improve loyalty and retention

Selected as One of the Top Technology Companies to Watch

3 Years in a Row by AutoSuccess Magazine

Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com

Introduction Driving Loyalty currently delivers consistent relevant messages to our auto dealer’s customers using email, direct mail, out bound phone calls and personalized customer websites. We are proud to announce the addition of a new channel for our dealers to communicate with their customers; Social Media! Our Social Marketing initiative is based on our philosophy that we “Do the Doing” for our dealers. In addition, as our mission statement suggests, we intend; “To be useful to our dealers and their customers with information to improve loyalty and retention.” To that end, we prepared this manual to share best practices in the use of Social Media for our dealer clients. Our goal is to help develop a coordinated Social Marketing/Networking plan that will complement our existing consumer centric messages throughout the customer’s shopping, buying and ownership experience. This manual is divided into sections that represent different social media channels and their unique marketing/networking opportunities, features and benefits.

Facebook LinkedIn Twitter Google + In addition to this manual, Driving Loyalty will be hosting several online Social Marketing resources including our own Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google + pages with regularly updated best practices as well as two online papers:

1. http://DrivingLoyaltySocial.com Driving Loyalty Social 2. http://AutoIndustrySocialMarketingSolutions.com Social Marketing Solutions – Auto Our Content Curation services will initially focus on providing information on Social Marketing. However, as our dealer’s apply these best practices we will be providing additional consultation services to support their social marketing efforts using the dealer’s staff and resources including: Evaluation of our auto dealer client’s social marketing sites, policies and procedures Recommendations to maximize the use of existing dealership personnel and content • “Blog Talk Radio Shows” featuring customer centric messages to promote the dealer • Blogs referencing the dealer and their efforts to support their community • Coordinate dealership social marketing messages to complement other DL media • •

In Summary: The market is a conversation that begins before, during and after the sale. Driving Loyalty is committed to include our dealers in the discussion to improve loyalty and retention.

Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com

Table Of Contents Chapter 1:

4 Methods for Conquering Low Facebook Reach

Facebook The Complete Guide to Facebook Analytics....................................................................................... Pages 4-39 10 tips to creating engaging page posts........................................................................................... Pages 40-44 The Comprehensive Guide to Facebook Privacy Settings................................................................. Pages 45-53 4 Methods for Conquering Low Facebook Reach............................................................................. Pages 54-61

Chapter 2:

Twitter

A Complete Guide to Twitter Analytics ........................................................................................... Pages 55-106 Helpful Hashtags for Auto Dealerships ......................................................................................... Pages 107-108

Chapter 3:

LinkedIn Essential LinkedIn Marketing Resources: A Complete Guide ....................................................... Pages 110-116 LinkedIn Company Page: Best Practices ..................................................................................... Pages 117-121 10 Tips for Engaging Followers with Targeted Status Updates...................................................... Pages 122-125

Chapter 4:

Google + 10 Tips: How Not to Use Google Plus ......................................................................................... Pagex 127-135 ??????? ............................................................................................................................................. Page 26-27

Chapter 5:

Content Curation/Creation ??????? ............................................................................................................................................. Page 29-30 ??????? ............................................................................................................................................. Page 30-31

Chapter 6:

Dealer Social Media Sites ??????? ............................................................................................................................................. Page 37-38 ??????? ............................................................................................................................................. Page 39-40

Chapter 7:

B2B Networking 3

??????? ............................................................................................................................................. Page 44-45 ??????? ............................................................................................................................................. Page 46-47

The Complete Guide to Facebook Analytics

simplymeasured.com http://simplymeasured.com/blog/2014/04/29/ebook-the-complete-guide-to-facebook-analytics/

The Complete Guide to Facebook Analytics How to analyze the metrics that matter

INTRODUCTION Chances are, your target audience is somewhere among the nearly 9.6 million users who log in to their accounts as least once per day. That’s good news because Facebook is a gold mine for marketers. Consider these Facebook numbers alone: • More than 1.26 billion registered users (1.19 billion of whom are active on a monthly basis) • 350 million daily uploaded photos • 4.75 billion average daily shared items • 20 billion minutes of usage per day

But it’s not enough to know that your target audience is on Facebook – the key is to reach and engage them and we’re going to show you just how to do that. In this comprehensive eBook, we walk you through the most crucial Facebook metrics you need to gauge the performance of your marketing efforts. Then we’ll outline specific ways you can use these metrics to create actionable Facebook strategies. Finally, because even the savviest marketers can find it challenging to make use of all that Facebook data, we share examples of how to use our tools to analyze and report on Facebook metrics yourself.

DEFINITIONS You can’t measure what you don’t know, so we’ll begin by defining all the important Facebook metrics and how they’re calculated. As a social media or community manager, having a firm grasp on these Facebook metrics will help you deliver better results with your Facebook strategy. The Facebook Engagement Megaphone is a tool we use at Simply Measured, which allows you to track the effectiveness of your post content throughout its life cycle. It will act as a helpful visual as we define Facebook metrics. The engagement megaphone outlines your Facebook activity; from your posts and posts about your brand to engaged users, to engagement, to reach, and to impressions. You can use this to find out how many people are seeing your content, whether or not people are interacting with your content, and how many new Page “Likes” your posts are generating.

Engagement Content is king, but engagement rules. After all, if no one engages with your content, what’s the point of creating it? That’s why your number-one priority should be to get people engaged with your brand content on Facebook. The good news is that Facebook isn’t a network for syndication; it’s a network built for engagement, and recent feature additions show that engagement is more important than ever. The ability to reply to others’ comments, click on hashtags, and search the web were all designed to keep users on-site and discovering new content with which to interact. How engagement is calculated

Engagement Likes + Comments + Shares

Three elements signify positive engagement with your posts: Likes The number of times people Like your posts, indicating how well your content resonates with people. Comments The number of comments people make on your posts. While the number of comments is an important metric, the tone of comments can provide insight into how people feel about your content, products, or your overall brand. Shares The number of times people share your content, measuring how much your content is amplified by those who see it.

Our calculation for engagement is different than Facebook's calculation. On Facebook, engagement includes clicks. Why are our calculations different? Clicks are not available in the public Facebook API so we exclude them from total engagement.

Comments

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Likes

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Total Engagement on Brand Posts

Brand Post Engagement Breakdown

What does engagement mean to you? Engagement with your posts reflects three vital things: • Your brand’s ability to capture users’ attention • Your brand’s ability to create a connection with your content • How many people see your posts Engagement plays an even larger role in who sees your posts, because it is a major factor in Facebook’s News Feed algorithm. This algorithm determines which News Feeds your posts are displayed in and ultimately, how many users you’re able to reach. When users engage, the actions they take appear in their timelines, making their connection with your brand visible to their friends. And that contributes to awareness for your brand. Engagement tells you a lot about your audience - which types of content they’re interested in and whether certain segments of your audience interact more or less with content that is specifically tailored to them. Engagement on certain types of posts can provide insight into the interests of a particular audience for content targeting.

Engaged Users When it comes to your audience on Facebook, there are far more important metrics than your number of Page fans. The engaged users metric is one of them; it’s a key Facebook metric that measures how many people are actively engaging with your Page.

Engaged Users The number of people who engaged with your page (including any click or Story generated)

How engaged users are calculated The engaged users metric can be found within Facebook Insights at both the Page and post levels. Engaged users aren’t just limited to your fans; anyone who engages with your Page is an engaged user. What do engaged users mean to you? Measuring engaged users goes a step beyond your Page’s fan count to tell you how many people are interacting with your Page. Out of the people whom you were able to reach, these are the users who took action on your Page – whether as a Like, share, comment, etc. Monitoring engaged users as a percentage of fans over time can help you determine whether you’re growing an active or a passive audience. Engaged users as a percentage of total fans indicates how active your audience is and how valuable your fan growth is from month to month. For example, if the number of total engaged users is up each month as a percentage of total fans, then the quality of your audience is improving. Even the number of engaged users reflects how much your audience is choosing to interact with your brand.

Total Reach & Engaged users 140K

Total Reach 6K

100K

80K

60K

40K

Engaged users

Total Reach

Engaged users 120K

20K

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Engagement with your posts impacts your ability to reach a larger audience. If you can’t continue to engage users, they won’t continue to see your content. Those who engage on your Page are your most valuable audience segment, since they are the ones consuming and sharing your content across Facebook.

Engagement Rate Engagement rate is a metric that you can use to measure your effectiveness at engaging your audience. It can tell you a lot about what content or which post types are the most successful and you can now access this metric in the updated Insights tool. You can calculate engagement rate in two different ways based on the available data: • If you use public post data in a Simply Measured Facebook Competitive Analysis, you can compare your Engagement as a Percentage of Total Fans against other brands on Facebook. • If you work directly with the engagement rate metric within Facebook Insights, you can see your brand’s engagement rate, whether for a single Page or multiple Pages.

The first option allows you to compare your post or Page performance to other brands on Facebook. Again, this is using public data, not data from Facebook Insights. The second option allows you to measure your own brand’s post performance as accurately as possible using Facebook Insights data.

Engagement Rate People who liked, commented, shared, or clicked on your post / people who saw your post (post reach)

Calculating engagement rate for posts using Insights data Engagement rate is designed to measure the number of unique users who engaged with your content as a percentage of the number of users that were exposed to it. Facebook Insights data provides in-depth unique user totals for engagement actions on your posts, as well as the overall reach of your posts. This allows you to calculate engagement rate based on more than Likes, shares, comments and clicks. Example:

100 unique users engaged with a given post and 1000 users saw the post Engaged users = 100 Engagement rate = 10%

The number of engaged users serves as a valuable metric for measuring content performance and the quality of your audience.

Sample engagement for Harley Davidson

Calculating engagement rate for posts without Insights data When calculating your engagement rate in contrast to your competitors, remember that you don’t have access to their Facebook Insights data. However, you can still draw meaningful insights by looking at engagement for both posts and Pages relative to total fans. The Simply Measured solution is to perform a calculation for engagement rate called Engagement as a Percent of Total Fans. This is a simplified way to calculate engagement rate to compare competitor engagement rates to your own. So even if you don’t have time to delve into the reasons for engagement – or lack thereof – this can provide you with the context you need to make informed marketing decisions.

% eng/total total engagement

Engagement Rate Total Engagement (Likes + Comments + Shares) / Total Fans

33% What does engagement rate mean to you? Engagement rate on individual posts is a valuable metric for measuring the quality of content that you post to your Page. Specifically, it allows you to compare engagement between two posts. Knowing what share of your audience actually engages with content can indicate whether or not you’re reaching the right audience as you grow fans over time.

1.6 Million

Engagement as a Percentage of Total Fans allows you to compare engagement on your Page with Pages that have different audience sizes, making it useful for competitive analysis. Comparing your engagement rate to that of your competitors can provide insights about the quality of your audience and your content effectiveness compared to others in your industry.

Reach Often the first Facebook metric that marketers focus on is the number of fans for a Page. When it comes to measuring the value of your audience though, what matters most is how many people are seeing your content. That’s where reach comes in. Overall, reach is the primary metric for determining how many people can possibly see your content. It’s a powerful performance indicator for tactics that enable your brand to connect with users on Facebook.

Reach The number of unique people who have seen content associated with your page

How reach is calculated There are three types of reach: organic, paid and viral. Understanding and measuring each of these is important to gauge how and why your audience changes over time. Organic Reach The number of unique people who saw your content in their News Feeds, tickers, or on your Page. Paid Reach The number of unique people who saw your paid content. Viral Reach The number of unique people who saw your post or Page mentioned in a Story published by a friend. These stories can include Likes, comments or sharing on your Page, answering a question or responding to an event.

Reach Breakdown by Type Organic

Viral

Paid

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Reach

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Measuring reach by type can help you pinpoint the factors that contributed to content views. If organic reach increased, it might be the result of more fans or increased engagement with content. Changes in viral reach can indicate how shareable your content was, and paid reach can tell you whether changes in reach were due to ads on the network. Reach can be viewed for your Page as a whole, or for individual posts. The difference is how many unique users saw an individual post versus those who saw other pieces of content – such as an eBook or report – associated with your Page. What does reach mean to you? Reach measures your brand’s effective audience. It’s a more accurate measure of your Facebook audience than fans, since not all your fans see your posts and many users who do see your posts are not fans of your Page.

Impressions The largest challenge for brands on Facebook is making it into users’ News Feeds. Impressions are a solid metric for understanding how many times your posts are seen and how frequently users are exposed to that content.

Impressions The number of times content associated with your page is displayed

How impressions are calculated Like reach, there are three main types of impressions on Facebook: organic, paid and viral. Organic Impressions The number of times your content was displayed in a user’s News Feed, ticker, or on your Page. Paid Impressions The number of times your paid content was displayed. Viral Impressions The number of times content associated with your Page was displayed in a Story published by a friend. Stories can include liking, commenting or sharing on your Page, answering a question or responding to an event.

Sample impressions breakdown by type Paid

It’s easy to confuse reach and impressions since both measure the visibility of content and both measure organic, paid, and viral content. Impressions vs. Reach Total Impressions

Total Reach

500K 450K

Viral

400K 350K

Organic

300K 250K 200K 150K

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275K The key difference between impressions and reach is that impressions measure the number of times your content is displayed, while reach measures the number of unique people who saw your content. For example, if five people each saw a post twice, the result would be ten impressions (times displayed) and a reach of five (unique people who saw it). What do impressions mean to you? Impressions measure your ability to expose people to your content on Facebook. This can help you understand not just how many users you’re reaching, but how frequently those users are seeing your posts or content associated with your Page.

Stories What is a Facebook Story? If you’re active on Facebook, you see them everyday and probably create your fair share. Facebook Stories are updates from friends about their engagement with a Page, person, event, etc. and they appear in your News Feed.

Stories Updates from friends about their engagement with pages, people, etc. that appear in News feed.

How are Stories created? Engagement actions that create Stories include: Likes on a Page, engagement on a post, posts on a Page, joining an event, tagging or mentioning a Page, check-ins at a location and other Page interactions. By viewing trends around Stories associated with your brand, you can identify how effectively your posts are driving awareness for your Page. Segmenting Stories by user wall posts and engagement on your Page can inform you of actions users are taking that drive awareness of your Page.

Stories About User Generated Content New Page Like

Page Mention

User Post

700

Stories Created

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For example, a high volume of Stories about a specific user post could indicate that an influential user posted or that an engaging discussion took place. What do Stories mean to you? Stories created about your brand posts build awareness for your Facebook Page. The more people who engage with content on your Page, the better the chances that one of their friends will see a Story associated with it. When people engage with posts on your Page, a description of how they engaged appears as a message in their friends’ News Feeds. For instance, the message may say, “Bob liked X Company’s Page” or “Susie commented on X Company’s Page.”

Consumptions When people think about Facebook engagement, most think of Likes, comments and shares. That’s because these are the primary actions we take as users, and it’s what we see associated with each post. They’re also the engagement metrics most often used by marketers to assess performance. However, Facebook Insights offers a broader measure of engagement that goes beyond Likes, comments and shares. It’s called consumptions. How is it different? It includes clicks.

Consumptions Clicks anywhere in your post (whether the click generates a Story or not).

How consumptions are calculated The consumptions metric can be found within Facebook Insights at both the Page and post levels. Within Facebook Insights, the consumption metric is broken down into four segments: • Link clicks • Photo views • Video plays • Other clicks (which includes clicks – whether Likes, comments or shares – that generate Stories)

Consumptions don’t include liking a Page in the Timeline

and they don’t create Stories in the News Feed; they are limited to clicks on your posts.

Viewing how clicks on your posts are segmented can provide additional information about what types of content are engaging people on your Page. It can also put the volume of other engagement actions in context with the number of Stories created. For example, you could look at how many people viewed an enlarged version of a photo on your post versus how many people liked, commented on, or shared it. Consumptions by Type

Stories Created

700

Photo Views

Video Plays

Link Clicks

Other Clicks

600 500 400 300 200 100

What do consumptions mean to you? You might be wondering why you should care about clicks that don’t create Stories in the News Feed. The answer is simple: clicks get factored into the News Feed algorithm. That means measuring clicks on your posts gives you a more complete view of engagement, and a better idea of whether your posts will continue to appear in users’ News Feeds. When cross-referenced with other key Facebook metrics, consumptions can prove extremely valuable in measuring content performance. For example, by pairing consumptions with impressions, you can establish a click-through rate for each post or content type. And that allows you to measure the frequency of engagement with your content. In addition, you can pair the number of consumers (unique people who clicked) with reach to measure the percentage of people who actually saw and engaged with your content.

Consumers vs. Engaged Users We already reviewed engaged users, so let’s go over consumers and how the two differ. Although the consumers metric is perhaps lesser known, it can actually offer more in-depth insight when it comes to content performance.

Consumers The number of people who clicked on any of your posts (whether the click generated a Story or not)

How are consumers defined? Consumers are people who clicked on your posts (anywhere within a post), while engaged users are those who clicked on or created a Story anywhere on your Page (this includes liking your Page). Since consumer engagement is limited to posts and engaged users can click anywhere on the Page, the number of engaged users on your Page will always be equal to or greater than the number of consumers. While both metrics are available within Facebook Insights at the Page and post levels, the number of engaged users and consumers should almost be equal at the post level. What do these metrics mean to you? Both metrics can be used to measure audience engagement and content performance. However, because of the subtle differences in how each metric is calculated, each has a specific use. Since the engaged users metric includes Stories generated by clicks on your Page and not just within your content, it is a more complete measure of total engagement on your Page. This makes it great for evaluating how engaged the audience is on your Page.

As mentioned earlier, consumers are limited to engagement with your content, not your entire Page. This makes consumers the most accurate metric for measuring post engagement. In addition, consumers can be segmented by the type of engagement action taken, including: • Link clicks

• Video plays

• Photo views

• Other clicks

Total Consumers

Photo Views

Video Plays

Link Clicks

Other Clicks

This breakdown, found in the Simply Measured Facebook Content Analysis, gives a greater level of insight into how someone engaged with your content and what type of post it was (link, photo or video). Again, remember that clicks generating Stories (including Likes, comments and shares) are included in “Other Clicks.” By comparing consumers to post reach, you can calculate the percentage of people who actually saw your content and chose to engage with it. In other words, you can determine what percentage of your audience was engaged at an individual post level. That means consumers is a better metric than engaged users for measuring content performance.

Like Sources A growing audience on Facebook is a sign of a healthy community. But you need to do more than measure the number of new fans to understand how your audience is growing and identify effective tactics for sustaining growth. You need to determine how users are finding your Page. To do that you’ll need to analyze your Like Sources.

Like Sources The places where people can Like your page

How Like Sources are calculated Like Sources can be found within Facebook Insights, via the Facebook Insights tool and the Facebook Insights data export. The number of unique people who like your page is broken down by location. In addition, Like Sources within the Facebook Insights tool are broken out into five segments: • On Your Page • Page Suggestions • Ads and Sponsored Stories • Your Posts • Others

Facebook Insights Tool

Within the Facebook Insights data export, Like Sources can be segmented even further. Dozens of sources exist; however, only the sources your Page was liked from will appear in your data export. Facebook provides the following description for some of the most common Like Sources in its Insights developer documentation:

Ads & Sponsored Stories Page Suggestions On Your Page Your Posts Others

This isn’t the complete list. For example, Facebook further segments mobile sources into mobile ads and mobile page suggestions. This does, however, give you an idea of the granular breakout that is available within the Facebook data export.

What do Like Sources mean to you? Like Sources can help you understand how users are discovering and liking your Page, and provide context for how your other digital marketing components impact fan growth. For example: • Are external connects (e.g., clicks on social plugins) from your website effectively driving users to your Facebook Page? • When you make changes to better integrate social plugins, do you see more Likes? • What percentage of new Likes is driven by Facebook Ads and Sponsored Stories? • Is the third-party app from your latest campaign contributing to fan growth? • How many users liked your Page from a mobile device? These are questions you can answer with data from Like Sources. From there, you can make more informed decisions about tactics designed to grow your fan Page – and better measure the overall impact of your social strategy.

Paid vs. Organic Likes Facebook advertising is a growing trend, with most brands devoting at least a portion of their social media budget to advertising on the network. According to Business Insider, 74% of survey respondents in August 2013 said their Facebook marketing budgets include spending on paid ads. That number is up from 54% in June 2012. For brands that advertise on Facebook, it’s important to be able to segment social media performance by paid vs. organic activities. This includes measuring audience growth, also known as paid Likes.

Paid Likes The number of people that liked your page from an Ad or a Sponsored Story

How paid and organic Likes are calculated Paid and organic Likes are broken out within Facebook Insights’ Like Sources, which we reviewed earlier. Like Sources can be viewed within the Insights tool or the Insights data export, where the number of unique people who liked your Page is broken out by location. You can find the following three sources of paid Likes within Like Sources: • Ads • Mobile ads • Sponsored Stories The sum of the three sources represents the total number of paid Likes for your Page.

Daily Paid Likes by Source Paid Likes

Ads

Mobile Ads

Sponsored Stories will disappear in April 2014.

Sponsored Stories

1,000

A breakdown of Paid Likes can display how audience growth is trending for each source.

900 800 700 600 500 400

In its place, social context will be automatically added to all Facebook Ad types.

300 200 100

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9/ 7/ 1

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Organic Likes are Page Likes that cannot be attributed to Facebook advertising. You can calculate organic Likes by simply subtracting paid Likes from total Likes. To analyze organic Likes further, you can segment Like Sources to identify whether Likes occurred on your Page, or were generated via a social plugin, third-party app, etc. What do paid and organic Likes mean to you? When you advertise on Facebook, it becomes more difficult to report on audience growth that is driven organically. Nevertheless, for social marketers, it’s important to both understand the impact of paid advertising and avoid attributing paid Likes to successful community management tactics. Segmenting paid Likes from total Likes allows you to do just that. By doing this, you can accurately report on community growth while still being able to identify trends in organic growth.

More information here.

Daily Paid Likes vs. Organic Likes Paid Likes

Organic Likes

1,000

Segmenting Paid Likes can help you spot successful tactics for organic growth.

900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100

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Organic growth trends can be used to identify successful tactics for building your audience. Segmenting fan growth also makes it possible to calculate benchmarks and set goals based on your Facebook advertising budget. Measuring paid Likes against your advertising spend can provide a benchmark you can use to forecast future audience growth, depending on your Facebook advertising budget. You can also use this benchmark to determine how much you should allocate to your Facebook ad budget. The challenge of measuring paid ads and forecasting performance isn’t limited to Likes. Paid advertising also affects engagement, reach and impressions. Segmenting performance for each of these metrics can help you measure the impact of Facebook advertising on your Page.

FACEBOOK TACTICS Now that we’ve reviewed how different Facebook metrics are defined, let’s put these metrics to use so you can make more informed decisions, improve campaign performance and enable success.

The new Facebook Insights We’re kicking off this section with an overview of the new Facebook Insights since it’s changed the Facebook metrics game quite a bit. In June 2013, Facebook updated its entire Insights tab for page admins. Here are the big differences that you need to understand. PTAT (as we knew it) is gone People Talking About This (PTAT) 40K 35K 30K 25K 20K 15K 10K 5K

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Chief among these changes is that the PTAT (People Talking About This) metric has been broken down and replaced with the sum of its parts: • Page Likes • People engaged • Page tags and mentions • Page check-ins and other interactions

Easier navigation…but no contextualization

With the new Insights, you get new views and navigation. That means you can easily toggle between several specific views. You can check out a high-level overview of your results on one tab, then easily navigate to other important metrics and KPIs with the click of your mouse. That’s the good news. Though Facebook Insights delivers an impressive amount of data, it can be daunting to put it into context because Insights’ tabs only help organize high-level metrics. This is where social analytics software like Simply Measured comes into play; it puts all your metrics in one report so you can contextualize your data. Page and Tab visits

This is our favorite part of the Insights section. Under the “Visits” tab in your handy new navigation bar, “Page and Tab Visits” allow you to see which of your tabs are being viewed. Why is this cool? If you’re promoting a photo-based campaign, or running a promotion in another tab, you can benchmark that against others on your Page. This allows you to optimize your content much like you would on your website.

Nate Smitha, our Marketing Conversion Manager, explains why this is a good thing: “PTAT was an aggregate metric. It combined important engagement components, and gave you an abstract number of how many people were talking (i.e., creating stories) about your page. But the PTAT metric didn’t help you understand how these stories were being created, so it wasn’t a metric that marketers could use to make very actionable decisions.”

All posts published

The Posts tab offers some great content analysis, complete with previews of visual content, reach and engagement stats. Of course, Facebook wouldn’t leave you high and dry without a way to capitalize on this insight through your ads budget. If you’re managing Facebook Ads, this is a great feature for you. It allows you to see your highest-performing content from an organic click-through perspective, so that you can quickly boost visibility of a post in your ad campaign. People

The People tab gives a great demographic profile of your audience, including a benchmark of “All Facebook.” While this isn’t new, it gives you an interesting way to understand your fans. As you create personas of your ideal customer, content consumer, or audience member, tap into this info to build richer profiles.

How to increase your Reach Many factors impact the reach of your content. Facebook’s News Feed algorithm determines which of your fans see your content, and, further downstream, which fan engagement actions – such as Likes and shares – are shared with the friends of your fans. To improve the reach of your content, you can: • Grow the number of active and engaged fans on your Page • Post content that can quickly and easily be consumed • Limit the amount of negative feedback your Page receives (For more on negative feedback, check out “How to deal with negative feedback” on page 47).

How to increase your Impressions To improve organic impressions, you need to make it into News Feeds more frequently and optimize your marketing tactics for Facebook’s News Feed algorithm. Specifically, just as with increasing reach, you should: • Grow the number of active and engaged fans on your Page • Post content that can quickly and easily be consumed • Limit the negative feedback you receive (For more on negative feedback, check out “How to deal with negative feedback” on page 47). Paid advertising on Facebook can also drive impressions. For marketers, this highlights the importance of understanding what’s driving brand exposure on Facebook.

BASIC ANALYSES Now that we’ve outlined and defined all the important metrics, we’re ready to put them all to work for us.

How to measure your Facebook audience beyond fans When it comes to measuring your audience on Facebook, there is more to it than just fans. Fans can be bought – lured with offers and promotions to Like your Page. The fact that they liked your Page doesn’t mean that they’re true fans of your brand or that they’re engaged with your content. Most social marketers know that there is more to understanding their audience than a trended fan count, but many still don’t know what they should be measuring to get the complete picture. Without actionable insights, it’s impossible to steer audience growth, tailor content to your audience or maximize engagement. Audience analysis is about understanding the following: • With whom you’re connecting • What type of content resonates with them • How you can more effectively build a community around your brand Here are five tactics that will get you focused on the right metrics and give meaning to your Facebook audience analysis. 1. Measure the audience you actually reach Those who see content associated with your Page are not limited to your fans. For that reason, reach — which measures the unique number of people who saw content associated with your Page — can give you a better idea of your effective audience. Reporting on reach over time can help you understand how the sharing of your content impacts your ability to attract and engage your audience. Without reach, you can’t accurately measure your potential to engage people or convert them into customers.

Reach Breakdown by Type Organic

Viral

Paid

140K 120K 100K

Reach

80K 60K 40K 20K

5/ 9/ 13 5/ 12 /1 3 5/ 15 /1 3 5/ 18 /1 3 5/ 21 /1 3 5/ 24 /1 3 5/ 27 /1 3 5/ 30 /1 3

5/ 6/ 13

5/ 3/ 13

4/ 9/ 13 4/ 12 /1 3 4/ 15 /1 3 4/ 18 /1 3 4/ 21 /1 3 4/ 24 /1 3 4/ 27 /1 3 4/ 30 /1 3

4/ 6/ 13

4/ 3/ 13

You should segment reach by its three main types – organic, paid and viral – to understand how your content was shared. It’s important to measure each reach type independently because each indicates different things. Paid Reach Reflects how many people were exposed to a Facebook Ad and will likely be dedicated to driving product awareness and sales rather than engaging your community Organic Reach Fluctuates based on changes in new fans and engagement with your content but is more likely than paid reach to generate engagement. Monitor organic reach to ensure it’s growing over time Viral Reach Changes in this metric can indicate how shareable your content was

2. Analyze your engaged users Engaged users are the people who took action on your page or with your content. Growing this audience each month is important. As your number of total fans increase, you want to also grow the number of users who engage with your content (engaged users). In other words, as your fan count grows, you want the percentage of engaged users to steadily scale. If you were to grow your audience with users that didn’t engage, the value of that audience growth would be negligible. When paired with reach, the percentage of engaged users can indicate when engagement is being driven by successful content strategies, such as the right content format or efforts to increase content visibility through promotion (e.g., paid reach). Engaged users as a % of Total Reach 7%

3 /1

27 /1

24 9/

3 /1 21

3 /1 15

13 9/ 9/

/1 31 8/

/1 25 8/

/1 22 8/

16 8/

3 /1

/1 10

3 7/ 1 8/

1/ 8/

8/ 41

While it’s important to continue growing the number of engaged users, it’s also important to understand how effective you are at engaging those who see your content. You can do just that by measuring engaged users as a percentage of reach. The more engaged your audience is, the more likely you’re reaching the right audience with the right content. Paid advertising can skew this percentage by inflating paid reach. To avoid distorting this ratio, you can measure engaged users and organic reach at the post level for all posts that weren’t promoted. 3. Create context for fan growth Although the number of total fans isn’t the primary metric for measuring your audience, new fan growth can still serve as a community health indicator. With the right context it can help you identify tactics to organically increase your audience size too. By analyzing Like Sources, you can determine where within Facebook people were or what device they were using when they liked your Page. You can also segment Like Sources to help you identify whether fans were acquired via a paid source (such as paid Likes) vs. an organic source (e.g., organic Likes). Daily Paid Likes vs. Organic Likes Paid Likes

1,000

Organic Likes

Segmenting Paid Likes can help you spot successful tactics for organic growth.

900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100

Further analyzing organic Like Sources can also help you determine whether your digital properties are effective at driving users to like your Page. For example, are social plugins on your website effectively driving users to your Page? Does better integration of social plugins on your site result in more Likes? 4. Identify your fans To identify who your fans are, establish an audience baseline using Facebook Insights demographic data. Page Fans: Demographic Profile 35K

Male

Page Fans: Top Countries

Female

U.S.A.

Canada

Other

Mexico

India

Philippines

1% 3%

30K 4%

25K 20K 15K 10K 5K 91%

13-17

18-24

25-34

35-44

45-54

Then put this data to use. For example, knowing where your fans are located can help inform decisions about what kind of content you share and when you publish it. Say a sizeable percentage of your Facebook fans are in San Francisco and the San Francisco Giants win the World Series. You could use that as a newsjacking opportunity to drive fan engagement. Or consider Ford as an example; when it realized its Facebook Page had a strong following in Germany, it announced on Facebook that it would introduce the Ford Mustang into European markets.

/1 21 9/

3 /1

17 /1 9/

3 /1

15 9/

3 /1

13 9/

7/ 1

Reporting on organic fan growth reveals the number of fans you were able to earn, irrespective of how many ads you ran. Organic growth trends can help you identify events, content and tactics that contributed to fan growth.

13 5/

3/ 9/

/1 30 8/

/1 8/

/1 26

24 8/

Newsjacking defined:

Brand journalism that allows you to take breaking news stories and inject them with your own ideas to generate attention for yourself or your brand.

If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re a B2C brand, just be sure to confirm that age and gender demographics match your target audience. Then use sales data to pinpoint the products your social audience is likely to be interested in. Once youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve established a baseline, go beyond fan demographics by building buyer personas that map to certain products or content topics. Measure engagement with content that ties back to personas as part of your regular audience analysis. This type of analysis can give you a deeper understanding of who your audience is and what content will resonate with them.

5. Discover when your fans are most active There are a couple of ways to figure out when your fans are most active. The first is built into the Facebook Insights tool.

Facebook’s recently redesigned Insights tool displays: • How many of your fans were online each day of the past week • The average number of your fans who saw any posts by hour This is an extremely valuable tool, but it’s important to note that it measures when your fans viewed any Facebook posts, not just posts specific to your Page. The upside is that fan activity isn’t biased by when you post; the downside is that it’s limited to your fans and does not include engaged users. If you have a well-established Page and a sizeable Facebook fan base, it’s likely that a large portion of your audience isn’t active with your brand on a weekly or even monthly basis. Before making major changes to how you time your posts, you should validate your findings by analyzing post reach and engagement with your content. This approach is more time consuming, but will help ensure you know when people are most likely to engage with your content.

How to determine which posts you should promote with Facebook Ads Facebook Promoted Posts are a great marketing tool for amplifying the reach of specific content. Before you start allocating ad dollars though, you need to determine which content is worth promoting. In this section, we outline five ways you can analyze the data from your Facebook Page to guide your Promoted Posts game plan. The more insights you glean ahead of time, the greater the likelihood of success when you execute. 1. Give new life to old content Analyze your content over a historical time period (3, 6, or even 9 months ago) to find posts with high engagement. These top-performing legacy posts have the potential to be successful when promoted. Running a Facebook Content Analysis report will give you an idea of which types of posts and what kind of post content generate the most engagement.

Here, we see that multimedia posts performed much better than posts with links, generating over twice the engagement per post.

In addition, we can analyze how people engaged on those posts. 2. Recast lower-performing content Next analyze your lowest-performing content to identify posts that drove little or no engagement. Knowing what hasn’t worked gives you the opportunity to recast that content and then give it new life with promotion. 3. Expand the reach of popular content You can also analyze your content to identify content with high engagement. Then capitalize on those posts with paid promotion to increase exposure and improve the success of your overall advertising strategy.

4. Figure out what works for your industry (and your competitors) Analyzing your competitors’ Facebook content can also help determine which content types and topics to promote. Identifying top performers and understanding what content your competitors use to successfully drive engagement gives you more options when putting together your promoted-content strategy. Fan Page Comparison: Engagement on Brand Posts

Engagement per post

Link

Photo

Status

Video

Other

CONTENT TYPE PERFORMANCE Most Engaging Content Type

12K

Photos

10K

2.5M interactions, 88% of all engagement

Most Commonly Posted

Photos

387 posts, 58% of all posts

2K 0

Best Performance: Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola

Sprite

Pepsi

Photos

9,258 interactions, .43% of the brand’s engagement

5. Figure out what works on other channels By determining what works well on other social channels, you could uncover posts that deserve a spot in your promoted plan on Facebook. For example, analyze your top-performing Tweets by engagement, and use your best Twitter content as a base for a few Facebook Promoted Posts. Evaluating and measuring your current content performance gives you a pre-launch prep list, and sets your campaigns up for success – before you spend any money. When you do launch, you will be starting off with a smarter, data-driven plan that will save you time and money.

How to measure the impact of visual content Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve probably noticed by now that visual content is one of the most widely used and widely engagedwith content on the internet. Visual content has become more and more impactful as a way to reach potential customers, fans and followers. But with so many services for creating and distributing images, and so many types of visual content, how can you tell which works the best? Here are some quick ways to analyze your visual content and create a strategy based on past success. Measure consumptions by post type Post Consumptions Over Time Photo Views

Video Plays

Link Clicks

Other Clicks

30K 25K 20K 15K 10K 5K

3 /1

3 6/

11 6/

13 2/ 6/

/1 30 5/

27 /1 5/

3 5/

/1 5/

3 5/

12 5/

9/ 5/

6/ 5/

1/ 5/

With Facebook Insights, you can delve into how many photos are viewed, videos watched and links clicked. Try different types of content and track how they perform over time. This data can be found in our Facebook Page Insights Report.

Measure total engagement against post engagement

Total Engagement on Brand Posts

Engagement Per Brand Post

Total Engagement

Likes

Comments

0 Status Posts

Links

44 Photos

11 120K

100K

80K

60K

40K

20K

Videos

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

Measure engagement type overall compared to per-post engagement on your various content. Perhaps you see huge engagement on photos but have also posted your photos four times as many photos as any other media. In such cases, it helps to know how successful your photos are on a per-post basis, breaking down Likes, comments and shares. You can measure this in our Facebook Fan Page Report.

Measure engagement on Instagram Engagement Outside of Instagram Twitter

Total Engagement

4.5K

Facebook

Tweets per photo

4K 3.5K

Facebook Likes per photo

3K 2.5K 2K

615 9.8 23,698 376.2

Facebook Comments per photo

0 0.0

Facebook Shares per photo

15 0.2

1.5K 1K 500

-9 /1 5 9/ 9

-9 /8 9/ 2

-9 /1 8/ 26

-8 /2 5 8/ 19

-8 /1 8 8/ 12

-8 /1 1 8/ 5

-8 /4 7/ 29

7/ 22

-7 /2 8

Since Facebook acquired Instagram, the two companies have created a very synergistic relationship so it’s in your best interests to track how your Instagram photos are performing on Facebook (which you can do using our Instagram Account Report). Then compare this to the performance of your Timeline photos within Facebook to form a solid Instagram strategy.

How to deal with negative feedback Facebook doesn’t have a dislike button, but the negative actions users can take can have serious implications for your brand. Namely, negative feedback ultimately limits the reach of your brand posts because of how the Facebook News Feed algorithm works. Let’s break down what constitutes negative feedback on Facebook. Then, with data from the Simply Measured free Facebook Insights Report, we’ll show how to find out how much negative feedback you receive and how to address the related data. What is negative feedback on Facebook? There are four main types of negative Facebook feedback, each posing different consequences for your brand:

1. Hide Clicks: When fans click to hide a specific post from appearing in their News Feeds 2. Hide All Clicks: When fans click to hide all posts associated with a single company or brand from appearing in their News Feeds 3. Report Spam: When fans report one of your posts as spam 4. Page Unlikes: When users choose to unlike your Page

Segment negative feedback actions Segmenting negative feedback can help you understand how it’s affecting your brand. For example, a fan hiding an individual post is much less severe than if they were to hide all of your posts. When a user hides all of your posts, you lose the ability to share content with them in the future. Negative Feedback by Type Hide Clicks

Report Spam

Hide All Clicks

UnLike

1.2K 1.0K

Negative Feedback peaks are red flags for brand content

800 600 400 200

14 6/

11 6/

8/ 6/

5/ 6/

3 /1

2/ 6/

3 30 5/

27 /1 5/

/1 24 5/

/1 21 5/

3 15 5/

6/ 5/

3/ 5/

That said, viewing individual feedback metrics like “Hide All Clicks” can give you an accurate picture of how many of your fans are opting out of seeing your content. On the other hand, tracking Page unlikes can show your effectiveness at retaining fans. When trended over time, peaks in negative feedback indicate when you’re receiving too much negative feedback. By cross-referencing this with the type of posts and content you published around that time, you may be able to identify the root cause (see Analyze negative feedback by post below).

Create benchmarks for your brand Acceptable levels of negative feedback vary by brand. The volume of negative feedback you receive can be influenced by how much reach your posts get, the size and quality of your audience, and your industry. Hide All Clicks Compared to Average Hide All Clicks

Average Hide All Clicks

70 60 50 40 30 20 10

1/ 13 5/ 3

9/ 13 5/ 2

27 /1 5/

13 25 / 5/

13 23 /

13 21 /

13 19 / 5/

17 /1 5/

15 / 5/

13 / 5/

11 / 5/

5/ 9/

5/ 7/ 1

5/ 5/

5/ 3/

5/ 1/

Since these factors are unique to your brand, one of the best ways to determine acceptable feedback levels is to establish benchmarks based on the average volume of negative feedback you receive, either by day or by post. Then set goals for decreasing your negative feedback average to help maximize your post reach.

Analyze negative feedback by post Go a step further than negative feedback Page totals to analyze actions taken on specific posts. Your perpost average will help you flag posts with higher-than-average negative feedback. Once you identify which posts receive the most negative feedback, determine the post attributes most likely to cause fans to hide your content, flag it as spam or unlike your Page. Going forward, avoid those post attributes. Account for reach Negative Feedback Rate (Percentage of Reach) Volume of Negative Feedback

Feedback as % of Reach

Hide Clicks

Report Spam

Hide All Clicks

UnLike Page

300

.45% .40%

250

.35%

200

.30% .25%

150

.20%

100

.15% .10%

.05%

3 5/

/1 29 5/

27 /1 5/

3 5/

/1 5/

3 19 5/

3 /1

17 /1 5/

3 5/

3 /1

13 5/

11 5/

9/ 5/

7/ 1 5/

5/ 5/

3/ 5/

1/ 5/

0% 13

The more people who see a given piece of content, the more likely it is that someone will find fault with it. In other words, a post with twice as much reach is likely to receive more fan engagement, but also more negative feedback. You can account for this by measuring negative feedback as a percentage of Reach. Peaks in your negative feedback rate show when more users respond negatively relative to how many users saw your content. This is a powerful metric for determining how much negative feedback is too much.

ADVANCED ANALYSES Facebookâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Graph Search provides an alternative to the major search engines. Since the service is still (fairly) new, at least from a marketing perspective, it can be hard for businesses to pinpoint how to best optimize for it. The answer is that while you optimize to appear in the major search engines using SEO (search engine optimization), you optimize to appear high in Graph Search results using GSO (Graph Search Optimization).

How to optimize for Graph Search Graph Search ranks content based on specific user-driven metrics, such as engagement on outbound content, so these are the ones you should focus on. With The Facebook Page Insights Report from Simply Measured, you can analyze these metrics to optimize your Graph Search rankings. Here are four key metrics to focus on while ramping up your GSO. 1. Engagement on outbound content Outbound Messaging and Engagement Over Time Engagement Details Admin Wall Posts

Stories Created About Admin Posts

Stories Created

Total Stories 4

3.5K 3K

3 2.5K 2K

1.5K 1K

500 0

23.7K

Likes

Outbound Messages

Comments

94.7K 9,513

Clicks Shares

95.1K 8,611

Averages Per Post Stories per Post

438

Likes per Post Comments per Post

1,753 176

Clicks per Post Shares per Post

1,760 159

Hand-in-hand with how people engage with your Stories and posts is the engagement on your outbound content; by that we mean content that you’ve posted on your Page. Since the goal with Graph Search will be to have your brand-generated Page, posts and comments show up at the top, it’s important to focus on this metric. Facebook bases priority in News Feeds on a number of factors, one of which is the number of Likes your content has gotten from the searcher’s network of friends (or even friends of friends, as a secondary level). Focus on content, stories and comments that are garnering the most Likes and overall engagement.

2. Page fan demographic profile

Page Fans: Demographic Profile 50K

Male

Page Fans: Top Cities

Female

Seattle, WA

45K 40K

15,824

Anchorage, AK

35K Portland, OR

30K 42,115

25K

11,731 Fairbanks, AK

20K 15K 8,725

10K 5K

Los Angeles, CA Other

13-17

18-24

25-34

35-44

45-54

2,977 2,323

Your demographic metrics give you insight into the type of users interacting with your brand, valuable information that makes it easier to cater to your market. Graph Search favors localized content so if you’re a brand with more than one location, claim brand Pages for each. If your Page caters to a specific location or type of clientele, optimize your “About” tab to reflect this by making your profile rich with relevant content and keywords.

3. Stories on user-generated content

Stories About User Generated Content New Page Like

700

Page Mention

User Post

Stories Created

600 500 400 300 200 100

The results served up by Graph Search are based on a user’s connections to friends. Stories generated by users are a very important metric in this regard. With that in mind, make your Page and content sharable, and give users an incentive to promote your brand to their network. Contests and promotions that encourage mentions of your Page are one good way to appear in Graph Searches of a user’s connections.

4. Top keywords from comments

Comment Keyword Analysis Total Comments

4,045

Facebook

1,020

Sale

975 567

Analytics 430

Data 231

Like Seattle Software

90 87

Focusing on the keywords appearing in comments can help you in two ways. For one, you can cater content to the conversations people are having, and drive search relevance by better engaging your active audience. Secondly, if the conversations aren’t driving more traffic to your Page, you can launch a keyword-relevant campaign that steers conversations toward topics that will help your GSO ranking.

How Graph Search can simplify your Facebook strategy In 2013, Facebook announced that posts and status updates are now part of Graph Search results. This update to the search platform allows users to search content including photo captions, check-ins and comments. While this feature only allows users to search content visible to them – including posts from friends and publicly shared content – it also means Facebook marketers can more easily plan campaigns and ad spend based on relevant conversations.

Check out our powerful Facebook Analytics

What does this mean for marketers? As a social media manager, you have to dig through an abundance of data to understand how well you’re engaging your intended audience. On Facebook alone, Insights can be overwhelming, Ads Manager is complex, and identifying conversations and topics that your audience is talking about can be daunting – unless those conversations directly involve your brand. The good news is that these users are already talking about your brand. While you want to keep them engaged, happy and purchasing, you still need to reach new users. There are several ways the new Graph Search functionality can help you do this. While it’s no replacement for a solid reporting tool that helps you get more from Facebook Insights, these new Graph Search features can help simplify your job as a social marketer.

1. Search for key terms By searching “Posts about The Voice,” for example, NBC would be able to see all public posts and conversations about its show – something it wasn’t able to do in the past.

Posts about The Voice

This type of information can give brand and social media managers great insight into the way their fans are talking about their company, offering, etc., even when they aren’t tagging the actual Page. To continue with this example, NBC’s brand and social media managers could also search on each of the celebrity coaches from the show to identify who resonates with fans, helping shape decisions for their next season. This opportunity isn’t just for giant national broadcasters. Even a small- or medium-sized business can identify conversations within its particular industry. For example, if you sell tools, you can search for “Posts about handsaws” and find out which competitors, features and projects people are talking about in relation to handsaws. 2. Search by location If you run a brick-and-mortar store, you’re bound to be more interested in local traffic than you are in Facebook fans from across the country. With the new Graph Search functionality, you can search by location. Let’s assume you run Mom and Pop’s Hardware Store in Seattle, WA. “Posts Written in Seattle, Washington” could deliver insight into what people are talking about in general in your city (around the time of the 2014 Super Bowl, the answer was “Seahawks”). You could narrow it even further by looking at “Posts written at Mom and Pop’s Hardware Store” to find out what customers are saying about their experience in your store.

Posts written in Seattle, WA

Posts written at Mom and Pop’s Hardware Store

Posts I commented on

3. Search by time Say you ran a sale at your hardware store last month. Just search on “Posts written at Mom and Pop’s Hardware Store from last month” for posts from that time frame to get a sense of whether or not potential customers were aware of the sale. 4. Search your own content Want to make sure you don’t miss a response when you participate in Facebook conversations? Now you can search “Posts I commented on” or “My posts from last year” to identify the places you engaged with fans. So there you have it – once you’ve used Graph Search to identify the conversations to target, you can track success, allocate ad spend and use your analytics to form future strategies.

Analyze to take advantage of News Feed changes In its most recent attempt to make branded content feel more organic, Facebook announced that it has updated the way Page interactions display. The update will treat Pages even more like people. If one Page tags a second Page that a user has liked, that post may appear in the user’s news feed, even if they don’t like the first Page. While the intent of this change is to create a more organic and natural newsfeed for Facebook users (the network ran a survey and found that these stories received high scores), the implications are also awesome for brand pages looking to expand their reach or grow their engaged audience. This change brings Facebook closer to Twitter’s prerogative; validating the fact that users are less resistant to brand interaction than was once assumed.

Here are some ways to ensure your page increases its odds of success with this update. 1. Identify Pages that already interact with your Page: Pinpoint brand Pages that already drive engagement for your brand by mentioning your Page, and leverage this attention. 2. Tag pages in posts when you may have similar audiences: This can help grow your audience organically, and gain added exposure for your content among a segment you wouldn’t have reached otherwise. 3. Discover new or related audience segments: Identify other brands in your space who engage their audience at a high level, and leverage this attention. Seems simple enough. But what’s next? Aside from guessing, how can we identify brand Pages to involve in our engagement strategy? Here are four types of analysis, using four different Simply Measured reports to help you plan your Page-targeting strategy.

How analysis can help identify opportunities 1. Discover the pages mentioning you: Finding pages that are already mentioning your Page gives you an opportunity to develop content that builds that relationship, and now, leverage their audience. Using Simply Measured’s Facebook’s Fan Page Report, we are able to identify the “top posters” of any brand page, whether we have admin access or not. Using Ducati’s Facebook Page as an example lets take a look at their top posters by both engagement and number of posts: Top Posters by Total Engagement

Top Users by # of Posts

(The users whose posts on your wall have recieved the most engagement)

(The users who have posted most frequently on your wall)

Ducatisti Integralisti

1,052

Ducatisti Integralisti 5

Zacks Garage

Ducatisti Integralisti

Franck Carini

Valentino Rossi Fan Club

Ben Kreten

Alpinestars

Melanie Kreten

SPEED

Juan Carlos

Alex Tondini

Kelly Cook

Ben Kreten

Vijay Nalanaglu

Franck Carini

Yumi Kawaguchi

Juan Carlos

Right away, it’s clear that Ducatisti Integralisti is both the most frequent poster on Ducati’s page, and that their posts have received the most engagement of anything posted on Ducati’s wall. To get a closer look at that engagement, we can open this report in Excel, and flip over to the “Posters” tab.

Of the engagement on Ducatisti Integralisti posts to Ducati’s wall, 219 were shares and 786 were Likes. This suggests that there is both an overlap of Page fans, and interest. This is key to Facebook’s News Feed “relevancy” algorithm. According to the announcement from Facebook:

“We look at many factors to make sure the most relevant stories appear in News Feed, including which posts are getting the most engagement (such as “Likes”, comments, shares and clicks) across all of Facebook. We also consider which posts are getting the most engagement from people who Like both the Page that posted and the Page that was tagged.” 2. Find large pages catering to similar interests: If you have a large list of competitors or industry “frienemies”, there’s a good chance that they’ve reached a large group of potential customers that you haven’t. Find out who they are, and how they’re doing it. Competitive analysis is one of the most versatile and under-utilized types of analysis. There’s a lot you can learn from your competition, and in this case, a lot you can leverage.

Ducatisti Integralisti is the most frequent poster on Ducati’s page.

Since Ducatisti Integralisti is a Ducati-focused site, this isn’t surprising, but it’s very possible that not everyone who Likes that page also Likes the Ducati page. Ducati could take advantage of this potential by tagging Ducatisti Integralisti in their Page Posts. With Facebook’s newest change, this gives them a new potential to show up in relevant feeds.

Fan Page Engagement Comparison Over Time on Brand Posts Fan Interactions (Likes, comments, posts,

Honey Bunches

Cheerios

Special K

Cap’n Crunch Frosted Mini-Whe...

Kellogg’s Frosted...

MOST ENGAGING POSTS FROM PEAK From 5/13/12 by Special K 4,830 Interactions From 5/11/12 by Cheerios 2,317 Interactions From 5/21/12 by Special K 2,683 Interactions

Kashi /1 3

/1 3

/1 3 5/ 17 /1 3 5/ 19 /1 3 5/ 21 /1 3 5/ 23 /1 3 5/ 25 /1 3 5/ 27 /1 3 5/ 29 /1 3 5/ 31 /1 3

5/ 15

5/ 13

5/ 11

5/ 7/ 13 5/ 9/ 13

5/ 5/ 13

5/ 3/ 13

5/ 1/ 13

With the Facebook Competitive Analysis Report, you can add competitors or successful companies in your space, and identify trends in engagement. Once you’ve done that, you can have a good understanding of how and when to mention them in a Post, and leverage their audience. In the above example, Special K had the most engaging Tweet, leading the way with a post about Mother’s Day. If I’ve determined that I’d like to attract the audience that engages with Special K’s Facebook Page, this presents a great Mother’s Day theme for me to use, as opposed to only talking about our products, which may compete for market share. 3. Learn when to time your mentions Once you know which Pages you’re looking to leverage, it’s time to focus on tactics. How do you plan on doing this? While Facebook offers a plethora of public data on your Page and your competitor’s Page, you can also access data that’s private to you as a Page admin. The Facebook Page Insights Report can give you some great data about when to plan your attack, so to speak.

When Are Your Fans Online? Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

Sunday

# of Fans Online

250.0 M

Top Time

200.0 M 150.0 M

8am - 9am For Online Fans

100.0 M

7am - 8am For Brand Posts

50.0 M 0 12am

3am

6am

9am

12pm

3pm

6pm

9pm

In the optimization section of the report, you can identify the peak times that your audience is logged into Facebook. If you’ve done your homework, this will mirror the data for industry-aligned pages you’re looking to target. Pick your times wisely. Mention other pages at peak times to ensure it displays in their fans’ News Feeds.

4. Test and measure everything Once you’ve started your campaign, and are mentioning other brand Pages, it’s time to measure. Did it work? Which one worked the best? Using the Facebook Post Insights report, you can determine which posts led to the highest engagement. Post Consumptions Over Time Photo Views

Other Clicks

Video Clicks

Link Clicks

30K 25K 20K 15K 10K 5K

/1 2

/1 2 6/ 14

6/ 8/ 12

6/ 11

6/ 5/ 12

/1 2

6/ 2/ 12

5/ 30

/1 2

5/ 27 /1 2

5/ 24

/1 2

5/ 21

/1 2

5/ 18

/1 2

5/ 15

5/ 9/ 12

5/ 12

5/ 6/ 12

5/ 3/ 12

5/ 1/ 12

Analyze whether or not tagging the brand pages boosted your engagement per post, or if it stayed relatively flat. This will help you understand the value of engaging with specific pages. Make sure you take into consideration your overall content goals when it comes to Facebook. You’re looking to see which post drove the most engagement, but also what type of engagement. If tagging a specific Page led to a lot of photo views, but no link clicks, which was the goal of the content, it may be time to reevaluate or try a different angle.

Perform a competitive analysis in your industry Social media puts an incredible amount data at your fingertips – especially when it comes to analyzing your industry as a whole. We’ve built reports that help you benchmark engagement across channels, measure share of voice, and analyze your competitors content from all angles. From this, we’ve created a guide on how to analyze your competitors using Facebook data, which dives into: Competitive Benchmarks We can help you find out how you stack up against competitors in your industry based on key metrics like engagement. Competitive Analysis We tell you how to find out why your posts or your competitors’ posts perform well. This includes sentiment around campaigns like promoted posts, or specific topics. Competitive Insights We help you discover how to use this data to find out how to modify your Facebook strategy to outshine the competition.

CONCLUSION Now that you know what each of the Facebook metrics means and how to analyze them, it’s time to put that knowledge into play. If you don’t currently have a tool to help you dive into all of your Facebook data, we’d love you to try Simply Measured’s full suite of powerful social media analytics reports.

SIMPLY MEASURED SAMPLE REPORTS Simply Measured provides a measurement and reporting solution that aggregates social media data and web analytics from more than a dozen sources and presents it in a single dashboard. We’ve provided samples of reports used by more than 30 percent of the top 100 global brands and over 80,000 users who are Simply Measured customers. Answer questions about Facebook Page performance and engagement, as well as fans, posts, “Likes”, comments and engagement trends. Dig into the most effective posts and the impact they’ve had on your Page and your audience.

Understand the performance of your brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Facebook Page(s) Facebook Page Insights Report *This report requires authorization from your Facebook Page Facebook Post Insights Report *This report requires authorization from your Facebook Page Multiple Channel Facebook Analysis Report (Mashable) Facebook Content Analysis Report (Cheerios) Facebook Domain Insights Report *Requires use of Facebook Social Plugins Instagram Account Report

Benchmark your brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Facebook performance against competitors Analyze the audience, content and engagement trends of any Facebook Page, allowing you to understand your competitive position, performance and market share compared to your competitors.

Measure your customer service efforts on Facebook Dive into individual user posts, track response rates and times, and analyze a dedicated customer service Facebook Page in relation to your main brand Page to understand your customer service effectiveness. Facebook Customer Service Analysis (Home Depot)

Compare your efforts on Facebook against those on other social networks Measure your efforts on Twitter in context with Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, YouTube, Google+ and more. Compare audience size and growth, as well as post engagement across all major networks. Complete Social Media Snapshot (RedBull)

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES AND SOURCES http://www.theverge.com/2013/9/29/4783702/the-faces-of-facebook-natalie-rojas http://investor.fb.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=802760 http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/AMDA-NJ5DZ/2301311196x0 xS1326801-13-3/1326801/1326801-13-3.pdf http://socialbarrel.com/facebook-photo-library-now-250-billion-user-photos/53315/ http://techcrunch.com/2013/07/24/facebook-growth-2/ http://www.businessinsider.com.au/marketers-are-spending-more-ad-dollars-on-facebook-2013-9 https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-engineering/under-the-hood-building-graph-searchbeta/10151240856103920 http://www.insidefacebook.com/2013/04/22/graph-search-optimization-the-new-seo-and-what-itmeans-for-social-advertisers/ http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2013/03/creating-content-facebook-graph-search/

10 Tips to Creating Engaging Page Posts

facebook.com https://www.facebook.com/business/a/online-sales/page-post-tips â&#x20AC;˘ Facebook ÂŠ, 2014

Visit this page for more information

https://www.facebook.com/business/a/online-sales/page-post-tips

Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com

The Comprehensive Guide to Facebook Privacy Settings

www.time.com http://time.com/25448/the-comprehensive-guide-to-facebook-privacy-settings/

Visit this page for more information

http://time.com/25448/the-comprehensive-guide-to-facebook-privacy-settings/

Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com 53

4 Methods for Conquering Low Facebook Reach

socialmediafuze.com http://socialmediafuze.com/methods-conquering-low-fb-reach/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_ medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+SocialMediaFuze+%28Social+Media+Fuze%29

4 Methods for Conquering Low Facebook Reach Posted: 01 May 2014 06:03 PM PDT

For years you’ve pushed people to like you on facebook. Possibly you’ve used signs at your store, you’ve included the link on business cards, asked people to search for you there, etc. Then you login and notice that only a small part of your fans are seeing your updates- how disheartening. I know how you feel, I have multiple clients who are in the same boat, and we are always watching Facebook for changes and trying to make new plans. But what about you? What should you do? Is Facebook even worth your time anymore?

Why You Should Stay Active on Facebook For starters I’d like to say that I still recommend an active presence on Facebook if your company can facilitate it- either the costs or the time to do it. Here is why:

• Most companies are expected to be on Facebook – so that they can easily search for you. • You already have access to some fans there- I wouldn’t abandon that if you can afford not to. • There are other ways to grow support for your company on Facebook- we will talk more about this later in the post. • It is still the largest audience in social media. • Chances are you are already active personally, business should be able to be handled in a few moments of time, at most, when you are already on.

Your Current Fans & Who You Are Reaching As seen several places online, Facebook reach (who sees your updates) is getting lower and lower. But that doesn’t mean you have to panic. Here is why I think it isn’t all bad:

• The people you are reaching are most likely the newest (most interested) fans you have. These are people who just liked you and really enjoy your company. • You NEED to have a funnel/strategy for getting fans to become email subscribers- where you will not lose them. If you have this in place, you can still make a profit from Facebook. • Another set of the people you reach are those who are on Facebook when you post. By knowing when the best time to post is, you can extend reach up to 100%.

Here is my plan of action for you:

Post When It Matters- When Is The Best Time to Update Your Fanpage? Find out when the best time is to update your fanpage- these screenshots and directions should help: At the top of your fanpage admin section, you will see the following:

Select- See Insights This will bring you to the overview- Select Posts from the same navigation in grey:

You will immediately see When Your Fans Are Online:

From here, you can see that most of my fans are on Wed- Fri and from 11am to 2pm. I should write my daily updates (if not multiple daily updates) during this time.

Keep Your Fanpage Updated- Using the Facebook Scheduling Tool Keep your fanpage updated (you can even schedule updates days a head of time) daily. I recommend using Facebookâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s schedule tool, here are some screenshots to help: First, go to your fanpage and go to where you would post a new update.

Click the little blue clock in the bottom left corner.

Click the calendar icon, or in the box with a date.

Select your date, and time. You will receive a pop up telling you what you just scheduled and where you can view all scheduled posts. You can also choose to schedule another post at this time.

https://www.facebook.com/SocialMediaFuze/allactivity- This is where you will find all of your scheduled content, replace the name of my fanpage with your own to get the right link. Here is what it looks like:

Schedule updates to be posted at the best time of day, based on the instructions from above. Check these times regularly to make sure you are achieving the best reach possible. I recommend once a month.

Get Email Subscribers- Keep Fans For Life When you get new fans- engage them. Here are a few ways you can do this:

• Find them on other social media platforms- search their name on Twitter, Pinterest or Linkedin and connect with them there. • Search for fans on Google. If the images match, you’ve got your fan, now build a relationship so you can invite them to subscribe. • Keep your newsletter updated- and when you update it, tell your fans about the update and where they can learn more- put a link to the newsletter sign up in comments. • Have a great offer for signing up for your newsletter- currently mine is a guide of 52 of my favorite social media tools- people love tools • Ask fans what you can do for them- Welcome new fans every few days or once a week and offer them a special gift they can get through private messaging you, in the private message- tell them about your newsletter. • Promote your newsletter to current fans on Facebook for $10 a month, this is called remarketing and it can provide impressive results.

To do this, you will need an email program, I use Get Response you can check it out here, it begins at $15 a month. I’ve used others in the past but none that I like as much, however for many MailChimp is free and can be used for business purposes, though not affiliate/referral links. A simple, monthly newsletter is all you need to stay in touch with fans, though you will find that your list of email subscribers is more responsive as you contact them more often. 58

Other Ways To Grow Support For Your Company On Facebook As I stated earlier there are other ways you can get support from others on Facebook. Let’s discuss them now.

1. Using Your Facebook Profile For Business I used to only use Facebook for personal relationships. Of all of the people I met online, I would only personally connect with them after several conversations and months to years of going back and forth in other places. But then I realized that most of these people didn’t want access to my personal information, they just wanted to connect to build relationships. Types of Friends on Facebook I started playing with the different lists Facebook allows a personal profile to have. There are 3 that are quite specificFriends- The people who you are closest to, they can see everything you do. Acquaintances- People you might not know as well, they can access your updates based on the restrictions you make here. Restricted- People who can’t see anything you do, unless you specifically tag them into it. Who Sees Your Updates Along with that, Facebook gives us the option to post to Friends, Friends except Acquaintances and Public, as listed below: Friends- those you are connected with. Friends except Acquaintances- those of your friends you are closest to. Public- Everyone on the Internet can see the update.

What I Do to Keep Business & Personal Separate Once I realized I could use my FB profile for business too, I started adding more friends as Acquaintances. You can do this by hovering over the person’s name in most places on FB and select Acquaintance.

Now when I want to post something on Facebook, I use the Friends except Acquaintances option. You’ll find this in just any place you want to post, like the following.

By selecting Custom in this picture, you can select to only share an update with Acquaintances. Choose Specific People or Lists and type in Acquaintances.

To edit this groups, on the left side of your newsfeed page, find the Friends section and select more when you hover over Friends. You’ll see a list of lists, select Acquaintances You’ll get a feed of your Acquaintances, and on the right side of the page, under the cover photo you can select Manage List- select update types or edit list to add or delete people. Now you can start adding more connections while keeping your personal updates and pictures of your kids private.

2. Engaging In Groups For Business Groups are a huge part of Facebook, and you can use them for business. You won’t have to personally connect with every person who wants to join, and you can actually tag people into posts- unlike on your fanpage. Cendrine Marrouat of Social Media Slant recently started a group for her followers and it seems to be going very well for her. I would recommend, if you try this, to provide a group topic that a lot of people will enjoy and make sure it is related to your business. This can be a study group for your topic, a support group for your services, etc. Unless it is completely necessary, I would make the group public, and I would still consider having a fanpage because it is fairly simple to keep and include updates on. Plus as I’ve stated before, you still have access to some fans there. In the group, I would continue to talk up your newsletter, as it is just as easy to lose reach with your group as it is with your fanpage.

3. Stay Active on Other Fanpages Monitor other fanpages that are highly visited on Facebook. When these pages update, login as your fanpage and comment (intelligently) as your page. Add to the conversation, give your expert opinion, and interact with others to get more fans and visits to your fanpage. I like to monitor Hubspot’s fanpage, Social Media Examiner’s and JeffBullas.com’s page (http://www. jeffbullas.com/).

Summary for Using Facebook With Low Reach There are still many ways to use Facebook for your business, without spending a lot of money. While I do recommend paying to play, even with very small budgets, I would only tell you to do this if you know exactly how to do it for results. In the mean time, try these other opportunities and let me know how it works for you. To sum up this post, I just want to reiterate the most important points

• Stay active on Facebook- you still reach some fans, even if it is much less • Use Facebook as yourself and build relationships with other business people • Consider using groups to get more reach and bang for your buck • Comment on other fanpages • BUILD YOUR EMAIL LIST!!!!

The post 4 Methods for Conquering Low Facebook Reach appeared first on Social Media Fuze.

Twitter

The Complete Guide to Twitter Analytics

simplymeasured.com http://get.simplymeasured.com/twitter-ebook-om.html

The Complete Guide to Twitter Analytics How to analyze the metrics that matter

INTRODUCTION Twitter is a green field for content marketers and social media managers. With more than 241 million active users, 500 million Tweets, and 2.1 billion searches every day, online marketers have an active and informed audience to engage with. But many ask questions like: “What’s the best way to engage my followers? How often do I need to tweet or reply to stay relevant? What’s the best way to leverage my brand’s Twitter account?” The answer lies in a few key metrics that you should be using to gauge your performance, all accessible through the Simply Measured Twitter Account Report. In this definitive eBook, we’ll walk you through the different Twitter metrics which are measurable through the Simply Measured Engagement Megaphone, and explain several specific ways to use them to create actionable Twitter tactics. Finally, we’ll give you the tools to do the analysis and reporting yourself.

Defining the Statistics If you want to be able to effectively leverage Twitter actions, you must first understand what they are, how they work, and the ways they’re calculated. In this section, we’ll outline the actions, or the different ways that users interact with your brand. We’ll also give you insight into how they affect your brand’s Twitter visibility.

Twitter Engagement Megaphone

What started it?

207

Tweets Sent by @delta

How many unique people engaged with your Tweet?

How many times did these people engage?

How many people could have seen these Tweets?

How many impressions could have been generated?

1,337

18,750

28,793

53,493,020

127,884,074

Unique People

Total Engagement

Potential Reach

Potential Impressions

People that interacted with you on Twitter

Organic mentions, @Replies, Retweets and Favorties

Combined followers of people tweeting about your brand (6/1/13 to 6/30/13

Potential times served in all follower’s needs

1.5 Interactions Per Person

What happened?

2,853 Avg. Followers Per Person Engaging

bit.ly Clicks

12,741 Followers Added

2.4 Impressions Per Person Reached

The graphic above is our Engagement Megaphone, which shows how content is amplified in social media channels. It provides an analytic breakdown of your brand’s engagement on Twitter, giving you an idea of how your Twitter efforts resulted in clicks or new followers. In fact, the Engagement Megaphone is the entire reason you create content on Twitter. You can reach massive audiences when your followers, influencers, and advocates engage, both spreading your content and increasing brand awareness. Great content leads to engagement and amplification. In turn, you increase your reach as more fans opt-in, which adds more fuel to the machine. With our Engagement Megaphone, there are metrics for each step of the process. Brands can use these to track and analyze their performance, and optimize and prove the value of social in their marketing efforts. The Engagement Megaphone gives you insight into how many unique people engaged with your content and how many times they engaged through mentions, @replies, and retweets. From this, we’re able to calculate the total possible users your content reached and how many potential impressions it generated. This calculation may seem complicated, so to help understand this better, we’ll break down and define each component that plays an active role in your brand’s Twitter visibility.

DEFINITIONS Engagement In an industry that pairs web activity and bottom-line ROI with brand awareness and overall market penetration, engagement can be one of the best ways to demonstrate success and brand activity. It tells the story of who is talking to your brand, about your brand, and why. This is why engagement is one of the most important Twitter metrics used today.

Engagement: @Replies + Retweets + Mentions + Favorites

What does engagement mean to you? Engagement on Twitter accounts for every way followers can interact with your brand to make it show up in their timeline. It incorporates one-on-one conversations as well as promotion to their circles of influence. This interaction is what makes Twitter such a powerful tool. Brands of all sizes have the ability to converse with users, respond to their questions, and promote their message in real-time. The followers with whom youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re engaging present several opportunities: they can act as advocates for your company, provide feedback on products or services, purchase products, and help you better understand your customers. Understanding how your brand engages users on Twitter is the first step to learning, developing and growing your Twitter marketing campaigns.

How is engagement calculated?

Twitter Engagement Breakdown 3.5k

Mentions

@Replies

Retweets

Favorites

Total Engagement

3.0K 2.5K 2.0K 1.5K 1.0K 500

3 8/

3 /1 21 8/

Engagement is the total of several components during the given report period: @Replies: When a user talks directly to your brand on the Twitter timeline by using your brand handle at the beginning of the Tweet. This will only show up in your feed and the feeds of users who follow you both. Example: “@SimplyMeasured Your reports rock!” Retweets: When a user directly shares your brand message with their audience. Example: “RT @SimplyMeasured: We’ve made some great updates to our Twitter Account Report. Check it out!” Mentions: When a user includes your brand handle, but not as a direct @reply. Example: “I really love that @SimplyMeasured charts are dynamic within Excel!” Favorites: When a user stars a Tweet from your brand without having to retweet or reply to the Tweet, or mention your brand. Many businesses focus on retweets and mentions because they have reach, appearing in the timelines of your followers’ followers, accessing a Twitter segment that may not be following your brand. This is not to say that @replies or favorites, which don’t have reach, are not worth looking at.. With thousands of Tweets being posted every second, examining which Tweets foster more engagement will give you insight into the types of Tweets that have the most impact.

Retweets Retweets are a great way for users to let their followers know that they are actively engaging with your brand by republishing your content. A retweet is a repost of a Tweet sent by another user. These Tweets are marked with the retweet icon and include the authorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s information, and the name of the user who retweeted the content. They are one of the most commonly used tools on Twitter and can be very helpful in identifying web trends, content that interests your readers or their followers, or Tweets that have the capacity to go viral.

Retweets: A retweet is a repost of a Tweet sent by another user, marked by the retweet icon.

Example:

Mentions and @Replies The difference between mentions and @replies seems simple at first, but many business Twitter accounts aren’t leveraging them properly. Mentions and @replies have very different impacts for your brand, and both are extremely important when it comes to engagement metrics. Understanding the difference between mentions and @replies will help you determine how to best use both to your advantage - to help your brand’s Twitter account stand out from the crowd.

Mentions: A Tweet including your @handle at any point other than the beginning. Example: “I really love that @SimplyMeasured charts are dynamic within Excel!” Mentions are when a user includes your brand handle, but doesn’t begin the Tweet with the @handle. These Tweets show up in your stream, the user’s stream, and the stream of anyone following the user. As we mentioned before, these Tweets have the potential to reach Twitter users who may not be following you.

@Replies: Tweets that BEGIN with your @handle.

@Replies are when a user talks directly to your brand by using your brand handle at the beginning of the Tweet in the Twitter timeline. This will only show up in your feed, the user’s feed, and the feeds of users who follow you both. Example: “@SimplyMeasured Your reports rock!” An interesting side effect of the difference in visibility for @replies and mentions is the .@reply (note the period before the @ sign). Twitter users use this method of engagement to overcome the less public nature of @replies. If a user wants their followers to see their replies to your brand, they will use an .@reply in place of a regular @reply. Because the Tweet starts with a period, it’s not considered an @reply, and will show up in their timeline and the timelines of anyone who follows them. In addition, because the Tweet starts with something other than your brand’s Twitter handle, these types of replies count as a mention. Example: “.@SimplyMeasured Your reports rock!”

What do Mentions and @Replies mean to you? @Replies and mentions account for two-thirds of your engagement and demonstrate two very different things. @Replies tell a story of users looking to engage in conversation with your brand. Mentions are more of an endorsement of your brand. The key difference between mentions and @replies is where they appear â&#x20AC;&#x201C; who automatically sees Tweets that use your brand handle. With mentions, your brand handle has the potential to be seen by a much larger range of users than it would in an @reply, allowing you to reach potential new followers. @Replies have a much smaller audience, but are important in building a strategy to retain followers through mutual engagement. An .@reply will be seen by your followers and your followersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; followers, and can help both gain and retain Twitter followers. Focusing on the types of mentions and @replies, the number of each, and patterns for each type can help you understand your audience and the relationship they have with your brand. This is important in the type of messaging you put out, the way you interact with various users, and the way you measure success.

Twitter Engagement Breakdown 3.5k

Mentions

@Replies

Retweets

Favorites

Total Engagement

3.0K 2.5K 2.0K 1.5K 1.0K 500

3 26 /1 8/

3 25 /1 8/

3 24 /1 8/

3 23 /1 8/

3 22 /1 8/

3 21 /1 8/

20 /1

Favorites Favoriting is becoming an increasingly popular way to engage on Twitter. In fact, favorites have grown to represent a significant portion of the engagement mix on Twitter. Favorites are similar to Likes on Facebook. With a single click, you can engage with content to either bookmark, show your appreciation, or simply let the author know youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve seen their Tweet. This has made favoriting an attractive form of engagement. Favorites are trending: We measured engagement for some of the top automotive brands on Twitter and found that favorites accounted for 8% of their total engagement.

Twitter Engagement Breakdown

3.5k

Total Engagement

3.0K

Mentions

@Replies

Retweets

Favorites

2.5K 2.0K 1.5K 1.0K 500

3 8/

3 /1 21 8/

Many automotive brands received nearly as many favorites as replies. In fact, in just one week @VW actually received 367 favorites, compared to only 276 replies.

4.5K

Twitter Engagement Details Comparison

4.0K

Mentions

@Replies

Retweets

Favorites

Total Engagement

3.5k 3.0K 2.5K 2.0K 1.5K 1.0K 500 0 @Honda

@Ford

@Toyota

@NissanUSA

@VW

Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s clear that favorites represent a significant volume of total engagement, and tracking them ensures that brands are getting the complete picture of how users are choosing to engage with their brand.

How Favorites are different: Favorites are a preferred form of engagement because they allow users to engage without having to retweet your content, provide feedback with a reply, or mention your brand. Users often want to engage without having to voice their opinion or broadcast something to their audience. Favorites benefit the user and send a signal to the author; as such, they’re the only form of Twitter engagement that doesn’t reach other users’ feeds.. The benefit for your brand: If favorites aren’t often seen by others, why should you care? Although favorites don’t create awareness the same way that retweets and mentions do, they are still another important indicator for measuring how your content resonates with people. If certain types of content are receiving more favorites than comments or retweets, you may need to deliver your content in a way that encourages more users to retweet and share.

Percentage of Engagement by Content Type 60%

@Replies

Retweets

Favorites

50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Photos

Videos

Links

Normal Tweets

Measuring favorites will also give you a better understanding of your ability to engage your audience. It’s inevitable that a portion of your audience will be more interested in consuming content rather than engaging with it. Favorites show a more complete picture of how users of how users are consuming your content which can inform your decisions on how to best optimize your content on Twitter.

Hashtags Another important method of engagement on Twitter is the use of hashtags – a form of earned engagement as opposed to the owned engagement we outlined above. They are one of the greatest tools social marketers have at their disposal. Yes, some marketers abuse the feature. Yes, there’s a relatively steep learning curve and some confusion when it comes to using hashtags as a tactic. But when it comes to campaign management, organization, and branding, it’s hard to top the simple power of the hashtag. Hashtags are terms used in Tweets (and now on Facebook and Instagram as well) that are searchable, clickable, and measurable.

Hashtags: Clickable terms within Tweets that begin with the “#” sign What do Hashtags mean to you? Hashtags should be a part of any Twitter strategy, because they allow marketers to engage with users they otherwise wouldn’t be able to and to build branded campaigns of their own. You can use hashtags to build easily monitored campaigns in a variety of ways:

Campaigns: When conducting a specific campaign, hashtags can be used to distinguish engaged Tweets and users. They can be searched to see activity and interest, and branded to promote your cause or company. For example, if Simply Measured wanted to promote a giveaway of a t-shirt and some stickers, we could use the hashtag #SimplySwag and ask users to tweet using the hashtag for a chance to win. Increased Reach: Hashtags of specific topics are often searched and monitored by marketers and users with specific interests. For example, if we tweet a link to our Twitter eBook with the hashtags #SocialMedia and #Twitter, we increase the chance of reaching social media marketers who are interested in learning more.

Chats: There are countless regular “Twitter Chats” out there that use specific hashtags to allow users to organize the conversation. For example, if we wanted to host a regular conversation about social media measurement, we might choose the hashtag #MeasureChat. This allows us to promote a searchable term that allows users to view and interact with anyone getting involved in the chat or conversation.

Discovery: When doing research, hashtags can be searched to discover interests, sentiment, attitudes, and demographics of the users engaging with the hashtag.

Comparison: Different hashtags can be measured and compared to identify trends, growth, or disparity. This is important for recurring campaigns and competitive analysis.

Potential Reach Potential reach is an important metric for any social media marketer. On Twitter, we aren’t just focused on engaging the people already following us, we’re trying to grow and expand our audience. Potential reach is one of the best ways to tell if we’re doing that successfully.

Potential Reach: The sum of all users mentioning your brand + the sum of their followers.

User A, who has 5 followers, posts a Tweet that mentions the @SimplyMeasured Twitter handle. In this example, we’ll calculate the potential reach of this Tweet for Simply Measured. User A • 3h

I love @SimplyMeasured reports!

+ users mentioning your brand (@UserA) = 1 + sum of their followers (@UserA) = 5

Potential Reach = 6

What’s the potential reach of @UserA’s Tweet if it’s retweeted by @UserB, who has 9 followers? User A • 3h

I love @SimplyMeasured reports!

User B • 1h

RT @UserA I love @SimplyMeasured reports!

users mentioning your brand =2 (@UserA + @UserB) + sum of their followers (@UserA) = 5 + sum of their followers (@UserB) = 9

Potential Reach = 16

NOTE: Potential Reach will always include your brand followers since they are part of the audience you are reaching on Twitter. When calculating the reach of just a mention (like in the examples on this page), your followers are not being engaged so they are not part of the reach calculation for that specific tweet. But when we calculate the overall reach of your Twitter activity, your followers are added to the equation. If @SimplyMeasured has 20 followers, in example one the total potential reach will be 26 and in example 2 it will be 36.

What does Potential Reach mean to you? The potential reach metric allows you to quantify not only the users you engaged with, but also the followers of those users who may have seen your @handle or Tweet. This is important because the focus of social marketing is to expand your audience and promote your message to a wider segment of the population. The reach metric is a good indicator of the content that’s working to grow your audience and ultimately “reach” new people. This is a true look at the audience you have the potential to engage with.

Potential Impressions Potential impressions have always been an important metric for advertisers. For traditional media like newspaper, radio, and TV, it has been one of the only metrics available to gauge success. Its relevance has stayed just as prominent throughout the advent of social media.

Potential Impression: The total number of times a Tweet from your account or mentioning your account could appear in users’ Twitter feeds during the report period. It includes your Tweets, Tweets that mention your brand handle, and retweets of your content. What does the Potential Impressions metric mean to you? Potential impressions are an important part of measuring your brand impact. If content you’re creating has a viral impact – for example Tweets that earn a large number of retweets and @ mentions - your potential impressions are the quickest way to identify that trend, allowing you to focus your efforts on the content that is drawing the most attention.

Potential Impressions Analysis Brand Tweets

800

User Tweets

Total Potential Impressions

18M

14M

Total Tweets

600

12M

500

10M

400

300

200

100

12 5/ 6/

3/ 6/

1/ 6/

/1 30 5/

5/ 28 /1 2

5/ 26 /1 2

5/ 24 /1 2

5/ 22 /1 2

5/ 20 /1 2

51 8/ 12

5/ 16 /1 2

5/ 14 /1 2

5/ 12 /1 2

5/ 10 /1 2

0 5/ 8/ 12

5/ 6/ 12

Potential Impressions

16M

700

What makes Reach different from Potential Impressions? Reach accounts for the possible number of people who may have seen your content, whereas impressions calculates how many times the people you’ve reached have seen your content. If you think of reach as how many screens your Twitter handle appears on, and impressions as how often your Twitter handle appears, it’s easy to get an idea of how far you can potentially spread your message and grow your brand. How are your Potential Reach and Potential Impressions calculated? Both potential reach and potential impressions are calculated based on mentions and @replies. When it comes to mentions, there’s an overall consensus on how to calculate that portion of potential reach and potential impressions based on the number of author’s followers: Potential reach and potential impressions for @simplymeasured Type

Author Followers

Potential Reach

Potential Impressions

Mention

10,700

Mention

10,700

TOTAL

10,700

21,400

User A • 3h

I love @SimplyMeasured reports!

User A • 1h

Thanks @SimplyMeasured you guys are the best!

The nature of @replies is that they show up only in the feeds of users who follow both handles (the original author and the @reply author). Unfortunately, there’s no consensus on how to calculate the potential reach and potential impressions for @replies; whether to assume no overlap (the authors share no followers) or assume some percentage of overlap (the authors share some of their audience). Based on feedback collected from our customers, our analysts were able to develop three different formulas for calculating this metric to accurately cover the widest spectrum of needs. At Simply Measured, we’ve focused on the most “conservative” calculation for @replies as the go-to model, because the majority of our research supports this method.

In this calculation one @reply results in one person reached. This will likely give you a lowerthan-actual reading, but makes a fair assumption that @replies won’t generate the full reach of the author’s followers. @Replies are typically 1-to-1 interactions, where reach and impressions aren’t as relevant. Potential reach and potential impressions for @simplymeasured Type

Author Followers

Potential Reach

Potential Impressions

@Reply

10,700

@Reply

10,700

TOTAL

User A • 3h

@SimplyMeasured your reports are the best!

User A • 1h

@SimplyMeasured you guys rock!

If you want to assume some amount of overlap in followers, Simply Measured’s Twitter Analytics supports modified reach calculations at the push of a button. We can help you determine which solution is best for your brand. Knowing how to best calculate your potential reach and potential impressions will give you insight into your virality statistics and brand exposure. Imagine @UserA mentions the @SimplyMeasured handle in 2 separate Tweets that reach his 5 followers... User A • 1h

User A • 3h

Thanks @SimplyMeasured you guys are the best!

Wow! @SimplyMeasured your reports are amazing!

...The @SimplyMeasured handle appears twice on each of their news feeds.

User A • 1h

Thanks @SimplyMeasured you guys are the best!

User A • 1h

News Source • 2h

User A • 3h

Weather tonight is cloudy with a chance of rain

User A • 3h

News Source • 5h

News Source • 2h

News Source • 5h

User A • 1h

News Source • 2h

User A • 3h

News Source • 5h

User A • 3h

Wow! @SimplyMeasured your reports are amazing!

News Source • 5h

Tune in tonight at 8pm for the latest #worldnews

Number of Potential Reach x Number of Appearances = Potential Impressions 5 followers x 2 appearances = 10 Potential Impressions

Response Rate Response rate is becoming more and more important to social media teams. On Twitter, focusing on outbound promotion just doesn’t work anymore. Customers reach out with issues, questions, and requests on a daily basis. It’s our job as social marketers to act as first responders in these situations – answering questions, directing traffic, and sometimes just saying no. Whatever your policies and tactics, measuring customer service success boils down to a few specific metrics. Key among them is response rate.

Response Rate: Total # of Mentions Replied to Total Mentions - Retweets

What does Response Rate mean to you? Whether you’re a customer service rep, a community manager, or a marketing manager who handles everything for a smaller company, Response rate can help you identify successes and holes in your social strategy. Maintaining company image can be as simple as keeping your engaged customers happy. This means responding to the highest percentage of inbound @mentions and @replies. How is your Response Rate calculated?

@fordservice Activity and Engagement Retweets

Mentions Excl. RTs

200

400

150

300

100

200

100

1/ 1/ 13 2/ 1/ 13 3/ 1 1/ 3 4/ 1/ 13 5/ 1/ 13 6/ 1 1/ 3 7/ 1/ 13 8/ 1/ 13 9 1/ /13 10 1/ /13 11 1/ /13 12 1/ /13 13 1/ /13 14 1/ /13 15 1/ /13 16 / 1/ 13 17 1/ /13 18 1/ /13 19 1/ /13 20 1/ /13 21 1/ /13 22 1/ /13 23 1/ /13 24 1/ /13 25 1/ /13 26 / 1/ 13 27 1/ /13 28 1/ /13 29 1/ /13 30 1/ /13 31 /1 3

Tweets Sent

Retweets & Mentions

Tweet Sent

Response rate is the number of inbound mentions of your brand handle that you’ve responded to, divided by the sum total of all brand mentions (excluding retweets). This equation gives you the percentage of inbound Tweets that you’ve responded to. With Simply Measured, this can be calculated using both our Customer Service Report and our Multiple Handle Customer Service report – designed specifically for brands with a dedicated customer service handle.

Response Time Customers reach out to brands constantly. Whether it’s a question, concern, or gratitude that they are trying to convey. that they’re trying to convey, it’s our job to engage with them in a way that shows our company cares. An industry standard for customer service success. Response time, similar to response rate, is an important way to measure your social activity for both brand engagement and the customer service.

Response Time: Time of @Reply to inbound Tweet

Time of inbound Tweet

What does Response Time mean to you? For many brands we’ve talked to response time is calculated in different ways. Direct messages and replies to Tweets that didn’t mention the brand handle (through a hashtag campaign for example) are just some of the factors that come into play. This can be a frustrating number for many brands that often don’t staff a Twitter account outside of normal business hours. A few dozen Tweets on a Friday that don’t see a response until Monday drastically skew your average response time. A recommendation that we make to Simply Measured users is to open the Excel version of the Simply Measured Customer Service Report and look at individual Tweets. This allows social media managers to identify and remove outliers, like the Friday evening mentions, to get a more realistic picture of their efforts.

How is your Response Time calculated?

Response Time: In Minutes Avg Time Per Response

Minutes Per Response (Goal)

400

80 70

300

60 50

200

40 30

100

20 10 0 2 /3 / 11 12 /4 / 11 12 /5 / 11 12 /6 / 11 12 /7 /1 11 2 /8 / 11 12 /9 11 /1 /1 2 0 11 /1 /1 2 1 11 /1 /1 2 2 11 /1 /1 2 3 11 /1 /1 2 4 11 /1 /1 2 5 11 /1 /1 2 6 11 /1 /1 2 11 7/1 /1 2 8 11 /1 /1 2 9 11 /1 /2 2 0 11 /12 21 11 /1 /2 2 2 11 /1 /2 2 3 11 /1 /2 2 4 11 /1 /2 2 5 11 /1 /2 2 6 11 /1 /2 2 11 7/1 /2 2 8 11 /1 /2 2 9/ 11 1 /3 2 0/ 12

The simplest way to measure response time is by subtracting the time of the original inbound Tweet from the time of your response. Take this difference in time from each of your responses and average them for your average response time. If the numbers don’t add up or don’t represent your effort the way you expected, open the Excel file and identify the responses that are skewing your average. This can help you identify holes in your strategy, ways to optimize your responses, or reinforce what you’re already doing.

Interactions Per Person There are many ways to measure the impact you have on your Twitter audience - whether through engagement, clicks, or favorites. One metric you can use to sum up your audience health is interactions per person. What are Interactions Per Person?

Interactions Per Person: Total Interactions Total Audience What do Interactions Per Person mean to you? This metric is great for understanding how involved your audience is as a whole. It’s one thing to see a total number of retweets or @replies that you’ve earned through your social campaigns, but understanding how that number stacks up to your audience size can give you a much clearer idea of your social media success..

19 81

This metric is important in identifying the appropriate level of saturation and gauging whether the amount of content you distribute to your audience is too little or too much. Study this metric as you test your cadence to find the highest level of interaction per person, before it plateaus (a sign of over-messaging). The goal is to find the sweet spot where multiple impressions are making an impact and engaging your audience, without spamming them. How to measure Interactions Per Person:

Twitter Engagement Megaphone

What started it?

207

Tweets Sent by @delta

How many unique people engaged with your Tweet?

How many times did these people engage?

How many people could have seen these Tweets?

How many impressions could have been generated?

1,337

18,750

28,793

53,285,030

127,884,074

Unique People

Total Engagement

Potential Reach

Potential Impressions

People that interacted with you on Twitter

Combined followers of people tweeting about your brand (6/1/13 to 6/30/13

Potential times served in all follower’s needs

1.5 Interactions Per Person

What happened?

2,853 Avg. Followers Per Person Engaging

bit.ly Clicks

12,741 Followers Added

2.4 Impressions Per Person Reached

Interactions per person should be measured in context with your other KPIs. In the example above, @delta has earned 28,793 mentions, @replies, retweets, and favorites. Since their audience is 18,750 people, this equates to 1.5 interactions per person. It’s important to note that this metric isn’t saying each of those 18,750 people engaged 1.5 times, but rather giving a snapshot of how that total engagement relates to @delta’s audience size.

BASIC ANALYSES Now that we’ve gone over all of the metrics definitions, we’re going to show you how to put those metrics to work to analyze your Twitter campaigns and make better decisions. We’ll be working out of our own software, but you can conduct the same analysis no matter which tool you use to pull Twitter data.

Measuring Engagement One of the most important goals for social media marketers on Twitter is increasing engagement. Through simple interactions, engagement helps grow awareness of your brand and helps increase traffic to your social profiles and your website. Remember, we defined engagement as the sum of @replies, retweets, and mentions. These three Twitter actions directly amplify your brand’s share of voice as your brand’s handle reaches the timelines of users who may not be following your brand on Twitter for regular updates. To measure your engagement look at your audience and how you retain followers. Is your audience growing? Do these users follow you during promotions, but unfollow shortly thereafter? What is the industry standard for number of followers and how do you stack up? Now, look at how those followers and their circles respond to or share your content. Do you have a surprisingly low number of retweets for the number of followers you have? Are there certain times that are better for engagement? Have you recently published any Tweets that have had success in regards to mentions or retweets? We’ve provided a few different metrics you can use to benchmark your campaign performance and assess your engagement strategy.

9 ways to measure Twitter audience beyond follower count Follower count is an important metric for measuring the performance of a growing audience on Twitter, but too often it’s the only audience metric that marketers focus on. With each new follower gained, the characteristics of your audience change. Over time, substantial follower growth can result in very different type of audience and just measuring change in follower count can only tell you so much. There is more you can do to understand your Twitter audience and find more effective ways to grow your audience.

1. Measure your followers’ followers Your follower count is just the first step to understanding your potential to reach. The followers of your followers are your secondary network. They determine how much potential there is for sharing content downstream.

Users

Followers’ Follower Count Distribution 450 400 350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0

413

200 87

0-100

101-500

501-1,000

2,001-2,500

>2,500

Follower Count

2. Measure your competitors’ followers Comparing competitor audience growth rates to your own growth will give perspective on how effectively you’re growing your audience - letting you know whether you’re ahead of the game or playing catch up.

Twitter Comparison: Total Followers Total Followers 250K

0.5%

200K

0.6%

207.6K

0.5%

150K 100K

Growth Rate per Day

117.1K 72.8K

50K

0.3%

0.1%

0.4%

0.3%

51.8K

77.5K

0.3% 0.1%

0.1%

0.6% @sap

0.2%

@ciscosystems

@oracle

@ibm

@accenture

3. Track engaged users who are not yet followers Identify users mentioning your brand by name or retweeting your content who are not already following you. These users may be unaware of your handle or are following your followers. Create a connection with these users to encourage them to follow you directly. 4. Measure share of voice for online properties Follow influencers who engage with your brand or your competitors. Monitor their Tweets for opportunities to engage with them directly. 5. Segment your followers by location Are your social goals tied to specific markets? Segmenting follower growth by location enables you to measure your share of voice on Twitter with respect to regional markets.

Follower Distribution By US Metro Area % of Followers

% of Population

Los Angeles, CA Chicago, IL New York, NY Miami, FL Atlanta, GA Houston, TX Boston, MA Washington, DC Las Vegas, NV Detroit, MI Dallas, TX Portland, OR San Antonio, TX Tucson, AZ Fresno, CA 0%

6. Segment your followers by how they engage Segment your followers by how they engage with your brand. Create “archetypes” for followers who frequently retweet your content, and those who often mention you on Twitter. Social archetypes for these users will help you better understand who your followers are and why they engage with you on Twitter. 7. Compare your new followers to your old followers Significant changes in follower count mean that you have more to learn about who your followers are. Comparing new followers to your previous followers can help you determine the value of new followers gained and whether you’re retaining old followers as you grow your audience.

8. Measure engagement relative to your followers Is your engagement scaling as your followers grow? Engagement as a percentage of followers (engagement rate) shows how much of your audience you are able to engage. Change in engagement rate can indicate the value of fans gained or lost.

Twitter Comparison: Total Engagement Total Engagement 3.0K

2,562

Engagement % of Followers 4%

3.5%

2.5K

2.8%

2.0K

1,601

1,575

3% 3%

1,433

1.5K

1,178

1.3%

1.0K

1.5%

2% 1%

0.8%

500

0% @sap

@ciscosystems

@oracle

@ibm

@accenture

9. Know how active your followers are How frequently your followers tweet indicates how active they are as users on Twitter. The more active your followers are, the more likely they are to see and engage with your Tweets.

Followers by Date of Last Tweet 33%

35% 30% 25%

20%

18%

20% 15%

11%

10%

10% 5%

Ye ar >

Ye ar La

s M 6 st La

on th

s on th

th M on st

2 st

W ee k

k La

W ee

ou rs

6 ways to measure Twitter share of voice beyond brand mentions Share of voice is one of the most regularly used metrics for measuring social media performance, but are you really getting the full picture? There’s more to it than just brand mentions. There are ways to take share of voice a step beyond mentions to measure not just how much share of voice your brand has, but how different types of conversation impact your brand relative to your competitors. With data from our own social media reports, we’ll look at different ways (besides brand mentions) to measure how share of voice impacts brand perceptions, regional markets, site traffic, and more. 1. Measure keyword share of voice Measuring your brand’s share of voice against specific keywords provides context for how users discuss your brand compared to your competitors. Depending on the keywords being compared, you can gain insights related to specific product categories or brand attributes. This data is particularly useful for measuring the performance of initiatives aimed at building product awareness or shifting consumer perceptions of your brand.

Keyword Share of Voice Within Brand Mentions @nissanusa

@kia

@honda

@toyota

ic Ec on

e Re

lia

t Co s

d Sp ee

y fe t Sa

H yb rid

yle St

V SU

Po we r

Se da

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

2. Segment share of voice by location Share of voice by location can indicate which regional markets are most aware of and engaged with your social brand presence. Regional share of voice data can be helpful for distributing relevant content, planning location-based social media efforts, and measuring your brand’s ability to increase awareness in specific markets.

3. Compare potential impressions and reach Share of voice typically measures brand mentions as a percentage of total Tweets in order to gauge the level of consumer awareness. However, share of voice as a percentage of mentions doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t account for how many unique users are discussing your brand or how many followers they have. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s why comparing potential impressions and reach are also important. Reach measures how many users were potentially exposed to Tweets mentioning your brand. Impressions can tell you how many times those users were exposed to mentions of your brand.

Twitter Comparison: Impressions and Reach

100M

Potential Impressions

103.3M

80M 31.7M 26.5M 12.8M

20M

17.7M

22.1M

4.8M

3.9M

Po w

yle

40M

60M

Impressions and Reach

Potential Reach 120M

4. Measure share of voice for online properties Segmenting Tweets that link to your website and the sites of your competitors can enable you to measure the share of voice responsible for driving traffic to your website. The share of voice for your online properties can serve as a performance indicator for how shareable your site content is and how well social media accounts and marketing efforts have been integrated with your site.

Distribution of Links to Brand Sites All Links

@Nissan

@kia

@honda

@toyota

5/ 1/ 2 5/ 013 2/ 2 5/ 013 3/ 2 5/ 013 4/ 2 5/ 013 5/ 2 5/ 013 6/ 20 5/ 13 7/ 2 5/ 013 8/ 2 5/ 013 9/ 5/ 201 10 3 / 5/ 201 11 3 / 5/ 201 12 3 / 5/ 201 13 3 / 5/ 201 14 3 / 5/ 201 15 3 / 5/ 201 16 3 /2 5/ 01 17 3 / 5/ 201 18 3 / 5/ 201 19 3 / 5/ 201 20 3 / 5/ 201 21 3 / 5/ 201 22 3 / 5/ 201 23 3 / 5/ 201 24 3 / 5/ 201 25 3 / 5/ 201 26 3 /2 5/ 01 27 3 / 5/ 201 28 3 / 5/ 201 29 3 /2 01 3

70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

5. Track hashtag adoption Many brands have hashtags they routinely use to provide context for specific conversation themes. Comparing share of voice for your brand’s primary hashtags with those of your competitors can reveal how successfully your hashtags are being adopted and reflect your brand’s ability to shape the way others discuss your brand.

CES Year/Year Twitter Comparison: Days 0-1 Tweets from 2013

Tweets from 2012

Tweets from 2011

9.0K 8.0K 7.0K 6.0K 5.0K 4.0K 3.0K 2.0K 1.0K

(

)

0 :0 10

00 8:

00 6:

00 4:

DAY 1

0 :0 12

:0 10

00 8:

00 6:

00 4:

(

0 :0 10

00 8:

00 6:

00 4:

DAY 0

AM 12

:0 10

00 8:

00 6:

00 4:

00 2:

)

All Times PST

The above chart compares three consecutive years of Tweets using the Consumer Electronics Show’s branded hashtags. When trended over the same amount of time, we’re able to identify growth trends and determine the events that caused specific spikes and drops in activity. Hashtags are easy to track using the Simply Measured Twitter Activity Report or Stream Snapshot report and can be trended over time to measure volume and activity. This can be important for researching opportunity, identifying successes, and measuring causes of peaks and lulls in activity. This technique can also be effective for measuring the share of voice driven by hashtags used in TV advertising.

6. Identifying conversation overlap with competitors The percentage of overlap in competitor conversations measures how frequently your brand is mentioned in Tweets that also mention competitors. Conversation overlap can measure how uniquely your brand is being discussed. A small degree of overlap can indicate brand loyalty or unique product discussion, while a high degree of overlap signals frequent brand comparisons, which are typically seen between highly competitive brands.

Overlap in Competitor Mentions vs. Share of Voice @Nissan

Competitor Overlap

38%

10%

20%

@honda

@toyota

14%

34%

Share of Voice

@kia

21%

30%

40%

41%

16%

50%

60%

29%

70%

80%

90%

100%

How to measure visual content “Pics or it didn’t happen.” That’s the general rule when dealing with a friend who went fishing…or to Vegas. It might as well be the motto for social media too. Visual content has become more and more impactful as a way to reach potential customers, fans, and followers. But with so many options, services and types of visual content, how can you tell which works the best? Here are some quick ways to analyze your visual content and create a strategy based on past success. All of this analysis can be done using Simply Measured reports. Measure engagement by content type The starting point for your Twitter content analysis should be the type of content: photos, videos, or links. Measure the engagement as well as the number of Tweets you’ve sent for each content type. This will give you a solid understanding of what you should be focusing on.

Brand Tweets by Content Tweets Sent 72

Photos Videos

Links

Normal Tweets

Engagement per Tweet 188.3

47.3 72.3 14.8

573

Measure engagement by media type Next, identify which service helps your brand see the most success. If you’re posting videos you may ask if Vine clips perform better than YouTube. For photos, are Instagram pics as successful as Twitpics?

Media Types in Tweets Engagement per Tweet

Potential Impressions Per Tweet

2.3M

2.1M 20.9

2.1M

1.8M

27.8

14.8

4.5

Vine

Instagram/Path

Posts

YouTube/Vimeo

Posts

81.4

2.1M

Other Photos

Posts

Top People Sharing Links to Your Site

By Number of Tweets

By Number of Visits

facetweet1388 seo1302 hoot1388 simplymeasured Cygfred TwitLimericks pigebak marramalho kmmpatke KevinSaysThings ninoscam gabejoynt dacort tabithagold resourcewater

26 24 13 6 5 5 5 4 4 4 4 4 4 3

simplymeasured KevinSaysThings otis dacort ElvisMoyaTTU owenblacker dixxieland AndyLloydGordon jakeludington 5ense KatHolmlund zdeluca adamshostack _vio_ paulabraconnot

Top People Sharing Links to Your Site By Visits per Tweet

73 14 12 6 5 5 5 4 4 3 3 3 3 3

simplymeasured otis ElvisMoyaTTU owenblacker dixxieland AndyLlyodGordon jakeludington KevinSaysThings 5ense zdeluca adamshostack paulabraconnot danbrookman mattisranting JuritaKruma

12 12 5 5 5 4 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 2

Understand where your traffic is coming from; segment earned versus owned visits. Are your own Tweets the primary driver for traffic to your site, or are others directing traffic for you? Your focus should be to create more engagement with your Tweets, encouraging others to contribute more content that links to your site. Explore user profiles that are successful at driving traffic, especially those that frequently share out Tweets linking to your site. Users who engage their audiences with Tweets to your site likely have audiences with particular interest in your brand. Discover what content resonates with these audiences, whether itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s products, promotions, or industry thought leadership.

4 ways to improve customer service measurement on Twitter In a recent study, we found that 34% of top brands now have a dedicated Twitter account for customer service. While Twitter programs are typically owned by the marketing/PR department, customer service is a key secondary activity. Many brands are investing efforts in solving customer problems via Twitter. The challenge is that when efforts are shifted from marketing to customer satisfaction, measurement strategies must also change to effectively evaluate performance. It is important that brands establish a customer service specific approach to measurement. Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve outlined four strategies to help your brand do just that, using Delta Airlines as an example. 1. Measure end-to-end performance Brands need to ensure that they are measuring success throughout the entire process.

Twitter Customer Service Workflow How many times was our brand mentioned across profiles?

How many times did our CS Account send a reply?

How many unique people did CS talk with?

How many high volume issues were addressed? (4 or more responses)

28,334

4,104

2,263

Total Mentions

CS Responses

Unique People

Complex Cases

91%

14.5 %

2,343

1.54

Percent of all responses were from CS.

Percent of Total Mentions with CS Responses.

Avg. Followers Per Person Engaging.

Avg. Number of CS responses per user.

18.7 mins. Average Response Time

Sunday Most active Day of Week

11:00 AM Most Active Time of Day

Work flow and processes should be analyzed end-to-end â&#x20AC;&#x201C; from customer demand to how efficiently issues were resolved. The visual above is a high-level summary that walks through the customer support process. This summary view provides a period snapshot that can be used for benchmarking customer service KPIs and optimizing overall performance. Quick response times and a high response rate are key to optimizing performance, but there is room for improvement if brands are experiencing a high volume of complex cases, or unexpected changes in the percentage of support responses being sent.

100

2. Capture complete coverage Often a brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Twitter presence consists of more than one branded Twitter handle. For example, a brand might have a primary marketing handle and a dedicated customer service handle. For big brands, multiple marketing handles might rely on one dedicated customer service account.

Coverage by Account Total Mentions

Total Replies from @DeltaAssist

25k 19.6k

20k 15k

14.5k

10k 5k

3,176

928

@DeltaAssist

@Delta

Regardless of how a brand is managing customer service, it is important to measure all of its efforts. The chart above displays total mentions for Deltaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s primary marketing handle, @delta, and its customer support handle, @DeltaAssist. By measuring customer service activity across multiple accounts, brands can determine how support resources are being allocated and measure customer response times specific to each account. The 14.5K mentions of @DeltaAssist indicate that Delta customers are directing replies to the dedicated customer service handle and shows that many customer support issues are making it to their intended destination.

101

3. Shift context: focus on core customer service KPIs Measuring customer service performance on Twitter requires a different set of KPIs from those associated with marketing performance. Follower and engagement growth are standard marketing KPIs. However, support handles should view these metrics as potential red flags rather than account management success. When it comes to customer support, the goal is to respond to and resolve as many customer service issues as possible, as quickly as possible. The KPIs that matter most are Response Rate and Response Time.

% of Mentions With @DeltaAssist Replies 50% 45% 40% 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5%

/1 2 8 11 /12 /1 9 11 /12 /2 0/ 11 1 /2 2 1 11 /12 /2 2 11 /12 /2 3 11 /12 /2 4 11 /12 /2 5 11 /12 /2 6 11 /12 /2 7 11 /12 /2 8/ 11 1 /2 2 9 11 /12 /3 0/ 12

7/ 1

/1 11

/7 /1

/4 /

/1 /3

/1 11

/1 /1

The chart above shows the percentage of total mentions that @DeltaAssist responded to in November. Keep in mind that not all brand mentions are customer-service related, and of those that are, not all warrant a response. The nature of customer engagement on Twitter varies for each brand. Brands should identify a target response rate and set goals for improvement by conducting ongoing monitoring and competitor benchmarking.

102

Once a consistent response rate has been established, it can act as a good indicator of whether a brand has the resource to scale customer service to meet increases in customer demand.

% of Mentions With @DeltaAssist Replies Avg. Time per Response

Minutes per Response (Goal)

80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10

7/ 1

12 /2

12 11

7/ 1

12 /1

0/ 11

/7 /1

/4 /

/1 /3

/1 11

/1 /1

Goals for response time must also be established through monitoring and benchmarking. Above, @DeltaAssistâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s daily average response time is displayed for November. Response time measures a brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ability to respond quickly and is also an indicator as to whether it can quickly meet increases in demand. However, response time isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t a standalone metric. Response time can falsely signal success if brands are simply responding quickly to recent issues and ignoring aging issues. Response Time and Response Rate must be measured in tandem when analyzing overall customer service performance.

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4. Identify ongoing trends Aggregated data can be very useful for identifying ongoing customer service trends.

Twitter Account Activity By Hour Business Hours

Response Time

User Mentions

@DeltaAssist Replies

PM 0 :0 10

00 8:

00 6:

00 4:

00 2:

0 :0 12

0 :0 10

00 8:

00 6:

00 4:

00 2:

0 :0 12

0 PM

500

1.0K

1.5K

2.0K

2.5K

3.0K

3.5K

4.0K

Mentions & Replies

Influencer Tweet

4.5K

Response Time (In Hours)

5.0K

The chart above displays @DeltaAssistâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s account activity by hour in November. This trended view makes it possible to quickly identify whether customer service response scaled with brand mentions. It also clearly shows patterns in response time. The 6:00PM spike in user mentions deserves attention. Replies did not scale with the increased mentions, although response time was improved. Mentions peaked at 6:00PM after an angry customer Tweet was heavily retweeted. Improved response time indicates that @DeltaAssist was quickly engaging where it could, but likely avoided mentions it did not think were worth responding to. Identifying trends that capture complete coverage and focus on core customer service KPIs can be very useful for spotting issues and making decisions regarding resource allocation.

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How to tell if your Twitter campaign actually worked You’ve spent countless hours preparing, strategizing, and planning for your Twitter campaign. You put your plan into action, worked overtime making sure it was executed properly…and now you’re pretty sure it went well. But in an industry that focuses on measurable goals through specific metrics, pretty sure isn’t good enough anymore You’re going to want to know if your efforts were worth it. Did your campaign result in an increase in customers, better brand awareness, or more engaged users? These are important questions in determining whether your efforts were worth repeating. It’s important to conduct a “post-mortem analysis” to determine what you did wrong, what you did right, and what you can do next time to improve. As you dig into your Twitter analytics to unearth these insights, there are several key metrics that can help you better understand your campaign and how well it worked.

Follower growth

Total Account Followers Total Followers

6.0K

232K 230K 228K 226K 224K 222K 220K 218K 216K 214K

Followers Added

5.0K 4.0K 3.0K 2.0K 1.0K

13 4/ 7/ 2

13 3/ 7/ 2

13 2/ 7/ 2

13 1/ 7/ 2

13 0/ 7/ 2

13 9/ 7/ 1

13 8/ 7/ 1

7/ 1

Followers

Followers Added

The easiest way to tell if your campaign had a meaningful impact is to look at follower growth and how it correlated with your campaign timeline. Did spikes in follower growth line up with key messaging from your campaign? Did influencer involvement drive a significant increase in new followers? There’s a lot of information that can be gleaned from follower trends, including something we call “campaign lift.” Was there a sustained increase in your follower growth rate after the campaign was over? Be sure to take that into consideration. If you saw a massive peak in fans and then a quick return to normal, you may need to reevaluate some of your campaign tactics.

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Engagement

Brand Tweets and Engagement Brand Tweets

Total Engagement

300

Brand Tweets

200

150

20 15

100

Total Engagement

250

13 1/

13 7/ 3

7/ 2

72 71 /

13 7/ 2

13 1/

7/ 2

13 7/ 2

9/ 7/ 1

7/ 1

13 3/

7/ 1

13 7/ 1

1/ 7/ 1

7/ 9

7/ 7/ 1

7/ 5

7/ 3

/1 7/ 1

0 3

While follower growth can give you some great insight and set a barometer for your campaign health, one of your main goals was most likely to get followers involved. Examine the engagement trends surrounding your campaign â&#x20AC;&#x201C; both before and after â&#x20AC;&#x201C; to determine your campaign lift for engagement. Set a wide sample set with at least twice the time of your campaign period to use as a benchmark for standard engagement. If users didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t respond to your messaging, you need to understand why. What can you do better? If they did respond positively, you can analyze key points from your outbound content that kept them involved.

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Web traffic

Twitter Activity Funnel 73

882

Sent Tweets

Retweets

@ Mentions

Link Mentions

2,575,528 Twitter Potential Impressions

1.18 Impressions per Person

2,185,125 Twitter Potential Reach

62 Visits to Site

0.07 Conversions per Visit

0.12% CTR

Goal Completions

This is our favorite feature of Simply Measuredâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Twitter Analytics suite. With the Twitter Traffic Report, you can tie your Twitter data in with your Google Analytics data to see how your brand efforts during your campaign translated to actual website visits and even which goals (from your Google Analytics goal set) were completed. This is the most concrete way to tell if your campaign worked. If you can determine the actual site traffic driven from your efforts and, in turn, the goal completions driven by your Twitter activity, you can determine a base-level ROI of your Twitter campaign. While it may not reflect residual brand awareness and later referral traffic, it can set the tone for future campaigns.

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Influence

Most Engaged Users billxaruto RaulElcheVettel moreira_osman DamienSeuzaret stinglove002319 PierrickLM lirrycupcake Myll_Erik Rhino_219 RedBullBOS SmalexTheSkater AllejanDR0oo redbullw1ngs VulgarDaClown Gabearchambault

Most Followed Users 54

40 33 31 29 28 27 26 25 23 22 22 22 21 20

RyanSheckler MaciBookoutMTV BigBoi John_Wall GameOfThrones JonahLupton GoPro marinapajon DefJamRecords brentnhunter XGames abc_es redbullracing AntonioMartez BrooklynNets

Top Users by Klout Score 2.4M

1.2M 748.4K 726.9K 650.4K 546.8K 544.6K 530.1K 393.1K 369.5K 317.2K 299.5K 253.7K 242.6K 242.5K

DefJamRecords SPIEGELONLINE GameOfThrones exclaimdotca Applebees BrooklynNets XGames pizzahut BigBoi Jason redbullracing Dolby KeystoneMtn AtlanticStation SnowboardMag

89 89 88 88 88 88 87 87 86 86 86 85 84 84 83

When running any kind of campaign, your goal isn’t to simply reach people – it’s reaching the right people. With Twitter, you can easily see whether or not you did. How influential was the audience you engaged? Not only can this be valuable insight for your campaign’s success, it can give you targeted goals and opportunities for future ones.

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Impressions & Reach

Impressions vs. Reach Total Impressions

Total Reach

500K 450K 400K 350K 300K 250K 200K 150K 100K 50K

3 /1

27 /1

3 5/

/1 5/

3 5/

12 5/

13 3/

3 4/

27 /1

/1 4/

3 21 4/

15 4/

3 /1

13 9/

12 4/

3/ 4/

The two metrics that tie in the audience of your followers â&#x20AC;&#x201C; impressions and reach â&#x20AC;&#x201C; can be a great way to tell if you were successful. Benchmark against standard impressions and reach, discover the key reasons for increases during your campaign, and set the tone for future activity.

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7 ways to measure influence on Twitter Twitter is a goldmine for social marketers. The audience is there, the conversation is rich, and the power players are actively engaging. What do we mean by power players? That depends on a lot of different factors: Your product, your goals, your engagement strategy, etc. But it boils down to one key factor that we often ignore: Influencers. Let’s take a look at some of the different ways you can measure influence on Twitter. Measure your most engaged followers Which users are interacting with your brand regularly? These are your brand ambassadors. They’re promoting and engaging with your content in ways that no one else is. It’s important to focus on the types of Tweets that engage them. There’s a lot to be learned there. Look at which types of activity engage your most active users, and utilize them to drive an even larger audience for your brand.

Most Engaged Users JetBlueNews LFANTBRAND Runway1R Yaerospace SteveMAbrams WanderingAramean Mdholidayz yankees368 VivaJazzOrlando LonesTarLou tvladeck autiglobetrot htctest02 JeanetteJoy DaniQT314

110

151 53 30 28 28 26 25 23 21 20 18 17 16 16 16

Identify your most followed followers Which of the users that you’ve engaged have large audiences? What did you do to get them involved with your Tweet? These users have the potential to influence large audiences beyond your own. By identifying them, you can foster that relationship and increase the types of content that they’re interested in. If these influencers are engaging with different content from the rest of your audience, it’s important to identify what separates them from the rest of the pack. Most Followed Users GMA TheSamSlater HarvardBiz Jillzarin FortuneMagazine AmericanAir McHypeMedia TheRealRaye MILKTYSON CNTraveler theoverheadwire chrisborgan DanKimRedMango kanygarcia fodorstravel

1.8M 961.9K 732.6K 547.6K 542.4K 375.6K 374.1K 292.6K 226.3K 224.7K 217.8K 210.1K 206.7K 179.6K 170.2K

Analyze the visits driven by users

Visits

Top 10 Users Driving Visits to Your Site

Size of bubble = # of Tweets

1.4K

simplymeasured

1.2K

rsarver

1.0K

randfish

800

bahoo

600

MissBerry206

400

BessemerVP

200

KevinSaysThings

50K

100K

150K

200K

Followers

250K

300K

350K

jaybaer

Audience Stats

2,020 39 1.24

Avg. # of Followers Avg. Klout Score Avg. Tweets per Person

Traffic Stats - Top Users by Visits 1,633

By Top 10 Influencers

1,357

All Other Users

KristinEIDE

Influence is more than just the number of times people reply to your Tweets. If your primary job is to engage potential customers on Twitter, there’s a good chance you have some bottom-line goals to meet. By tying Google Analytics into your Twitter reporting, we’re able to break down the individual Twitter users driving site traffic for your brand.

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Break down the people Tweeting links Just like you want to identify the people amplifying your Tweets, you want to know who is amplifying your website content. By identifying users sharing the most links to your site, you can create engagement campaigns to thank them for acting as ambassadors, create content geared towards them and their audience, and focus your efforts on earning their continued involvement. Top People Sharing Links to Your Site By Number of Tweets ptnovaodessa IfUSeekLeo McBoessio pt_novaodessa Bjorn_ds isqais20 AlbionKryeziu nodessa elgrodo Joe2596 tipsJP _justpp liesatrosewood PigglyBigglyBoy earthtoalliee

13 10 6 5 5 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

Measure the Tweets driving the most visits Identifying the users who have the greatest reach with the least effort is a crucial step in the influencer relations process. If a user has an audience so engaged that they can Tweet a link to your site once and get a huge response, youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll want to focus on increasing the amount of content theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re willing to share. By identifying the top visits-per-Tweet, you can identify these users and engage them further. Top People Sharing Links to Your Site By Visits per Tweet i999y _CallMeJohn start_write DonaBibes carofjx Far0s hollyabingd0n CasperDeWinter bellaale thijsvdvaart ItsMeKillian Feadare prezlinator mickhinds REVEALERblog

112

26 20 20 17 16 16 16 14 14 12 12 11 12 11 10

TOOLS Example reports Understand the performance of your brand’s Twitter account. Answer questions about Twitter Account performance and engagement, as well as followers, sent Tweets, retweets, mentions and engagement trends. Dig into the most effective Tweets and the impact they’ve had on your account and your audience. Twitter Account Report (JetBlue) Twitter Follower Report (StarwoodBuzz) Twitter Audience Analysis (Tide) Multiple Twitter Channel Analysis (IPG Agencies) Vine Tweet Analysis (chrisbrogan) Benchmark your brand’s performance against competitors Analyze the audience, content and engagement trends of any Twitter account, allowing you to understand your competitive position, relative performance, and market share compared to your competitors. Twitter Competitive Analysis (Hotel Chains) Measure your customer service efforts on Twitter Dive into individual user Tweets, track response rates and times, and analyze a dedicated customer service handle in relation to your main brand account to understand your customer service effectiveness. Twitter Customer Service Report (Ford) Multiple Twitter Customer Service Report (Ford) Compare your efforts on Twitter against those on other social networks Measure your efforts on Twitter in context with Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, YouTube, Google+, and more. Compare audience size & growth, as well as post engagement across all major networks. Complete Social Media Snapshot (RedBull)

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ABOUT SIMPLY MEASURED Simply Measured is a fast-growing team of data geeks dedicated to making the world of analytics and reporting a better, more beautiful place. Our goal is to put the tools to understand business data in the hands of business users. We think reporting should be simple, beautiful, and accessible for everyone – not just data scientists. Our software streamlines the process from data to deliverables and eliminates the countless hours spent on everyday reporting tasks. We do this by putting cloud data sources at your fingertips, providing a marketplace of best practice reports, and generating beautiful deliverables on the web, in Excel, and in PowerPoint with a couple of clicks.

Want to try Simply Measured?

Request a Free 14 Day Trial

Helpful Hashtags for Auto Dealerships

palmer-advertising.com http://info.palmer-advertising.com/blog/bid/340355/Helpful-Hashtags-for-Auto-Dealerships

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Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com

5 Hastag Tracking Tools for Twitter, Facebook and Beyond

www.socialmediaexaminer.com http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/hashtag-tracking/

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Essential LinkedIn Marketing Resources: A Complete Guide

www.socialmediaexaminer.com http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/linkedin-marketing-resources/?fb_action_ ids=10152349347292028&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_ id=288381481237582

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http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/tag/linkedin/

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LinkedIn Company Page: Best Practices

www.leadformix.com http://www.leadformix.com/short-takes/linkedin-company-page-best-practices.html

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http://blog.linkedin.com/

Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com 131

10 Tips for Engaging Followers with Targeted Status Updates

linkedin.com http://marketing.linkedin.com/sites/default/files/attachment/LinkedIn_TargetedStatusUpdates_ BestPractices.pdf

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Marketing Solutions

LinkedIn Best Practices Targeted Status Updates

Prior to the launch of Targeted Status Updates, marketers had no way to tailor the content in their status updates to specific types of company followers. Audiences from different industries, job functions, geographies, and levels of seniority all received the same content. Now with Targeted Status Updates, marketers have an easy, proven way to engage company followers with content that’s relevant and tailored to their personal interests. To help you get up and running quickly, here’s our top 10 tips list for driving success with Targeted Status Updates.

10 Tips for Engaging Followers with Targeted Status Updates 1. Personalize your messages to your audience Drive increased engagement by targeting your status updates to specific groups of your followers using LinkedIn’s rich, up-to-date profile data.

DO: Include your biggest brand advocates in your targeting: your employees! Employees are 70% more likely to take action on your update and spread your message to their networks by liking, sharing, or commenting on your posts.

DON’T: Don’t add so many targeting filters that you exclude audiences that may find your status update interesting.

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2. Remember what LinkedIn members are interested in Looking to engage your followers, create leads, and facilitate customer conversion? Focus on sharing relevant and actionable insights about your company and industry. Informative, useful updates receive the highest engagement rates because that’s the information members expect from companies they follow on LinkedIn. After all, your followers are active on LinkedIn because they want to be more productive and successful professionals. • 60%

of members are interested in industry insights are interested in company news • 43% are interested in new products and services • 53%

3. Encourage your audience to participate Post status updates encouraging your followers to interact with you. Interactions (e.g., likes, comments, and shares) drive the amplification to your followers’ connections to help extend your reach. • Participate

in the conversation with follow-up questions or answers

• Leverage

your other LinkedIn assets (e.g., interesting group activity) as content to crosspromote in your status updates

• Write

updates that include clear calls to action (e.g., like, share, or “Tell us something”)

• Ask

questions to spark participation in the discussion thread

DO: Post updates that give followers a sneak peak into your company’s upcoming product or service launches. DO: Ask followers for their opinion with questions that elicit an emotional response and inspire passionate conversations.

5. Time your status updates Time the posting of your status updates during business hours for maximum reach. LinkedIn’s busiest hours are morning and midday, Monday through Friday.

6. Post regularly Post as many status updates as your content supports. You will reach more of your audience and extend your reach as you post more often. • Post

at least 20 status updates per month to maximize your reach to approximately 60% or more of your unique audience each month. • Our best-in-class marketers are posting 3-4 status updates per day, per audience. • 20%

of followers are typically reached with one status update.

7. Experiment and learn Keep testing the target, content, and strategy. Keep conversations fresh with different content types – from company news to event announcements to industry insights. Certain content may resonate more with different targeting segments. Experiment to learn what works! Try posting the same status update at different times of the day, different days of the week, or with different headlines to maximize reach.

8. Plan the editorial Companies that have organized the content strategy and administrative access have seen tremendous results with engagement. • Assign

multiple admins for the Company Page so that different stakeholders can split the work and control content for specific lines of business. • Create an editorial calendar so that each admin can organize their content and the timing of status updates.

9. Monitor, analyze, and refine DON’T: Don’t always ask followers questions about your company. Members engage with your brand on LinkedIn if you offer them ideas and solutions. If you decide to post company news, ask yourself whether your followers will truly find it valuable.

4. Keep it brief Make your posts succinct and meaningful. Build industry credibility by adapting your language to match that of your targeted industries. If you’re posting to developers, use their language. If you’re targeting by country, localize your spelling for the region in which your audience is based.

Monitor and analyze individual status update performance and your follower analytics page to refine your strategy. Pay attention to the audience targeting, types of content, time of day and frequency that drive the most interactions.

10. Recruit help if you need it You don’t have to do it yourself! Use our social media management partners to help you manage your posts and Company Page strategy. Contact Hootsuite at linkedinvip@hootsuite.com or Buddy Media at inquiries@buddymedia.com for assistance in managing your Company Page communication. Stay tuned for more LinkedIn partners to come! For more information, please visit http://marketing.linkedin.com Copyright © 2012 LinkedIn Corporation. LinkedIn, the LinkedIn logo, and InMail are registered trademarks of LinkedIn Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other brands and names are the property of their respective owners. All rights reserved.

10-LCS-081-G 0612

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of members are interested in industry insights are interested in company news • 43% are interested in new products and services • 53%

in the conversation with follow-up questions or answers

• Leverage

your other LinkedIn assets (e.g., interesting group activity) as content to crosspromote in your status updates

• Write

updates that include clear calls to action (e.g., like, share, or “Tell us something”)

• Ask

questions to spark participation in the discussion thread

5. Time your status updates Time the posting of your status updates during business hours for maximum reach. LinkedIn’s busiest hours are morning and midday, Monday through Friday.

6. Post regularly Post as many status updates as your content supports. You will reach more of your audience and extend your reach as you post more often. • Post

of followers are typically reached with one status update.

8. Plan the editorial Companies that have organized the content strategy and administrative access have seen tremendous results with engagement. • Assign

10-LCS-081-G 0612

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google+

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10 Tips: How Not to Use Google Plus

socialmediatoday.com http://socialmediatoday.com/krista-bunskoek/1641096/google-plus-10-mistakes-to-avoid

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This update with “Got strawberries?” could be directed to ‘Public’ and ‘Extended Circles’ (‘Extended Circles’ gets your updates posted to Circles of your Circles). 140

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Goggle Analytics: How to Make Smart Marketing Decisions

www.socialmediaexaminer.com http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/google-analytics-with-andy-crestodina/

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www.entrepreneur.com by CATHERINE CLIFFORD • http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/232257 • March 17, 2014

To Win at Marketing, Scrap Your Marketing Department and Hire a Data Geek (Infographic)

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www.simplymeasured.com http://simplymeasured.com/library/2014-planning-guide-hl/ â&#x20AC;˘ ÂŠ2014

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14 Tips for 2014: Planning Social Media Campaigns for the New Year The holidays are fast approaching, which means the New Year is right around the corner. A new year means new opportunities – and new chances to test social media campaigns and kick the competition to the curb. Don’t wait until the last minute to put a plan in place for how you’ll kick off 2014 on social. Start strong with these 14 tips to plan social media campaigns so you can hit the ground running in 2014.

1. Start with a 2013 summary Take time to review your activities and performance over the past year. What was your baseline in terms of followers, reach, engagement and growth? Where did you see the biggest gains and losses? Which promotions were particularly successful, and which ones could have done better? Don’t forget to compare your performance with your competitors’. Doing so will give you a better idea of the landscape, and point out opportunities for standing out from the pack. Want to see how your 2013 campaigns performed? Try a FREE Simply Measured report.

2. Have a plan This may seem obvious, but many social media engagements tend to veer off plan, becoming reactive and opportunistic. While it’s very important to remain flexible, there are benefits to sticking to a long-term strategy. Meeting yearly, quarterly and monthly goals requires a degree of pre-planning. Planning will also help make sure your social media fits your overall brand image and help you manage your workflow so you’ll have time to react when necessary.

159

Simp

3. Set SMART goals When it’s time to lay down objectives, remember the SMART acronym, and make them Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound. The clearer your parameters, the easier it will be to develop strategies and tactics that will help you achieve them, as well as come up with a manageable timeline. Making sure they can be tracked and measured will help you determine your level of success, and their eventual return on investment (ROI).

4. Spy on the competition Checking on what your competition is up to is a great way to set a benchmark for your own campaigns, and possibly steal an idea or two. We’re not saying you should copy them verbatim, but knowing what they’re doing allows you to do it better. And don’t just benefit from the things they’ve done well – pay attention to campaigns your competitors have run that haven’t performed well or didn’t resonate with your audience, and avoid similar tactics. Need to track your competitors’ campaigns and compare your own? Try some of our competitive analysis reports free for 14 days.

5. Create an editorial calendar One of the best ways to plan is through a smart and well-designed editorial calendar. Begin by mapping out the year: adding such things as company and industry events, holidays, events in entertainment and pop culture (the 2014 Winter Olympics, for example) and other noteworthy dates. Then, incorporate your marketing campaigns and other promotional activities. This way, you’ll be able to plan for upcoming opportunities, and start creating a timeline for executing on your plan. Need some help? Find out about some useful tools in tip #7. Copyright © 2010–2013 Simply Measured, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

160

Specific

Measurable

Attainable

Time-bound

Relevant

Goals should be simplistically written and clearly define what you are going to do.

You need tangible evidence that you’ve accomplished your goals.

Your goals should stretch you slightly so you feel challenged, but defined well enough so that you can achieve them.

Set a definite target date for completion as well as frequenciesfor specific action steps.

Goals should be instrumental to the mission of the entire marketing team and/or organization.

Speci

Goals written are go

Meas

You ne you’ve

Attai

Your g slightly define can ac

Relev

Goals the mi team a

Time

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6. Align with your marketing goals Social media should complement your company’s overall branding and marketing presence. Consider designing a cool social media promotion around a big ad campaign. Remember, social media users will also be paying attention to traditional media. To work best, your goals should be synchronized – whether they’re leads generated, impressions, audience growth or otherwise.

7. Develop a strategy for execution

S of

Google offers several tools to help you keep things on track. Google Docs provides Editorial Calendar templates for blogs and websites, and Google Drive lets you share items with the entire team and work off the same document, so you can better maintain version control. Conduct weekly meetings and send out reports keep everyone abreast on work in progress. And make sure to allow enough time for content review, fact checking and proofreading. Track all of your social media campaigns with Simply Measured’s powerful social media analytics. Start a free 14-day trial.

8. Marshal your resources writers and designers 6. Start Alignrecruiting with your marketing goals for your social channels; maybe even try out newmedia people in case someone becomes unexpectedly unavailable. want Social should complement your company’s overall branding andYou marketing to have time to generate someawell-thought-out, content.aKeeping presence. Consider designing cool social mediahigh-quality promotion around big things fresh isRemember, important. Having a “deep bench” creative talent will allow ad campaign. social media users will of also be paying attention to you to mix things up, so your content doesn’t always look and sound the same. Want traditional media. To work best, your goals should be synchronized – whether tips on howleads to keep content fresh over theaudience holidays,growth even while you’re on vacation? they’re generated, impressions, or otherwise. Download our Social Media Manager’s Guide to the Holidays.

7. Develop a strategy for execution

Do Soci Gui

S of

Google offers several tools to help you keep things on track. Google Docs provides Editorial Calendar templates for blogs and websites, and Google Drive No matter how well you plan, social media has a way of throwing curve balls. So lets you share items with the entire team and work off the same document, so build flexibility into your schedule. Plan to create more content than you need in you can better maintain version control. Conduct weekly meetings and send out case something becomes irrelevant or something turns out to be unusable for reports keep everyone abreast on work in progress. And make sure to allow whatever reason. You’ll also want to be able to react in the event of an opportunity, enough time for content review, fact checking and proofreading. Track all of your and having backup will free up your time to do so. While you want your content to social media campaigns with Simply Measured’s powerful social media analytics. look and feel professional, at no time do you want to appear to be on autopilot. Start a free 14-day trial.

10. Give yourself some wiggle room 8. Marshal your resources

If a crisis occurs, it may throw your entire editorial calendar out of whack. Make Start recruiting writers and designers for your social channels; maybe even try sure you have bandwidth, time and budget to develop content and promotions, if out new people in case someone becomes unexpectedly unavailable. You want necessary, in conjunction with the crisis. For example, if a flood or earthquake hits to have time to generate some well-thought-out, high-quality content. Keeping your geographical area, it could be nice if you could run a charitable promotion, things fresh is important. Having a “deep bench” of creative talent will allow you to or at least gather volunteers or donations to help out. It’s one thing to have social mix things up, so your content doesn’t always look and sound the same. Want tips media resources free to respond, but it’s even better to be able to “walk the walk” on how to keep content fresh over the holidays, even while you’re on vacation? – and put money or time toward a solution. Download our Social Media Manager’s Guide to the Holidays.

11. Consider more visual content 161

According to Forbes predictions for 2014, image-centric Copyright © 2010–2013 Simply Measured, Inc. All Rights content Reserved. will rule. Infographics, charts, videos and images can attract your brand more attention than traditional text-based content. Just make sure you have time and resources to get these items produced and approved. Visual campaigns are where the editorial

Do Soci Gui

or at least gather volunteers or donations to help out. It’s one thing to have social media resources free to respond, but it’s even better to be able to “walk the walk” – and put money or time toward a solution.

11. Consider more visual content According to Forbes predictions for 2014, image-centric content will rule. 9. Infographics, Build in some backup charts, videos and images can attract your brand more attention than No matter how well you plan, social mediasure has you a way of throwing balls.toSo traditional text-based content. Just make have time and curve resources buildthese flexibility your schedule. Plan toVisual createcampaigns more content you in get itemsinto produced and approved. are than where theneed editorial case something becomes irrelevantit’s or useful something turnsaout to be of unusable planning comes in handy, because to create backlog images for and whatever reason. You’ll also want to ready be able react campaigns, in the eventyou’re of an opportunity, interactive content so when you’re to to launch not waiting and having backup will free up your time to do so. While you want your content to on a designer to get you what you need. Want tips on how to drive engagement lookyour andbrand’s feel professional, no time doour youfree wantwhite to appear on Instagram?atDownload paper.to be on autopilot.

2010–2013 Simply Measured, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 10. Give yourself Copyright some ©wiggle room for mobile a crisis occurs, it may throw your entire editorial calendar out of whack. Make 12. IfOptimize

surenoyou havethat bandwidth, time and budget to develop content to and promotions, if It’s secret users are increasingly using mobile devices access necessary, in conjunction withthat the by crisis. For87% example, if a flood devices or earthquake social media. Forbes predicts 2017, of connected will be hits your geographical area,your it could be nice you could runwork a charitable promotion, smartphones. Be sure content and iflanding pages for a mobile audience, or atconsider least gather volunteers or donationslike to help out. It’s onetargeting thing to have social and mobile-specific campaigns location-based and checkmedia resources free to respond, but it’sabout even users betteraccessing to be ableyour to “walk the via walk” in promotions. Additionally, be strategic content – and put money or time toward a solution.For example, users are less likely to mobile devices when planning campaigns. consume heavier pieces of content on their tiny mobile phones, so be careful with Consider more visual content 11. campaign targeting when promoting eBooks and white papers. On most networks According to Forbes predictions for 2014, image-centric content will rule. you can segment your audiences by which device they’re using – take advantage Infographics, charts, videos and images can attract your brand more attention than of this. The knee-jerk reaction is to target all devices so you can reach the biggest traditional text-based content. Just make sure you have time and resources to audience, but that doesn’t always benefit your end goal. Campaigns that require get these items produced and approved. Visual campaigns are where the editorial little to no work on the user’s end are likely to perform better on mobile. planning comes in handy, because it’s useful to create a backlog of images and so when you’re ready to launch campaigns, you’re not waiting 13. interactive Embrace content diversity on a designer to get youcongregating what you need. Want tips on howis to drive engagement Where is your audience on social? Pinterest 72% female, while on your brand’s our people free white Google+ is 70%Instagram? male. Older,Download more affluent usepaper. LinkedIn, and if you’re trying to capture the youth market, look into Tumblr (which has a greater percentage of Copyright © 2010–2013 Simply Measured, Inc. All Rights Reserved. teens and young adults than Facebook) or Vine. The better you can match your social media activity to your target audience, the greater your potential ROI. Keep in mind that the same audience can behave differently depending on the social network they’re on at the time. For example, a user may be more likely to consume business-related content while he is on LinkedIn than he is when he’s on Twitter. Find the overlap between audience and channel and tailor your content to that happy medium. Copyright © 2010–2013 Simply Measured, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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14. Track and measure everything Make sure everything is trackable: add tracking parameters to any URLs driving to your website, use unique hashtags and/or Twitter handles for specific campaigns and promotions, Facebook apps and plugins, unique landing pages – you name it. At the end of the campaign, you’ll want to be able to attribute every like, every visit and every conversion to the proper channel so you can figure out what worked best and what flopped. This will enable you to continuously run successful campaigns and kick the underwhelming campaigns to the curb. Additionally, attributing success appropriately will aid in budget allocations and measuring ROI. Track, analyze and report on all of your social media campaigns 14. Track and measure everything so you can make better decisions and beat the competition. Get started now. Make sure everything is trackable: add tracking parameters to any URLs driving to your website, use unique hashtags and/or Twitter handles for specific Remember: start early, develop a workable plan, stay flexible and whatever you campaigns and promotions, Facebook apps and plugins, unique landing pages – do, measure everything. If you need assistance with monitoring, reporting or data you name it. At the end of the campaign, you’ll want to be able to attribute every visualization on your campaigns, Simply Measured is happy to help. like, every visit and every conversion to the proper channel so you can figure out what worked best and what flopped. This will enable you to continuously run successful campaigns and kick the underwhelming campaigns to the curb. Additionally, attributing success appropriately will aid in budget allocations and ABOUT SIMPLY MEASURED measuring ROI.isTrack, analyze and report on allgeeks of your social media campaigns Simply Measured a fast-growing team of data dedicated to making the world so you can make betteradecisions andbeautiful beat the place. competition. Get started now. of analytics and reporting better, more ABOUT SIMPLY MEASURED Our goal is to put the tools to understand business data in the hands of business Remember: start develop ateam workable plan, stay dedicated flexible and youworld Simply Measured is early, a fast-growing of data geeks towhatever making the users. We think reporting should be simple, beautiful, and accessible for everyone – do, measure everything. If you need assistance with monitoring, reporting or data of analytics and reporting a better, more beautiful place. not just data scientists. Our software streamlines the process from data to deliverables visualization on your campaigns, Simply Measured is happy to help. and thethe countless spent on everyday reporting tasks.ofWe do this by Our eliminates goal is to put tools tohours understand business data in the hands business putting cloud data sourcesshould at yourbefingertips, providingand a marketplace of everyone best practice users. We think reporting simple, beautiful, accessible for – Copyright © 2010–2013 Simply Measured, Inc. All Rights Reserved. reports, and generating beautiful deliverables on the in Excel, not just data scientists. Our software streamlines the web, process from and dataintoPowerPoint deliverables with a couple ofthe clicks. and eliminates countless hours spent on everyday reporting tasks. We do this by putting cloud data sources at your fingertips, providing a marketplace of best practice reports, and generating beautiful deliverables on the web, in Excel, and in PowerPoint with a couple of clicks.

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S of

Content Curation/Creation

164

2014 Content Marketing Tactics Planner Creation, Curation & Syndication

www.curata.com http://info.curata.com/rs/hivefire/images/Curata_ContentMarketingTacticsPlanner2014.pdf?mkt_tok=3RkMMJWWfF9ws RokvKvBZKXonjHpfsX57%2B0tW660lMI%2F0ER3fOvrPUfGjI4ARcJjI%2BSLDwEYGJlv6SgFSbDBMah21LgFWxk%3D

165

2014 Content Marketing Tactics Planner Creation, Curation & Syndication

Overview

to report Curata’s third annual content marketing study. We’re pleased to report that over 500 marketers ting study. We’reWelcome pleased to that over 500 marketers participated in our survey this year, as well as many more who contributed through our more qualitative any more who contributed through our more qualitative interview process. A quote from Thomas Edison best represents the results of this study: best represents the results of this study: “We often miss opportunity because it’s dressed in overalls and looks like work.” it’s dressed in overalls and looks like work.” That is, although there’s significant opportunity to use content marketing to better engage buyers, many o use content marketing to better engage buyers, many willincrease fail to capitalize oncontent this opportunity in 2014. Most marketers will increase their 2014 content ty in 2014. Most companies marketers will their 2014 investment, doubt (71% to be exact); however, only a select number of them will succeed e exact); however,marketing only a select number without of them awill succeed as a result of putting in the hard work needed build the team and process elements for an eﬀective content to build the team and process elements for an eﬀective content marketing strategy. Guidance for success includes: es: –  Build a content marketing team that is integrated with your existing marketing structure to deliver ntegrated with your existing marketing structure to deliver high quality content. Develop a content supply chain without sacrificing the “art” of creation. t sacrificing the “art” of– creation. thirdofparty into ntent through curation,– for Include the benefit yourinsights audience asyour content through curation, for the benefit of your audience as wellsyndicated) as your budget. (suggested mix: 65% created; 25% curated; 10% syndicated) 5% created; 25% curated; 10% –  Don’t to market marketing. As bright as the next shiny piece of content may appear, you As bright as the next shiny pieceforget of content may your appear, you need to increase the mileage that you get out of your existing content. get out of your existing content. –  Tap into the power of new content marketing technologies. keting technologies. data, the insight guidance is provided in this eBook to help you along the path to content d in this eBook to Additional help you along pathand to content success. all those marketers and thought leaders that helped make this study a eters and thoughtmarketing leaders that helpedThank make you this to study a success. aaa

166

Michael Gerard CMO, Curata Share this eBook:

Share this eBook:

The Content Marketing Jungle Welcome to the content marketing jungle. Although marketers have been practicing content marketing for decades, digital marketing coupled with a new, buyer 2.0 environment, has created a whole new set of opportunities and challenges in the content marketing realm; and many organizations are still trying to find their right path for success. For example: •  Many companies still struggle with identifying “What is content marketing?” •  Over 1/2 of marketing organizations have no executive or lead in place for content marketing •  With significant staﬀ and program spend increases, few companies have developed a formalized process, with supporting technology, for their content supply chain. There are many paths to content marketing success; however, what will we have to do to ensure we’re on that right path?

What’s your Content Marketing Animal Spirit? There are many types of animals in the jungle, and some are simply better suited for survival than others. As you think about your own organization and its ability to thrive in the content marketing jungle, do you think of yourself as: The Fox? Cunning, strategic, quickthinking, adaptable, clever and passionate; with an ability to use its resources for survival and growth.

The Wildebeest? Follows the pack, always afraid of being left behind.

The Elephant? Strong, stable, patient; yet slow to shift to changing situations.

T-Rex? Simply put, extinct or rapidly on the way to extinction.

This eBook will provide the data from Curata’s annual content marketing survey to help you understand where the pack is today and where they’re heading in the next 12-18 months; but more importantly, we’ll provide the insight and guidance to help you select the best path through the content marketing jungle so you can be most like the fox. 167

Source of Insight Objective: This study dove deep into the tactics of digital content marketing practices. Survey Methodology and Demographics: Curata surveyed a total of 502 marketers in the fall of 2013. Participants included:

–  Titles: CMOs and VPs of Marketing(21%); marketing directors, managers and specialists; marketing consultants and agencies; and business owners. –  B2B vs. B2C: 53% marketers who took the survey were B2B companies, 12% were B2C and 28% listed themselves as both. –  Verticals: 28% technology businesses, 22% marketing agencies, 20% professional services and 11% healthcare. –  Company size by revenue: 56.8% <$10M; 21.3% $10M to >$100M; 12.6% $100M to <$1B; 9.3% $1B+.

Interviews with content marketing leaders –  Thought leaders surveyed included CMI, B2B MarketingProfs and Industry Analysts. –  Best-in-class content marketers included Xerox, Avaya, Verne Global, 360Chestnut, Aternity, Zipcar, Alcatel-Lucent, EMC and others

Current State of Content Marketing 168

Three Main Content Components

The following charts summarize the positives in these three key areas of content marketing: strategy, investment and content; as well as items to be mindful of in the current state of content.

Full steam ahead: marketers are developing their content strategies, increasing investment and producing more content. But, be careful. If you follow the herd too closely, you can’t always see where you’re going… Full Steam Ahead – The Positives Strategy

•  Marketers’ priorities are to gain more leads, engage buyers, and build brand awareness •  Their top challenges are that they have limited staﬀ, a limited marketing budget and need to publish more fresh content; all of which can be solved with a best-in-class content strategy

Investment

•  Investment in content marketing is increasing •  “30% of (2013) marketing budget spent on content marketing.” - MarketingProfs and CMI* •  71% of marketers will increase content marketing spend in 2014

Content

State of Content Marketing

*Content Marketing Institute & MarketingProfs, 2013 B2B Content Marketing 2014 Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends - North America

Three Main Content Components …and you might end up in a bad spot like these wildebeests here. Be careful not to follow the herd and jump too quickly into increasing spend and creating new content before developing a solid content marketing roadmap. Careful of Following the Herd – Be Mindful

169

Strategy

•  Many marketers’ strategies are a work in process; they must be careful to have a solid plan in place before allocating resources •  Only 43% of companies have a content marketing strategy executive, who is critical for a best-in-class content strategy •  Few companies have an integrated content management process

Investment

•  “Blind ambition” – many marketers are unsure how much to spend and where to allocate this investment in their marketing strategy •  “Measuring the impact of content” was found to be a low priority, while it should be a top one

Content

•  Too much focus is on content quantity and SEO vs. quality and context •  Marketers are not optimizing their content's mileage (e.g., repurpose, reuse) •  Marketers are failing to market their marketing

State of Content Marketing

Increasing Investment Regardless of companies’ animal spirits, 71% of them will increase investment in content marke<ng in 2014 across the areas of people (internal and external) and technology. 1. People: Hire a content strategy executive and a content development team

3. Technology: Use software for ideation, production, curation, promotion and analytics 170

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Investment Data and Priorities

Increasing Investment How will you change your investment in content marketing during calendar year 2014?

Significant Decrease Decrease 3% 1% Significant Increase 12% No Change 25%

Insight/Guidance •  •

The majority of marketers (71%), plan to increase or significantly increase their content marketing budget in 2014. With the increasing demand to build brand awareness, lead quality and customer engagement, marketers are investing in content marketing in 2014 to give these areas a boost.

Increase 59%

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Investment Data and Priorities

Marketers Need to be Aware of Buyers’ Environment as Content Marketing Investment Increases Buyers are already overwhelmed, not just from our own content, but the 1,000s of pieces of other companies’ content as well. The move to marketers becoming the next generation of publishers will continue, and therefore, we must think about how to diﬀerentiate what we provide our audience to help break through the noise.

171

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Investment Data and Priorities

Top Content Marketing Priorities Rank the following content marketing objectives for your organization in order of priority: (1 = top priority) Drive sales and/or leads Engage customers/ buyers/influencers Boost brand awareness Establish/sustain thought leadership Increase SEO and web traffic Decrease cost of acquisition for new 1 Highest Priority

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

6 Lowest Priority

Insight/Guidance

“Leads” and “Engage Customers” are top content marketing priorities. Marketers have not lost site of the importance of leads, however, they do acknowledge that engagement is the “name of the game” for content marketing. Once customer engagement increases, the quality of leads will, too. 2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Investment Data and Priorities

Impact of Content Marketing Please estimate the impact of content marketing on the following areas during the past 12 months. 90% Increase

80%

No Change

% of Participants

70%

Decrease

60%

Funnel

50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0%

Awareness Building

Buyer/customer engagement

Thought Leadership

SEO and/or web Lead Quality traﬃc

Lead Quantity

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

Insight/Guidance

Content marketing is more focused on the upper part of the customer creation funnel, as evident by its greater impact on awareness building. However, its impact on the lower part of the funnel is also quite significant, with almost 2/3rds of companies indicating an increase in lead quality and quantity due to content marketing. 172

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Investment Data and Priorities

Content Marketing Challenges Please rank your greatest content marketing challenges? 1.  Limited staﬀ 2.  Limited budget 3.  Creating enough content on a regular basis 4.  Finding the best sources to create amazing content 5.  Organizational culture Don’t follow the herd... 6.  Measuring the impact of content “Promotion” and “Performance Measurement” should not be at 7.  Promoting content the bottom of your list!

Insight/Guidance

The promotion and measurement side of content marketing were ranked as the lowest marketing challenges, however, these should start to make their way to the top of the list. Limited staﬀ, budget and content, as well as source discovery, will become much easier problems to resolve with implementation of content management systems and curation platforms. The ability to measure the impact of content will allow marketers to create more of what works and less of what doesn’t. Promoting content helps marketers get the most out of what they create before creating more. Don’t forget to market your marketing! 2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Investment Data and Priorities

2014 Content Marketing Strategy:

What organizational changes related to content marketing will occur in 2014?

173

Content Marketing Executives Do you currently have an executive in your organization who is directly responsible for an overall content marketing strategy? (e.g., Chief Content Oﬃcer, VP or Director of Content)

Insight/Guidelines •

Yes 43%

•

No 57%

Catch up with the herd and hire a content marketing lead if you haven’t already. 43% of marketing organizations have an individual in place today who is directly responsible for an overall content marketing strategy. Best-in-class marketers began this trend, and are already taking the next steps after hiring a content marketing executive to: a) create a content marketing team; and b) align with their broader organization.

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Organizational Changes

Content Marketing Executives

Ed Youngblood Director of Content Strategy

What’s our content marketing mission? “Create and guide a strategic, persona based and holistic approach to digital content marketing which supports business objectives, SEO and audience needs. Redefine the enterprise process to create scalable content that supports a multi-channel, multi-media and multipurpose approach.”

Why did we create this position? “We needed to convince people (both internally and externally) of Zipcar’s commitment to focusing on content marketing. Our CMO knew that one person, at the VP-level, really needed to own it from strategy all the way through education to ensure its success.” Noriko Morimoto VP Brand and Content Marketing

174

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Organizational Changes

Your Content Marketing Team What’s Next Once You Have a Content Marke<ng Lead in Place?

Build a Content Team

•  •  •  •

Align Internally

•

•  •

Establish a center of excellence team Hire strong writers that can create valuable content for your audience Build a team of dependable freelancers who create content that require minor editing Avoid “cheap” content: Ensure that all the content developed for your brand is high quality and aligned with company standards

Identify individuals and teams across your organization to be part of your extended content marketing team: •  Writers •  Content Contributors •  Idea contributors Evangelize support from content marketing by securing executive buy-in Establish focus areas along with experts: segments, geographies, buyer roles, solution areas

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Organizational Changes

2014 Content Marketing Strategy:

What content marketing process changes will occur in 2014?

175

Process Changes “Content marketing should be a strategic initiative, not a tactical maneuver.” - Michael Gerard CMO, Curata, Inc.

Content Strategy

Analysis

Content Pyramid* Distribution (Publish, Promote)

Content Development

Asset Development

•  Integrate content marketing with global and local marketing strategies. •  Establish content campaigns that align with your marketing campaigns. •  Identify what content you will produce, and how that content will flow from creation to distribution to analysis (refer to Curata’s Content Pyramid*). •  Establish metrics that will drive improvement in the content marketing process as well as demonstrate its impact on the organization.

Map Out Your Content Workflow

*Content Pyramid: http://bit.ly/CMpyramid 2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Process Changes

Process Changes

Drive Innovation in Content Development •  With thousands of pieces of content developed each year, the need to create more relevant content will only increase in 2014. •  Develop an ideation process within your content supply chain that encourages innovation, for example: •  Crowd-source: the means of compiling information or work from a group online, either internally or externally •  Derive inspiration: through curation of third party sources •  Listen to customers: what are they saying? Write your content based on their needs

176

2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Process Changes

2014 Content Marketing Strategy:

What’s Next in Content Marketing Technology?

177

The Content Marketing Tools Universe

•  •  •

The acceleration in the number of applications and tools available to content marketers shows no sign of slowing. To help navigate the Tools Universe and tap into the power of technology, Pawan Desphande, Curata’s CEO, has created a “spider diagram” of vendors according to 3 content marketing activities - producing, distributing and measuring For a more in-depth look and full diagram please visit: http://bit.ly/ContentToolsMap 2014 Content Marketing Strategy: Marketing Technology

Getting Tactical 178

Now let’s take it from our tree top industry overview and dive into the roots of content marketing tactics with definitions, the content mix, and content creation & curation best practices.

Definition of Content Marketing Much of this study is dedicated to understanding the content marketing mix across three types of content, as well as the tactics of executing these types of content. Therefore, it’s important to review the definitions used in the Curata survey. Content Marketing: The process for developing, executing and delivering the digital content and related assets that are needed to create, nurture and grow a company's customer base.

Content Type #2

Content Type #1

Created Content: Original content authored on behalf of your organization. (internally or externally sourced)

Content Type #3

Curated Content: Portions of 3rd party content published on your digital property that have been contextualized (e.g., annotated, commentary added) for your audience.

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

Syndicated Content 3rd party content published in full form on your digital property that has already been published on another site. (paid or unpaid model)

Content Mix: Created, Curated, Syndicated What is your [current; desired] content marketing mix for each type of content? 70%

% of Content

60%

63.4%

Current Desired

60.4%

50% 40% 30%

24.0% 27.3%

20%

12.6% 12.3%

10%

Insight/Guidance

•  The average desired content marketing mix is 61% created, 27% curated and 12% syndicated, with not much change from the current mix •  Curated content includes annotated (added commentary) social posts, blogs, newsletters and microsites. •  However, a more dramatic change from the “status quo” had been expected based upon two key challenges today...

0% Created

Curated

Syndicated

Type of Content Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

179

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

Content Mix: Created, Curated, Syndicated What is your [current; desired] content marketing mix for each type of content? 70%

% of Content

60%

63.4%

Current Desired

60.4%

50% 40% 30%

24.0% 27.3%

20%

12.6% 12.3%

10%

Insight/Guidance

0% Created

Curated

Syndicated

Type of Content Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

Challenge #1: Feeding the Content Beast Marketers can’t create enough of their own high-quality content to feed the content beast. This is due to a lack of resources and/or a lack of talent to continuously produce great content. For more insights on how to feed your content beast, we recommend you check out How to Feed the Content Beast (without getting eaten alive) http://bit.ly/Beastcuration

180

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

Challenge #2: Other People’s Content As great as our own content may be, buyers want to learn from other third party sources as well. The good news is that most marketers have adopted content marketing as a key part of their marketing strategy. No longer are we only telling buyers about our own products. We are now providing our own insight and guidance about the topics that are of greatest interest to them. We have evolved. . . .or have we? Most marketers continue to communicate to their audience in their voice only, striving to be the sole source of content on their chosen topic. Only the best-in-class marketers have begun to understand that we must stop egocentric content marketing, and complement our own created content with the wealth of knowledge that the rest of the market has to oﬀer. For our own benefit, as well as that of our audience. …Then why didn't the high level chart shown on page 29 show a more dramatic change in content curation to complement created content? A deeper look at the data in the next slide reveals that a significant market shift is occurring to show a more balanced content portfolio of creation and curation. *eBook: Stop Egocentric Content Marketing http://bit.ly/StopEgoMktg

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

Best-in-Class Marketers Complement Created Content with Curation

What is your [current; desired] content marketing mix for each type of content? [CREATED CONTENT] Enlightened Marketers

Aggregators 40%

Egocentric Marketers

Current Desired

35%

% of Participants

30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0% 0 to 30%

31% to 49%

50% to 59%

60% to 79%

80 to <90%

90-100%

% of Content that is “Created” (vs. curated and syndicated)

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

A significant shift in the content marketing mix will occur in the next 6 to 18 months as marketers complement their original, created content with curated content.

181

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

Content Marketing Mix for Leaders in 2014 What is your [desired] content marketing mix for each type of content? Insight/Guidance •  The Fox: Enlightened marketers strive to create 65% of their content in 2014, with the remainder being 25% curated and 10% syndicated.

Syndicated Content 10%

Curated Content 25%

Created Content 65%

The Objectives? 1.  Better leverage resources 2.  Improve the ideation process 3.  Better engage buyers through higher value content

Best-in-class Marketing Mix •  65% Created •  25% Curated •  10% Syndicated

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

A Focus on Created Content What is your [current; desired] mix of created content? 70% Current

60%

Insight/Guidance: •

Desired

50%

•

40%

•

30% 20%

Content marketing is not a part-time job and requires dedicated staﬀ Your dedicated content marketing team should have ultimate accountability for content creation Crowd-sourcing will remain an important source of content ideas, and creation of technically deep content

10% 0% Dedicated In-House

Crowd-Sourced InHouse

Outsourced Staff

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

182

Getting Tactical: Content Mix

Getting Tactical:

A Focus on Curated Content

Content Curation: Where are you in the Jungle? The Fox (Best-in-Class Marketer) is implementing curation to: 1.  Increase customer/buyer engagement with more fresh content 2.  Improve brand visibility and buzz by starting more online conversations 3.  Improve thought leadership with a variety of perspectives from third party sources

Top Challenges for the Rest of the Jungle: 1.  Lack of budget to spend on content curation/content marketing 2.  Lack of knowledgeable staﬀ (e.g., for finding and annotating the best content to curate) 3.  Lack of buy-in to support curation (including answering the question, “What is curation?”)

183

Getting Tactical: Curated Content

What Exactly is Content Curation? Have you ever… •  Published a “best of” post? •  Commented on and shared a link on Twitter? •  Posted a link to Facebook with your commentary? Then you’ve curated! And so have these brands:

Getting Tactical: Curated Content

What Exactly is Content Curation? “Content curation is when an individual (or team) consistently finds, organizes, annotates and shares the most relevant and highest quality digital content on a specific topic for their target market.” -Curata Find

184

Getting Tactical: Curated Content

Annotate

Curation in Action: A Curated Blog Post Here are 5 tips on how to curate content: 1. A new title and thumbnail are used to better contextualize the article referred to in this curated blog post.

2. Annotation: The marketer introduces the reader to the curated post, putting it in context for the reader. 3. Snippet: A couple of sentences are quoted from the original post.

4. Insight: The marketer adds their own insight to further contextualize the curated post and add value for the reader.

5. Clear attribution and a link-back as part of ethical curation. h"p://www.contentcura0onmarke0ng.com Getting Tactical: Curated Content

Example 1 of Curation in Action By Whom? Alcatel-Lucent (IT Strategist) What is it? A destination site designed specifically for IT professionals that want to learn and stay up to date on enterprise-focused IP infrastructure and communication solutions along with top IT issues What does it contain? A mix of content created by their own expert staﬀ, coupled with curated content from across the web, bringing in the best that industry experts have to oﬀer.

http://www.itstrategist.net/

185

Getting Tactical: Curated Content

This is another example of curation in action, with a hyperfocus on: •  Target audience •  Highly relevant and fresh content for that audience •  Content that supports Alcatel-Lucent’s direction, and provides them the opportunity to bring in third party perspectives to support their brand image

Example 2 of Curation in Action By Whom? 360Chestnut (www.360chestnut.com/blog) - an information resource for consumers who want advice on how to remodel their home with an energy efficient and rebate/incentive outlook. Marketing Challenge: Publish more high quality content on their blog that offers their customers advice on localized incentives and topics that they may not be experts on given a small staff and limited resources. Solution: Utilize curation to source relevant localized content from around the country and give customers more quality information by publishing insights from other field experts. (i.e. If an incentive for a new heating & cooling system is offered in Virginia, 360Chestnut does not have to become an expert in that area and write their own article, but can instead curate that piece for their customers and get the information out faster.) What does it contain: Original, created content (blog posts) and high quality, relevant curated content

http://www.360chestnut.com/blog/

Results: •  Able to post on their blog 5-7 times per week, while previously only having the time and staﬀ to create 1-2 original posts per week •  40% increase in marketing leads from a higher quality of site visitors •  20% increase in Twitter followers •  Ability to provide localized incentives for customers around the country with a single oﬃce in Massachusetts Getting Tactical: Curated Content

Example 3 of Curation in Action By Whom? Verne Global (GreenDataCenterNews.org) – Owns and operates a data center based in Iceland (leverages geothermal power for its energy, and has lower cooling costs due to its location, makes IT operations more eco-friendly) Marketing challenge: Build Verne Global’s brand equity and client base on a shoestring budget and few staﬀ Solution: Build a robust news and opinion site to establish Verne Global as the leader in green data centers: Green Data Center News (www.greendatacenternews.org) What does it contain? Original, created content (blog posts) and high quality, relevant curated content www.greendatacenternews.org

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Results: •  It has quickly become the hub for up-to-the-minute IT energy eﬃciency information from around the world •  Thousands of hits each week •  2 time Stevie web site awards winner •  High organic Google search results © Curata, Inc. 2014 All rights reserved.

Just to be Clear, Content Curation Done Right is not Pirating Create, curate, but never pirate content.

Follow these 6 tips on how to curate content ethically*: 1.  If you are re-posting an excerpt from the original article, make sure your excerpt only represents a small portion of the original article. 2.  Always identify the original source and drive visitors to the original publication. 3.  Retitle all content that you curate. 4.  Don’t use no-follows on your links to the original publisher’s content. 5.  Inject a bit of creation in all of your curation eﬀorts. Add your own voice to your curated content. (e.g., provide context for the material you use, add your own insight and/or guidance for your audience). 6.  Make your commentary longer than the excerpt you’re reposting.

*eBook: Content Marketing Done Right http://bit.ly/curataethicsebook Getting Tactical: Curated Content

Content Curation Frequency How often do you curate/share content from 3rd party sources such as blogs, social media, industry publications or news sites with your customers and/or prospects? 25%

Insight/Guidance

20%

% of Participants

•  16% of marketers are curating for their audience every day, 48% are curating from third party sources at least once a week. •  Leaders (the fox) curate more frequently to support their own original content and plan to increase curation in 2014.

48%

15%

10%

Daily

3 days per week

Weekly

Monthly

Quarterly or less

Never

Best-in-class marketers are curating at least once a week.

Content Curation Frequency Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

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Sharing Curated Content On what channels do you currently share your "curated" content? 100%

Insight/Guidance •  Social media, blogs, newsletters and corporate sites are the top places marketers are choosing to share their curated content. •  Especially with content management platforms that have a one-click to multiple channels feature, it’s getting much easier for marketers to publish curated content for a wider audience.

90%

% of Participantrs

80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0%

Social Media

Blog

Newsletters Corporate Site

Feeds

Dedicated Mobile App Microsite

Other

Daily Curation Time Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

Most popular channels to share curated content are social media, blogs and newsletters.

Getting Tactical: Curated Content

Who Curates Content for You? What percentage of your "curated" content is curated by each of the following parties? 90%

Insight/Guidance

80% % of Participantrs

70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Curation by Inhouse staff

Curation by Outsourced staff/ contractor(s)

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Curation by Agencies

•  An overwhelming majority of marketers are curating inhouse. •  This goes hand in hand with the implementation of a dedicated in-house content marketing team. •  The dedicated in-house staﬀ who are creating content will have a better notion of what types of curated content will best support their original content. Best-in-class marketers are curating over 80% of content in-house.

2014 Content Curation Investment Do you have plans to increase your investment on "curated" content in the next 6-12 months? Insight/Guidance •  39% of marketers plan to increase their investment on curated content in 2014 to complement created content and better leverage content marketing resources.

No 26%

Yes 39%

Best-in-class marketers are outpacing the herd with respect to increasing investment in curation in 2014.

Not Sure 35% Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

Getting Tactical: Curated Content

Content Curation “Opportunity” How eﬀective is your organization at executing across the following stages of content "curation"?

60%

Struggling

66.7%

70%

62.6%

Not Struggling

57.4%

Not Doing This

52.3%

% of Participants

50% 40%

44.2% 39.4%

30%

24.1%

20% 10%

13.3%

22.8% 10.5% 3.5%

3.2%

0% Finding & Discovering Content

Insight/Guidance •  Many marketers are struggling with content curation; contextualizing and organizing content being the two most common issues. •  With the increased budget for content marketing and curation, more marketers will be able to implement content management tools to help find, organize, annotate and share content for their audience; working smarter, not harder.

Organizing Content Contextualizing Content Curation Process

Sharing Content

The Fox will not only find the best content for its audience, but also contextualize it.

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Impact of Content Curation How has content curation impacted each of the following for your company during the past 12 months?

Insight/Guidance

70% 63% 60%

55%

54%

51%

50% 41% 42% 40%

33%

31% 30%

30%

24%

20%

16%

15%

14%

13%

•  Like content marketing, curation has also had a positive impact on the marketing funnel. •  The majority of marketers utilizing curation have seen the largest increase in brand awareness, followed closely by thought leadership and SEO & web traﬃc.

10% 0% Brand Visibility & Buzz

Thought Leadership Increase

SEO & Web Traffic Customer/Buyer Engagement No Change

Number &/or Quality of SalesReady Leads

The Fox will increasingly complement its created content with curated content.

Don't Know

Curata's 2014 Content Marke<ng Tac<cs Planner

Getting Tactical: Curated Content

Content Curation Dedicated Time How much time do each of your team members spend on average, per day, curating content on days when they are curating? (i.e., finding, annotating, contextualizing and publishing/sharing content) 25.0%

% of Participantrs

20.0%

15.0%

10.0%

5.0%

0.0% <15 minutes

15-29 minutes

30 - 59 minutes

1 to 2 hours

Daily Curation Time

>2 to 3 hours

>3 to 4 hours

4+ hours

Insight/Guidance

•  46% of marketers are spending over 2 hours per day on curation. •  These marketers are most likely spending too much time searching for credible sources, annotating content that isn’t brand relevant and manually sharing to multiple channels. •  Implementing a content curation platform can help these marketers spend less time curating. The Fox will better leverage technology to curate content, reducing time spent per day.

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Content Marketing Tactics Wrap-Up Content marketing is not just a fad; it is a mandatory part of the next generation of marketing. Marketing leaders get this, and have already begun to reap its benefits through improved engagement with today’s Buyer 2.0, and improved lead and opportunity nurturing.

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Build your content team. (internal and external) Start with hiring an executive dedicated solely to content.

Use a mix of created, curated and syndicated content to optimize your resources and the value you deliver to your audience.

Develop an eﬃcient content supply chain without sacrificing the “art” of content creation. And don’t forget to market your marketing!

Tap into the power of new content marketing technologies for ideation, planning, creation, curation, promotion and analysis.

Wrap-Up and Resources

Additional Resources

eBook: Content Marketing Done Right: Ethical Curation

Report: 2012 B2B Mktg. Trends Survey

eBook: 5 Steps to Becoming a Content Curation Rockstar

Guide: Content Curation Annotation Methods

eBook: Stop Egocentric Marketing: Content Marketing Strategy

eBook: Open & Shut Case for Curation

eBook: Look Book Content Curation Case Studies

Industry Resource & News: Content Curation Marketing Site

www.contentcurationmarketing.com

â&#x20AC;Śand more online at: www.curata.com/resources

Share this eBook:

2014 Content Marketing Tactics Planner ÂŠ 2014 Curata, Inc. Copyright holder is licensing this under the Creative Commons License, Attribution 3.0. Please make all attributions to curata.com

Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com 192

Dealer Social Media Sites

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Social Media Tools Guide

www.RazorSocial.com http://www.razorsocial.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/RazorSocial-Social-Media-Tools-Guide.pdf

Social Media Tools Guide

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PERSONAL WELCOME Thank you so much for downloading this guide. This will not be a waste of your time and I guarantee you will get some value out of it. My name is Ian Cleary and I’m the CEO of RazorSocial. We recently won an award as one of the top 10 social media blogs for a global competition run by social media examiner so we must be doing something right. In this guide you will get lots of information related to tools and technology. Our entire focus is in this area and we are now considered the leading resource globally for information in this area. Now that I’ve got you, you’re not getting past me until you read this guide!!! We’d love to hear your feedback. Send me an e-mail to ian.cleary@razorsocial.com and I’ll respond personally to every e-mail. You are more than welcome to share out this guide to anyone that you feel will benefit from it.

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MENTION Monitor Your Brand or Keywords on the Web Mention is an excellent social media and web monitoring tool. You set up alerts based on keywords and content related to those keywords is displayed through the Mention application or sent to you via email or social media. When you monitor and track keywords you can find potential business, build relationships with new people and respond quickly to situations that could damage your brand. There are many monitoring tools available but they are generally either very expensive or have severe limitations. For example, you may use Google Alerts at the moment to track some keywords mentioned on the web. These alerts are not nearly as comprehensive as Mention. Google Alerts also does not provide the functionality that is really essential to manage and proactively respond to these alerts. Mention provides this functionality. Mention is a very cost effective and comprehensive solution that monitors your alerts across a variety of sites. They provide a free version to get you started as well as a very affordable Lite and Pro Plan. You can start the Pro Plan on a free trial. Mention has a really clean user interface that makes it extremely easy for you to manage your alerts and track all the activity.

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Features Here are the key features:  Set up alerts for your brand, keywords, and competitors and view these within the application, social media or via e-mail or text based alerts.  You can track mentions of these keywords on blogs, websites, social media sites and forums.  Displays the source of each mention within the user interface so you don’t have to click off to other sites and open additional windows.  A really nice feature is the ability to interact with alerts that are displayed directly within the application. For example, if an alert was related to a blog post you can respond to the blog post within the application. Similarly, for tweets you can see not only the tweet but also the bio for the person so that you have context before you respond to the tweet.  The application adjusts the results displayed based on your interaction. For example, if you consistently remove alerts from specific applications or websites it will not display results from these sites.  A priority queue which attempts to identify the important alerts. This could be because your name is mentioned or it’s from a site with a lot of traffic. There is a new feature not released yet which will display a priority based on someone with a high Klout score.

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LIKEALYZER Improve Performance of Your Facebook Page LikeAlyzer is a very simple (and free) tool that assesses your Facebook page and provides suggestion to improve it. The analytics for your Facebook page provided by Facebook can be very useful but can also be very confusing. LikeAlyzer is not complicated to use and provides some simple but valuable insights.

Features  It analyses your page to assess how well it performed in relation to other pages.  Your page is graded from 0 to 100. The higher the score the better.  Suggestions for improvements on your page are provided based on the analysis. You can see at a glance what you do well but it also draws your attention to the areas you need to focus on.  Details of the top performing pages that have tested their page using LikeAlyzer are provided. Learn from other pages that get a high score.

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Setup What is great about this tool is that there is no set up or registration required. Just put in your page name and an online report is produced. But be aware that when you run your report this is not private. Other people can see reports run in LikeAlyzer. Underneath the option to analyze your page you should check out other options:  Recent -This displays a list of the most recent pages that were analyzed.  Popular – This displays the most popular pages analyzed. These are listed in the order of number of fans.  Toplist – This is a list in the order of the pages that achieved the highest score. This can be very useful to analyze why particular pages performed better than others.

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SOCIAL CRAWLYTICS Identify Your Competitors Most Shared Content Social Crawlytics is a free tool that analyzes how popular or unpopular content is on a website. This is very useful to assess the performance of your blog or your competitors. It analyzes the content and produces detailed information on where content is shared out and how often it is shared. If you understand what content is popular and gets shared out the most can be very helpful to determine content that you should produce. Find out what is not popular is also useful, so you can understand what type of content does not resonate with your audience or your competitors. “Social Crawlytics is the first of its kind. A fast and flexible web-based crawler, geared for social. Now marketers can maintain ongoing reports of social share history across all pages of any website “ Joe Griffin, CEO of iAcquire If your competitor has a small number of pages you can do this manually but what happens if your competitors have hundreds or thousands of pages? Social Crawlytics makes this process easy.

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Features  You can find out what content is shared out most on social media on a competitor’s website.  You can find out the authors on a blog that get the most shares. This will only work correctly if the website has implemented Google Author Tags.  You can implement a scheduled report which automatically sends you an updated report on a website at a time you choose When Social Crawlytics goes through a website it picks out all the blog posts and then displays these posts in order of popularity on social media channels.

It displays Google+, Twitter and Facebook and it also displays shares on StumbleUpon, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Delicious. In the example above, the post related to 30 social media experts making predictions had 5332 shares on Twitter. Could you do a post similar or better to this?

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AGORAPULSE Marketing Your Business on Facebook To get maximum benefit from using Facebook it is important to use a management tool that provides functionality to improve engagement, grow fans and help develop business for your company. Agorapulse is a platform to manage and grow your Facebook presence. It has a broad range of functionality that can be used to help grow your presence on Facebook.

Top Features You can operate all essential features of Agorapulse without any technical skill. The following are some of the key features:  Facebook Page Management – Ability to update content on your page, schedule updates, target updates based on groups of countries or languages.  Facebook Applications – You are provided with 14 applications to help you grow your fans including applications for a competition, quiz, top fans, document application and many more.  Lead Management and CRM – Agorapulse builds up a profile of your fans based on interactions on your Facebook page and participation through the applications. For example, when you run a competition you can collect additional information related to your products or services that can be used for targeting specific offers to these fans.  Analytics – There is a detailed analytics module which gives you an overview of how your pages and posts are performing.

Getting Started Register using your Facebook account and then choose which Facebook page you want to manage. You can try it for free for 28 days before deciding to buy. Once you select your page you are shown the dashboard which contains an overview of your page’s performance. From this dashboard you can see what posts are effective, what is not working, what is the best time to interact and much more.

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You can also choose to focus in on certain areas via the other menu options. This includes:  Apps – add new applications to your Facebook page or view details of the performance of existing applications  Calendar – A visual display of posts made or scheduled on your page.  Posts – A view of posts made with details of comments, likes and a gauge on sentiment (e.g. positive or negative). You can also schedule updates to be posted at the optimum time to get the best engagement.  Fans – A graphical display of the top users that have posted content or interacted on your page. By identifying your most loyal fans you can build a closer relationship with them. Your loyal supporters will be the people to turn to when you want to get the word out about a new product or service.

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 Reports (premium feature) – Detailed analytics and stats on your Facebook page such as who is getting your content and how your fans engaged with each post. This helps you identify what is working and more importantly what’s not.

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 Competitors (only available with diamond premium) – A grid comparing you against your competitors for fans, engagement, posting etc.

Key Benefits of Using Agorapulse  There are many configuration options when setting up the applications which give you great flexibility and control.  The ability to collect additional information on the fans and build up a profile of the fans is really valuable.

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 Having an extensive suite of applications, page management and analytics in one platform saves a lot of time and ensures that you can see all activity in one place.  The applications support frictionless sharing through Facebook Open Graph. This means that participants entering the competition can share out information related to the competition automatically. This results in much higher shares.  Very useful information provided in relation to analytics and engagement on your page. For example a calendar showing what you posted over the past month, what fans are engaging and how your page is performing.  There are currently 14 applications to choose from. A broad range of Facebook applications reduces the chances of your fans getting bored with similar content.  Ability to moderate user posts and create actions based on the content. For example flag it or assign to a team member.

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HOOTSUITE Manage Your Social Media Profiles HootSuite is one of the most comment tools that are used by social media professionals to manage Twitter, Facebook and other accounts. Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll assume at this stage that you are familiar with the basic functionality of HootSuite so here are 5 additional features of HootSuite that you may not be using.

Setting up a Stream at a Conference If you go to a conference and want to keep track of the conversation the best way to do this is to set up a stream filtered by the hash tag for the conference. In HootSuite select the search box, enter the hash tag and then click save as stream. After you are finished the conference you could remove the stream. You could also set up this search just to search through specific topics on Twitter or search based on locations.

Filtering content within streams HootSuite allows you to divide up content into streams (columns of filtered data). You can perform searches based on content that is within that specific stream. If you select the down arrow (highlighted in the screenshot below) you are given the option to filter your streams. You can filter by keyword or filter by Klout score (a score produced by Klout which attempts to rank people by influence).

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This is handy functionality to find relevant information within the steams.

Creating Streams within Tabs Streams are the columns of information you display within HootSuite. For example, you can have a stream which displays when your name is mentioned or for a particular hashtag. Over time as you add streams you end up with too much information. Sometimes itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s better to have multiple tabs and then have relevant streams within those columns. When I click on any of the tabs highlighted there can be multiple streams displayed relevant to the tab.

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

Prepend text to each message – You may want to put some additional text at the start of each post.



URL Shortener – These tools just shorten the links so that more can be fit in a tweet.

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VIRAL TAG (FORMERLY PINGRAPHY) Manage Your Pins on Pinterest Pinterest is an increasingly popular site where people identify images on the web and share it out on Pinterest. When they select an image they ‘pin it’ and this gets pinned onto a virtual board which displays the pinned images. There are some useful tools to help grow your presence on Pinterest. ViralTag is a tool that allows you to schedule pins on Pinterest. When you browse the web you may come across various images that you want to pin and on some pages you may find several images. ViralTag identifies al images on a page and allows you to select which images you want to share and when you want to share them.

Top Features ViralTag is a relatively simple but effective tool with a core set of features. Here are the main ones:  Select all images on a page and make available for pinning  Pin a group of images at the same time or at later scheduled date  Photo editing software so you can modify pictures before you upload  Analytics available for tracking repins, likes, clicks and reach for every item shared. In Pinterest you create boards which are like virtual pin boards. When you find images that are relevant to a board you ‘pin’ them to the board. For example, if you were a wedding organizer and you had a “Stunning Dresses” board you could go to one of the wedding designer’s websites. When you see something you like, click on the ViralTag button in your browser. ViralTag recognizes the images on the page and lets you create pins with the ones you like.

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By default all images are selected. Simply deselect any images you do not want to pin by clicking on the tick in the top left of the image. Next you need to enter a brief description of each image. The URL field allows you to enter the web address of where a user will be brought to when they click on the image in Pinterest. This will generally be back to the source of where the image was pinned. Finally, you can decide whether you want to schedule them for later or upload them now.

At the time of writing this post you can delete a scheduled Pin from the Dashboard, but you can also change the scheduled date and time. When pinning multiple images you can set a posting schedule – every 30/60/90 minutes. Then you can once again change posting times if they don’t suit you. You also have the option to edit the images to enhance or improve how they look. Click the bottom left hand part of the picture. You can then modify the image by applying an effect, cropping it, rotating it, and much more.

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When you upload images you can track statistics on the items pinned such as the amount of repins (other people pinning items already pinned), likes and comments.

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Key Benefits of Using ViralTag  You can schedule pins to deliver them at the most appropriate times.  It saves a lot of time by uploading more than one pin at a time.  You can easily pin items on a page that may not already have the functionality to pin available.  Analytics is useful to track what pins work or don’t work

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TAILWIND While Pinterest provides some basic analytics to help you assess the performance of your Pinterest account, if you want more advanced analytics and the ability to analyze your competitors, Tailwind is a good application.

Top Features  Growth Tracking of fans, followers, boards, likes and pins—View graph reports based on default or custom date ranges. Track the volume of pins from your website.  Audience Engagement Details—Find trending pins, your top repinners, most influential followers and a table of the people who share content the most.  Content Optimization—View details for each piece of content to help you decide how to optimize (e.g., view the time and day of the week when most pins occur).  ROI Measurement—Through integration with Google Analytics, view the website traffic and revenue that’s generated from Pinterest and view the individuals who drove that traffic.  Competitor Benchmarking—Benchmark your analytics against your competitors.  Collaboration—Share your account with multiple team members.  Enterprise Features—At the enterprise level, you can create custom reports, set up keyword monitoring and run influencer campaigns to identify, vet and recruit key influencers.

Getting Started There’s a paid version of Tailwind, but you can start with the free version. Just enter your Pinterest username and select the Create Free Dashboard option. Note: Certain features we mention, such as competitor benchmarking and measuring your ROI, are included only in the paid version of Tailwind.

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 Engagement Rate is the percentage of your pins that are repinned at least once. This will reveal how relevant your content is to your audience. In the example above, nearly 95% of the pins in the last 7 days were repinned. A phenomenal engagement rate and one I’m sure we’d all love to achieve. On Your Boards, a breakdown of performance helps you determine which boards are most popular or are having the greatest impact. Use the arrows to sort the data in each column and focus on a specific stat such as Followers, Repins, Virality Score or Engagement Score. Click on any of the board titles to drill down further via the Pin Inspector and see the performance of all the pins on that board.

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If you upgrade to a paid plan, Your Website will show stats and details on pins that are created directly from your website. These are mainly pins that other people create when they find something on your website that they want to share on their own boards. You can also view the trending pins from your website to see which images are most attractive to pinners.

Engage Your Audience Explore this section to view details of your most engaging content and the audience that’s sharing it the most.  Trending Pins will show which images on your website are getting the most engagement on Pinterest and who is pinning them.  Under Top Repinners, you see the people who repin your content the most, while Top Brand Promoters shows you the Pinterest users who mention you the most in comments. You can also see which of these users aren’t following you.  Use Influential Followers to identify the most influential people on Pinterest who are following your boards. These pinners are ranked by influence and show up according to the number of followers they have on Pinterest. It’s very useful to see which of your top repinners aren’t following your boards so you can start engaging with those who have a large following.

Optimize Content Use this section to identify trends and monitor the type of content that’s resonating with your audience. What you learn here will help you recognize current interests and post content that continues to engage them.

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Find a detailed list of the most recently pinned images in the Pin Inspector. You can see the number of repins, likes and comments for each pin, then sort the columns to see what type of content works best. The Category Heatmaps provide a visual summary of the categories and boards that are performing the best. The size of the box indicates the volume of pins on that board, and the color indicates the level of action on that board (i.e., repins to pins). Darker colors mean more engagement. As its name suggests, Peak Days & Times will show the best (and worst) times and days for you to pin. Are you focusing your efforts in the right area?

Measure ROI Section If you connect your Pinterest and Google Analytics accounts, Traffic & Revenue will show referral traffic from Pinterest and the estimated revenue generated as a result of this traffic (assuming you have goals set up with values attached). The Valuable Pinners section lets you see people who pin content that drives traffic to your website. If these are influential people, follow and engage with them to encourage more sharing.

Competitors This is where you perform benchmarking of your Pinterest account against your competitorsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; and see how you compare with regard to followers, pins, repins and more.

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With Competitor Benchmarks and Competitor Intelligence, you can compare the performance of your Pinterest profiles or the breakdown of pinning from your websites.

Compare the volume of pinning from a competitor’s website to yours.

Key Benefits If Pinterest’s baked-in analytics don’t provide you with enough detail and you want competitor analytics, Tailwind will help you monitor your analytics and gain valuable insights into how you can grow your presence on Pinterest quickly.

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PINALERTS PinAlerts helps keep you informed of any items that are pinned onto your boards from your site. You can even track when images are pinned from your competitors’ websites.

Top Features  Sends alerts when items are pinned from a website.

Setup To register an account for alerts, provide your name, email and website URL. When you log into the account, you immediately see the Add screen where you enter the websites you want to track (e.g., your own website and/or your competitors’ websites). Enter a list of competitors’ websites separated by commas. This is also where you decide how often you want to receive alerts about pins:    

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As it happens Once an hour Once a day Once a week

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Tell PinAlerts how often to send you alerts for each website. The alerts you get will look like this. This is an example of the alerts delivered by email. These alerts are particularly useful if you want to grow your following on Pinterest. As you find people who pin content from a competitor or who pin content relevant to your brand, you can use the live Pinned By link to visit their profile and follow them. You can also click on the Board Name link to find out where they’re pinning the image and follow the board. It’s very likely they’ll follow you back. Here’s an example of a board that Kim Garst‘s image was added to. The owner of this board has 717 pins and over 3,000 followers so she’s a good candidate for me to follow and build a relationship with. Example board where a competitor’s content was added.

Key Benefits PinAlerts is a simple but useful application that lets you keep an eye on who is pinning content from your competitor’s website. Use the alerts to find out what content is popular and find new followers.

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BUFFER Schedule your Tweets Buffer an application with a browser extension you install that allows you to buffer content into a queue for later delivery on social networks. For example, if you are browsing the web and come across 10 articles you want to share with your social networks it doesn’t make sense to share them all at the same time.

You set your schedule based on the optimal times to post:

Key Features  Automatically schedule content to be delivered over Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or Goole + (company page)  View analytics on shares through buffer  Automatic link shortening on any links shared  Ability to add team members to fill up your buffer queue

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NIMBLE Building Relationships through Social Media Nimble is a social relationship management tool. It automatically builds up a profile of people you want to form relationships with and helps you nurture this relationship right through to sale. Here is an example of how you could use it. Make a list of your influencers in Twitter and import into Nimble. Within Nimble you can communicate with your contacts via Twitter, LinkedIn, and so on. This is all recorded so you can see when you last spoke to these contacts.

Add in the social profiles of your contacts. Now you can view any of their interactions through these social profiles (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, and Google+) and you can interact directly within Nimble.

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Nimble is excellent for managing your relationships and is very much socially connected.

Features  Full contact management system for any contacts you need to develop relationships with  Ability to interact with your contacts on social media directly within nimble  e-mail integration that allows you to view e-mail correspondence with contacts  Deals management to progress contacts to leads to sales  HootSuite app for Nimble so you can view contact details within HootSuite or add contacts from HootSuite to Nimble  Integration available to a variety of platforms, for example – MailChimp, Wufoo, Hubspot, Rapportive, Freshdesk, Zapier, Quoteroller

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DLVR.IT Automate delivery of Blog Posts to Social Media Some automation makes perfect sense and some is damaging. When you create a blog post you are generally going to want to share this out to your social networks so it makes perfect sense to automate this. In Dlvr.it you set up a source which is where the data comes from and then a destination to where the content is going to. Dlivr.it will then automatically monitor the source for new data and send out the relevant tweet, Facebook update etc.

When a post comes from RazorSocial (listed as social media tools above) a tweet is automatically generated to Ian Clearyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s profile. With this tweet you can also automatically add items on to it. For example, for every tweet related to a post I include #RazorSocial.

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101 MAGIC TIPS AND TOOLS We regularly find new tools and tips and we’d like to share 101 of them. We hope you’ll be able to pick out a few to help your business.

SEO and Blogging 1. The title tag is the most important part of your optimization for your blog post. Spend time ensuring it is good. Words at the beginning of a title have more weight from a Google perspective than words at the end so choose them wisely. 2. Google used to look at meta tag keywords but doesn’t any more so don’t waste your time on them. 3. If you’re in doubt about which software platform to use for blogging go with WordPress. That’s what the biggest blogs use so why don’t you use it? 4. If you are using WordPress make sure you set up your page names to include keywords. By default they don’t. This is important for SEO. 5. Link to other relevant blog posts on your blog using relevant keywords. Linking from external websites to yours is useful but internal linking is also valuable. Try to link to at least a couple of blog posts on your site. 6. Use the Google site command to find out all the page titles and descriptions for all the posts on your website (e.g. go to Google search and type site:<name of your website>) 7. Read these tips for improving what Google indexes on your site. 8. Use Google Advanced Search to find guest post opportunities. 9. Make sure you have a sitemap created for your blog but also make sure you have a video sitemap. Both give Google more details of what you have on your site. With a video sitemap, even if your videos are on YouTube, Google will index the videos on your site.

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10. If want to find the best source of WordPress articles go to my friends site Syed Balkhi â&#x20AC;&#x201C; WPBeginner. 11. Use Quora to find good ideas for blog posts. 12. If you are guest posting on other blogs make sure to include keyword rich links in your profile when you are linking back to your site. Generally when you guest post they will just copy what you send for the post so make sure to include the links!

13. Implement Google Authorship. This means Google will start linking all your blog posts on your site and other sites and build up a profile about you as an author. This is not used for ranking yet but this will happen. Another benefit is that your picture will start appearing on search results.

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14. Use Screaming frog to do an analysis of the SEO optimization of your blog. Really useful tool. 15. Set up monitoring on your blog using Pingdom. If your blog is not available you’ll get an e-mail about it. It’s a free service for one account. 16. If you have more than one blog than use ManageWP to manage them. It’s a great tool for managing multiple blogs. You can update WordPress on all blogs at the same time, update plugins, take backups and lots more. 17. Revisit your old blog posts and do some SEO optimization on these. You shouldn’t change the website links to these posts but you could optimize the titles, descriptions and also the linking done between posts. 18. Schedule delivery of your blog posts to Twitter multiple times. You’re not going to capture everybody’s attention the first time. You can use dlvr.it to manage this or you can use HootSuite which allows you to schedule posts. 19. Make sure your blog is supported on a mobile device. We get over 20% of our traffic from mobile. We have a responsive theme which means the blog adjusts in size according to the size of the device. 20. Join Triberr to help you grow your community. If used well it can be a great resource. 21. Use HitTail as recommended by Syed Balkhi to further optimize your posts. It will suggest keywords that you can rank higher on so you can update existing posts or create a new post based on these keywords. 22. Use Dlvr.it to automatically publish your blog posts to Twitter. Very easy to set it up and once set up your posts will be published to Twitter (and other platforms depending on your setup). 23. Implement a content delivery network to speed up your blog. Your content will be ready and waiting in multiple places around the world so your customers will receive it quicker.

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24. Use Google Keyword tool when you are doing your keyword research but make sure to check the ‘exact match’ option so you can only see exact matches. Google Keyword tool lets you know what people are searching on. 25. Register your blog with relevant RSS Directories to drive relevant traffic. 26. Check out what articles are getting the most shares on your competitor websites using Social Crawlytics. This will give you some ideas for blog posts. 27. If you want to build a list that can easily be updated and voted on by your community use List.ly. 28. Use WiseStamp to automatically include a link to your latest blog post in your signature. 29. Buy a small hand held camera with an external mic input where you can connect a good quality mic. This is great to get video interviews at shows which can be used for blog posts. I have the Canon Zi8. This is not available for sale new any more but you can still get them on eBay or get something equivalent. 30. Use Ubersuggest to help with your keyword research. Great also for helping come up with blog post titles. 31. Optimize all your images for SEO. Make sure you give them a good ‘Alt Tag’ and Title. Google reads the ‘Alt tag’ when indexing your photos. 32. Optimize your image sizes. No point in having really large image sizes if you’re not displaying large images on your site. Quite often you can reduce quality/size but they still look great on your blog. 33. Make sure you have an option to subscribe to your blog via RSS. This allows people to read your blog from an RSS reader application instead of coming to your blog every day checking for posts or waiting for email. Email subscription is a preferred option for you but you should have RSS for the experienced people. Note: RSS – Real Simple Syndication – Providing information in a standard format so that other applications can process and display that data. 34. Use InboundWriter for optimizing your blog posts for SEO as recommended by my friend Nate Riggs. 35. If you’re on WordPress use BackupBuddy to back up your data. 36. Implement Disqus as a commenting system and you’ll get more comments. Mainly because your users won’t have to login all the time.

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37. Ever stuck for content for a blog? Set up a feed of news just for you on paper.li. You can track mentions of particular keywords and find great articles to get inspiration from. 38. Page rank is an indicator of how important Google thinks a page is. If you want to guest post it’s one of the indicators you use to figure if the website is relevant. Use prchecker.info to check page rank. 39. If you want to check traffic on a site if you’re thinking of guest posting on then use compete.com. 40. Need software to manage your editorial calendar, check out DivvyHQ. 41. Want to get feedback on your blog? Use Qualaroo. A nice little popup will appear in the corner of the screen asking people to answer a couple of questions. Research is so important! 42. Sign up for Whiteboard Friday run by Rand Fishkin. You’ll learn a ton about SEO which will help your site.

Email Marketing 43. Make your e-mail subscription options as simple as possible. The more fields you have to fill out the less people will fill them out. 44. Where is your e-mail subscription? Biggest problem is that it’s hard to find this. Make it stand out on the page! 45. Think about Social proof. You will increase your subscription rates if you indicate that a lot of other people have already signed up, somebody with influence gives you a great quote (e.g. best newsletter ever!), testimonials from customers etc. Think about how you implement social proof. 46. Popup’s can be annoying but can work really well also. Test them out! Find a popup that has good configuration. You don’t want the popup appearing to the same people every time they visit your website. 47. Use an e-mail marketing tool right from the start. This gives you much better control over your e-mail list. AWeber is my preference but there are plenty of others e.g. MailChimp.

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48. Send a personal response to every subscriber until you can’t! If you’re not getting many subscribers each day send them each a personal message and ask them a bit about themselves and ask them what they would like to see on your site. This will be the best research you have ever done! 49. Try to be personal in your e-mail newsletters. My best response to a newsletter was when I told people it was my birthday. The more you can build up the personal relationship with the subscriber the higher your open rates will be! 50. Test your subject line out. This has a serious impact to your open rates. 51. After someone subscribes bring them to a thank you page that includes a nice message and a link to your best posts. At this stage they probably have only read one blog post so try and get them to read more! 52. Use a web address shortener with links. You can then see stats on how many people clicked on the links. Check out Bit.ly. 53. Use Copyscape if you want to check to see if your content is copied on the web anywhere.

Twitter Tools & Technology 54. Use HootSuite for managing your social media efforts. It’s by far the most popular tool and you get a lot of great free functionality. 55. Use BufferApp – Another no brainer. It’s a great app for sharing great content. Automatically buffering content for sharing out at later dates/times that are pre-configured is a great time saver. 56. Use ManageFlitter to tidy up your Twitter followers. This is a really helpful tool for removing fake followers, inactive followers or people not following back. There’s also a great search facility on it. 57. Use SocialBro to figure out the best time to send your tweets. The timing of your tweets is really important. You can send during a quiet period when not many followers are online hoping the few that are will see your tweets. Or you can send during the busy times when most of your followers are online. SocialBro will help you figure out the best time. Lots of other great functionality but that’s a good one to start with.

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58. Use packrati.us if you want to automatically save any tweets that you have links in. 59. Twitter chats can be a great way of finding new followers. TweetChat is a useful tool for managing and monitor Twitter chats. 60. Interested to know how many people seen your tweet, check out TweetReach 61. Tweet Addr is a very powerful tool but don’t abuse it. You can set it up to automatically follow and unfollow users, send messages. There’s nothing wrong with finding a small group of relevant followers and automatically following them. Use it wisely. 62. If you want to find out what content is shared out on social media the most, perform a search using Buzzsumo. 63. Use Nearby Tweets if you want to find local people tweeting. Or you can use it to find people in your target market tweeting, you don’t have to be nearby! 64. Worried about missing some important tweets. Set up Twitter alerts based on keywords using Twilert.

Google + 65. Use Do Share Chrome extension if you want to schedule updates to Google + personal page. This only works when you leave your chrome browser open. There is currently no other option for this until Google + allows it officially. 66. Read this post on Google + - 5 tools to grow your presence on Google +

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Pinterest 67. Use ViralTag to schedule and manage pins on Pinterest. 68. If you want to search Pinterest and look at analytics use Pinalytics. 69. Use TailWind (formerly Pinreach) to identify influential users on Pinterest.

Facebook Apps & Analytics 70. If you want to post updates to Facebook from your mobile use Glyder. A great app for putting up visually appealing updates to your Facebook page without the need for a designer. 71. Agorapulse provides some great applications but also provides CRM functionality so you can help convert your fans to customers. 72. ShortStack has some great competition apps at a good price. 73. Test your Facebook page using LikeAlyzer. This gives you an overview of how your page is doing with some information on how to improve it. You can also view other pages to see how they have performed.

74. Create a leaderboard using Booshaka. You can create a leaderboard with your fans to try to encourage more interaction on your page 75. If you want a directory of Facebook Apps check out Appbistro. 76. Use Static HTML iFrame App if you want to build an App yourself using HTML.

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77. If you want to do general research on Facebook stats use Socialbakers.

Monitoring & Analytics 78. Use Mention App to monitor mentions of your brand online. Great tool and there’s a freebie version with 500 mentions of your brand per month. There are plenty of other monitoring tools but this one has great functionality for a reasonable price. 79. Use Google Analytics. If you’re not looking at Google Analytics reports at least once a week then you’re missing out. Get familiar with the terms; spend some time doing the free training online provided by Google. It will be well worth it. 80. Set up Google Analytic Goals. Wouldn’t it be great to know that out of 100 visitors you got x number of subscribers which means an x conversion rate. If you set up a goal within Google analytics you can track this. If you’re not tracking it you won’t increase it. 81. Follow Avinash Kaushik if you want to hear from the guru of analytics. 82. In Google Analytics Twitter traffic links appear as ‘t.co’. This is the web address shortener used by Twitter. If you install the chrome extension from Campalyst you can get over this problem!

General 83. Take a look at these useful tools for searching social media 84. Use Google Webmaster Tools to resolve issues that may be affecting traffic to your blog. 85. Read Social Media Examiner. I write for social media examiner and they are the hardest company to write for because they have the highest standards. They do great social media tool posts! 86. Use Nimble to manage your relationships with key people you want to track. There is a HootSuite add on so you can use it directly within HootSuite. 87. If you want to create landing pages to test conversion try out Unbounce. Without any coding knowledge you can set up a variety of pages to test to see which works. 88. Follow RazorSocial SlideShare account. We only cover tools and technology and the slides are specially designed for people with very little time on their hands.

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89. If you want to search social media use these tools in our post about searching social media. 90. Thinking of Podcasting and not sure the equipment to buy? Just buy what Cliff Ravenscraft recommends, you won’t go too far wrong! 91. If you want to test out posting to multiple groups on LinkedIn and tracking results try out Oktopost. 92. Use Virally App for downloadable guides. Instead of filling out a form visitors can provide their details by connecting with their social network of choice. You also get the benefit of collecting lots of juicy information from the social profile they connect with. 93. Use Screenflow on the mac for video editing. Great software and easy to use. If you’re on a PC use Camtasia. 94. Have a look at these 8 social media tools in beta if you want to track what’s coming up! 95. Don’t assume your site will work on all browsers. Test it out using Browser Shots. 96. Split testing is an important part of your website. If you are getting good traffic but poor conversion you can test out different pages on your website to see which gets better conversion. Optimizely is a neat tool for this. 97. Want to spice up your social search on Google, install Wajam. When you search on Google you’ll start to see Wajam to the right hand side. It displays details of any of your network connections that are sharing out links or videos that are related to your search.

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98. Social Mention is a good social media search tool. You can also save off your searches and get free alerts. 99. NeedTagger is Twitter advanced search on steroids. Filter through Twitter and find really relevant information related to keywords that you are tracking. It’s based on a natural search algorithm. 100.If you’re running an ecommerce site alongside your blog consider Socialproof.it. This socializes your shopping experience. Add what you like to a cart and share out to your friends to get their feedback. Great for promoting your products on social media but also for getting friends back to your site. 101.Our final tip is the most important! If you really like some of the content above then sign up to RazorSocial for further updates. We’re building a community and we’d love you to be part of it. Please send us any tips or tools you’d like to add!

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THATâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S ALL FOLKS There you go, I hope you find that very useful and have already started using some of the tools or implemented some of the tips and tricks. Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d love to hear your feedback on how we can improve this document or even just to say hi. Please email me directly on ian.cleary@razorsocial.com. We are going to update this document every 3 months and we also provide weekly blog posts on the latest tools and tips that are really worth subscribing to. Go to www.razorsocial.com if you are not already subscribed and subscribe now. And please tell all your friends about us!!

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author. Requests to the author for permission should be addressed to ian.cleary@razorsocial.com. Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the author has used his best efforts in preparing this book, he makes no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book The author shall not be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages. For general information, please visit our website at http://www.razorsocial.com

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Driving Loyalty Social

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52 Headline Hacks

boostblogtraffic.com https://s3.amazonaws.com/boostblogtraffic/HeadlineHacks-03-10-2012.pdf

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In college, an English professor said something that changed my life. "The best writers are the best thieves," he said. "Shakespeare stole his plots from Greek 1

and Roman plays. Thomas Jefferson practically plagiarized the Declaration of

Independence from John Locke. Oscar Wilde stole from... well... everyone. And so 249

should you."

I was stunned. From kindergarten on up, we're all taught that stealing the ideas of others is wrong, and we are threatened with everything from failing grades to expulsion from school for doing it.

Yet, here was a college professor (with tenure, I'm sure), telling everyone that the key to great writing is blatant and unrepentant theft. And I had to admit, he had some pretty solid examples.

"Can it possibly be true?" I thought. "Could I really be hurting my writing by trying to be original?"

My answer, three years later, as a professional writer and Associate Editor of one of the most popular blogs in the world: Yup. 2

The truth about being a "serious" writer One of the worst ways you can torture yourself as a writer is to believe everything you do has to be original. Yes, it's possible, but you'll get comparatively little done, and the continuous pressure will give you a nervous breakdown.

It's far, far better to steal. No, you shouldn't violate copyrights or willfully claim someone

else's work as your own, but the writers who make it in this business -- and yes, writing is a business -- are the ones who watch what's working for everyone else and then creatively adapt it for their own.

It's not because they're lazy. It's because they're busy. If you write for any serious purpose, you learn very quickly that you can't afford to spend 250

months or years dreaming up a daring new approach for everything you write. No one has that kind of discipline. The only way to survive is to write quickly, and the only way to do that is to take a page from the playbook of guys like Shakespeare, Jefferson, and Wilde --

If you write for any serious purpose, you learn very quickly that you can't afford to spend

copying from others not because you lack genius, but because true genius is clothed in the ideas of others.

Headlines are no exception None of those irresistible headlines you see on the covers of Cosmopolitan Magazine and The National Enquirer are new. The majority of them are more than 50 years old,

written by great direct response copywriters like Eugene Schwartz and Claude Hopkins. They might change the wording around or modernize the language, but the ideas are

essentially the same, rehashed over and over again by every popular magazine, newspaper, and blog in the world.

And do their readers complain? No. I've received a lot of complaint letters about the content of the articles I've written, but no one has criticized me for failing to develop an original headline. On the contrary, I've 3 received hundreds of complements on my headlines from people who thought I created them from scratch. But I didn't. I "stole" them, just like every other popular writer. If you look carefully at any great headline, you can distill it down to a fill-in-the-blank

"template" that works for almost every topic in any niche. The best writers I know have thousands of them either saved to a file on their computers or floating around in their

heads, where they can reference them at a momentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s notice to develop a winning headline of their own.

A simple shortcut you can apply immediately 251

It's a simple shortcut, and that's why I call these templates "Headline Hacks." Just as "life hacks" are shortcuts for dealing with the complexity of life, these Headline Hacks will

of their own.

A simple shortcut you can apply immediately It's a simple shortcut, and that's why I call these templates "Headline Hacks." Just as "life hacks" are shortcuts for dealing with the complexity of life, these Headline Hacks will allow you to bypass the years of study and failure required to write great headlines. It's not because they're "magical." It's because they're based on headlines that have

worked time and time again for some of the most popular publications in the world. Use them. Here's what I recommend: 1. Read through the whole report, stopping at every Headline Hack to write down a

few examples of your own. By the time you're finished, you should have at least 52 headlines you can use in your articles or blog posts.

2. Write at least one article per week that uses one of your new headlines. You can

use them in any order you like, but consciously commit yourself to at least one per week. With 52 headlines, your collection should last you an entire year.

3. At least once a month, scan through the Headline Hacks again. The point of doing this is to allow the examples to sink into your subconscious. Your brain will

internalize them, and you'll find great headlines popping into your head when you least expect it.

Of all the ways you can improve your blog, this one is by far the easiest. I mean, what could possibly be easier than filling in the blank?

No, it won't put you in the Technorati 100 (at least, not by itself), but you will see an

increase in traffic. More importantly, you'll be learning one of the most important skills any blogger can master: making your readership curious. 252

The more curious your headlines make people, the more they'll read your posts. The

any blogger can master: making your readership curious. The more curious your headlines make people, the more they'll read your posts. The

more they read your posts, the better your chance of building a relationship with them. The more relationships you have, the more influential you become in your niche.

It's the same process, regardless of whether you have 100,000 subscribers or you started your blog yesterday. And it all begins with the headline. So, what are you waiting for? Scroll down, and check out the goods. :-) Best regards, Jon Morrow PS: Don't miss the little bonus on the last page.

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We are all afraid of an unexpected attack. Whether it's a person, an asset, or a personal keepsake, none of us wants to lose

something we value. What's more, we worry about whether we're really doing enough to protect it. Are we missing something that could come back to bite us?

There's no way to know, and that's why these headline hacks work. If you can pinpoint something your audience is afraid of losing and the person they are afraid of taking it, you can get inside of their head and craft a headline that's impossible to ignore.

The key is to be specific. You want the reader to think, "How on earth did they guess that

I'm afraid of that? Are they psychic?" Like many headline hacks, your power to use it will

grow in proportion to how well you know your audience. How Safe Is Your [ Valuable Person/O bject] from [ T hreat]? Oh, this one is evil. It sounds so innocent. It sounds so concerned. It sounds so understanding. And all the while, it's subtly directing your subconscious to imagine an attack.

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Questions have always made powerful headlines because... well... our minds want to

answer them. It's almost like a reflex reaction. Even if you're not consciously aware of it, your subconscious will work on it in the background, until it comes up with an answer.

In this case, the question forces anxiety. Not only does it ask you to imagine an attack on something you value, but it implies there might be new threats you're not aware of. You

could've taken great pains to protect yourself, but you'll find yourself thinking, "Is it really as safe as I thought? Maybe I'd better read this, just to be sure." Examples: •

How Safe Is Your Husband from the Secretary Sitting Right outside His Office?

•

How Safe Is Your Family's Land from Developers with Powerful Friends?

•

How Safe Are Your Shoes from These 10 Types of Dogs?

7 War ning Signs T hat [Blank] Secretly, I think we are all closet hypochondriacs. We hear an expert describe the symptoms of a certain problem, and we think, "Yes! That describes me perfectly!" Then we hang on their every word, desperate to find out what is wrong with us.

This headline hack takes advantage of that tendency. It promises to describe the

symptoms of a problem or threat, implying that you can avoid it if you know what to look for.

Examples: • 255

• •

5 Warning Signs That You're about to Get Audited by the IRS 10 Warning Signs That You Chose the Wrong Blog Topic 7 Warning Signs That You're Drunk on Your Own Words

for. Examples: • • •

5 Warning Signs That You're about to Get Audited by the IRS 10 Warning Signs That You Chose the Wrong Blog Topic 7 Warning Signs That You're Drunk on Your Own Words 11

War ning: [Blank] "Warning: Shark Infested Waters!" "Warning: Hurricane Approaching!" "Warning: Coffee Is Hot!" Chances are, you've seen lots of signs like the above, and the one thing they all have in

common is that you don't want to ignore them. If you do, you could be eaten, drowned,

burned, or God knows what else. As a result, most people pay attention to anything with the word "Warning" as if their lives depended on it.

This headline hack takes advantage of that conditioning. The word "Warning" is so

powerful that it almost doesn't matter what you put after it. People will read it, and if it seems halfway important, they'll read your article too. Examples: •

Warning: Use These 5 Surefire Headline Formulas at Your Own Risk

•

Warning: These Over-The-Counter Medications Can Kill Your Dog

•

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Warning: Testimonials without Proof Can Land You in Jail

Can We Really Tr ust [Person/Company/Product]? Microsoft, Wal-Mart, the US Government -- they're big, they're powerful, and most of

•

Warning: Testimonials without Proof Can Land You in Jail

Can We Really Tr ust [Person/Company/Product]? Microsoft, Wal-Mart, the US Government -- they're big, they're powerful, and most of us distrust almost everything they do.

Why? Because, subconsciously or not, we recognize that we as individuals have almost no influence over them, and they can turn on us at any moment. In fact, you might say we're waiting for it to happen.

12 So, what happens when a smart writer (such as yourself) decides to write a headline that

addresses our fear?

We read the article, that's what. We believe it's going to confirm what we've thought all along, and we are itching to share it with all of our friends and relatives and say, "See! I was right! Here it is IN PRINT!"

It doesn't matter if it's true. You could end the article by concluding that everything the company/person/product does is on the up and up. Just by posing the question though, you'll immediately have everyone's attention. Examples: • • •

Can We Really Trust Barack Obama? Can We Really Trust PayPal?

Can We Really Trust Tylenol? 7 Things You Should Know

T he Shocking Tr uth about [Blank] The traditional media uses this one a lot. 257

It suggests a scandal without telling you anything about what it is. If you want to know,

T he Shocking Tr uth about [Blank] The traditional media uses this one a lot. It suggests a scandal without telling you anything about what it is. If you want to know, you have to watch at 10 o'clock, or turn to page 32, or click the headline. It also sets you up as a truth teller. You've just discovered a shocking secret, and now you're going to expose that secret "exclusively" to your audience. Is it often an exaggeration? Yes. Does it continue to work anyway?

Yes. Unlike the news and some magazines, however, I recommend you use this headline only when you have a shocking truth to expose. It doesn't necessarily have to be something bad. You can expose something they're doing shockingly well and make it into a good

article, too.

Just don't overdo it. There's a reason why journalists are some of the least trusted professionals in the world, and you don't want to join them. Examples: • • 258

•

The Shocking Truth about Twitter

The Shocking Truth about Bank Of America The Shocking Truth about Tiger Woods

T he Great [Blank] Hoax Where the last few headlines make you curious by employing scandal, this one comes

right out and calls it "Hoax." It's much more direct, but it's no less potent.

Here's why: people love conspiracy theories. If you doubt it, just look at the circulation numbers for publications like the National Enquirer. It was built on conspiracy.

If you can find some concrete data that suggests a well-known brand is deliberately

deceiving people, and you use this headline as a lead, it might be one of the most popular articles you've ever written. These stories spread like wildfire. Note: You can also use a sub headline to further push the story, if need be. •

The Great Google Hoax

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The Great 9/11 Hoax: What Is Congress Really Hiding? 14

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The Great Income Tax Hoax: Proof That Taxes Are Unconstitutional!

How [Blank] Gamble with Your [Blank]: 7 Ways to Protect Yourself Three years ago, a man was running late to work. Instead of stopping at red lights, he decided to take a chance and run them, actually speeding up as he went because he

thought it would improve his chances of not hitting anyone.

The first few times, it worked, but the last time it didn't. The last time, he ran into my van. Going 85 mph. Ever since then, I've always been a little nervous on the road. It's not because I'm afraid of getting hurt again but because I realized that, on the road, other people make lots of

decisions that affect me, and they're not always good ones. They're gambling with my 259

life, and really, there's nothing I can do about it.

At some time or another, I think we've all felt this way. We realize that a doctor, a

mechanic, the government -- they're all taking chances, and we have to pay the price when things go wrong.

It's disturbing, and that's why headline hacks like this one are so hard to ignore. They delve into the fear that comes from a loss of control, and they promise to give it back. Examples: • • •

How Doctors Gamble with Your Life: 7 Ways to Protect Yourself

How Clients Gamble with Your Reputation: 5 Ways to Protect Yourself How Your Host Gambles with Your Blog: 11 Ways to Protect Yourself

9 Lies [Group of People] Like to Tell

15 "Lies" is another one of those threatening words that's hard to ignore. Politicians, journalists, NASA, historians -- we suspect that almost everyone is lying to

us. The problem is, we can't discern the lies from the truth. We're never as informed as we'd need to be to argue with an expert, and it bothers us. What we need is another expert to tell us who is lying and how.

That's why this headline hack works so well. It promises to expose the lies of a certain group of people, making us one of the enlightened few who know the real truth. Examples: • • • 260

9 Lies Telephone Con Artists Like to Tell 14 Lies Playboys Like to Tell Their Dates

7 Lies the Media Likes to Tell about the Conflict in Israel

13 T hings Your [ Tr usted Person] Won't Tell You Have you ever worried that someone you're supposed to trust might not be telling you the whole truth?

Like your accountant? Or your spouse? Or, God forbid, your child? Society says that you're supposed to trust them, and you probably want to... but what if

they're not telling you something? And if they are, what if it's really, really bad, and they don't want you to know?

It's a worrisome threat, and this headline hack plays on it beautifully. You can use it effectively for almost any subject, and it'll get the attention of your audience. Examples: • • •

13 Things Your Financial Advisor 16 Won't Tell You

21 Things Your Website Designer Won't Tell You

7 Things the School Principal Won't Tell You about Your Child

5 Little-Known Factors T hat Could Affect Your [Blank] The beauty of the words "little-known" is that they imply the reader doesn't know something without calling them ignorant. After all, how could they know, if no one else does?"

But it's no less enticing. Just as we all have a tendency to believe in hoaxes, scandals, and lies, we also believe there are factors controlling things from behind the scenes that no one knows about. What's

scary is we have no idea what those factors are, and they might hurt us at any moment. 261

Typically, this headline hack works best for subjects where your reader knows they are uninformed. Pick the right one, and you'll have no trouble getting their attention.

scary is we have no idea what those factors are, and they might hurt us at any moment. Typically, this headline hack works best for subjects where your reader knows they are uninformed. Pick the right one, and you'll have no trouble getting their attention. Examples: •

5 Little-Known Factors That Could Affect Your Divorce Settlement

•

7 Little-Known Factors That Could Affect Your Search Engine Rankings

•

9 Little-Known Factors That Could Affect Your Baby’s Intelligence

[ Your Audience] Aler t: T he New [Blank] Scam to Avoid We've been through a lot of very subtle headlines in this section, so I thought it might be nice to conclude with one that's as straightforward as possible.

Sometimes, the most powerful headline is one that identifies the audience, and then gives them a reason to read. This headline hack is a brilliantly simple example of how to do

exactly that. It's so simple, in fact, that it's hard to see the allure until you see it in action. 17 Examples: •

Mom Alert: The New Daycare Scam to Avoid

•

Homebuyer Alert: The New Financing Scam to Avoid

•

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Traveler Alert: The New Mexico Scam to Avoid

These days, most people are in a tough spot. They have too many responsibilities, but they can't do anything about it. No matter how much they would like to, they can't stop being a parent or quit their job or refuse to pay the bills. That would be unconscionable.

So, the only solution is to simplify. They search for ways to get the same results in less time. Granted, it's not a very methodical search -- they tend to look for answers one day,

and then forget about it the next -- but that sense of being overwhelmed stays with them. It's a powerful emotion, and these headlines tap into it.

T he Zen of [Blank] On the surface, this is just another "how to" headline, but there's one important

difference.

With this headline hack, you're showing them how to do it in a Zen-like way. Given the

increasing popularity of Buddhist teachings, most people automatically think of anything

with the word "Zen" as easy, masterful, and calming -- all things overwhelmed people are desperate to experience.

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Of course, the headline works best when you pair Zen teachings with something your

audience would normally consider hectic. Writing a post with the headline "The Zen of

Meditation" wouldn't get much attention because people expect it to be Zen-like. There's not enough contrast. Also, feel free to follow this headline with a how-to or list-style headline. Examples: • • •

The Zen of Rush-Hour Traffic

The Zen of Writing with Kids around: 11 Ways to Quiet Your Mind The Zen of Team Meetings: How to Never Lose Control Again

Can't Keep up? 11 Ways to Simplify Your [Blank] Once upon a time, everyone wanted to "get ahead." They worked as quickly and

efficiently as possible, so they could finish early and still have time or money left over to do extra. They wanted to do more at work, enjoy more time with their family, and have more time to relax. Not anymore. Now, all we can focus on is "keeping up." We have more to do than we could possibly accomplish, and we are terrified of one-day running out of energy and falling behind. We worry that, if that happens, we might never catch up again.

It's a common thought process, and this headline jumps directly into it by using the

phrase ("Can't Keep up?") that's already going through their heads. It then promises multiple strategies for simplifying the problem.

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Examples:

multiple strategies for simplifying the problem. Examples: •

Can't Keep up? 11 Ways to Simplify Your Gmail Inbox

•

Can't Keep up? 21 Ways to Simplify Your Search for New Clients 20 Can't Keep up? 7 Ways to Simplify Your Wardrobe for Tonight's Date

•

How to Take C harge of Your [Unr uly Problem] Mental rehearsal is a great technique for improving your performance in sports, giving speeches, or just about anything else, but it can also backfire.

Sometimes, we rehearse bad things happening in the future, not just positive ones. We

imagine little problems growing into big problems, and we worry about whether or not

we'll be able to handle them. Some psychologists even say that much of our anxiety centers around problems that don't even exist yet.

So why not write a post, targeting those worries? Figure out what problem your audience is worried about spinning out of control, and then tell them how to take charge of it. Examples: • • •

How to Take Charge of Your Husband's Gambling Problem

How to Take Charge of Your Junk Mail Folder in Microsoft Outlook How to Take Charge of Your Blog's Comment Section

T he Minimalist Guide to [A gg ravation] This headline is similar to the previous ones, except with one small but important

difference: it focuses on topics your audience perceives as unimportant or annoying.

People who enjoy minimalist decor usually feel that extravagant interior design is a waste, just as those who want a minimalist website design feel like most flashy designs get in the 265

way of usability. It's all about minimizing something they dislike.

In turn, it's usually not a good idea to use this headline for topics your audience finds important. Focus on a topic your audience wants to avoid. Examples: •

The Minimalist Guide to Twitter

•

The Minimalist Guide to Cooking a Nutritious Dinner

•

The Minimalist Guide to Homework (Keep Your Good Grades!)

10 Shor tcuts for [Completing Tedious Process] in Record T ime Who isn't interested in a shortcut these days? Not only does this headline hack promise to make our lives simpler, but it implies you'll have an unfair advantage. While your competitors are working blithely along, doing

things the old-fashioned way, you'll take a shortcut and skip ahead, achieving the same results in a fraction of the time. All the while giggling gleefully, of course. Examples: •

10 Shortcuts for Becoming an Authority in Your Field in Record Time

•

7 Shortcuts for Building a Company Website in Record Time

•

21 Perfectly Legal Shortcuts for Finishing Your Taxes in Record Time

Get Rid of [Recur r ing Problem] Once and for All Simplifying or taking charge of a problem is great, but what if you can get rid of it once and for all? Wouldn't that be better?

This headline hack promises to show your readers how. You can use it for almost any

nuisance, but it works best if the problem is recurring. Find a problem where your reader 266

is thinking, "I'm so tired of dealing with this! I wish I could handle it once and for all!"

Also, it's best if your audience believes a permanent solution is possible, but they don't know what the solution is. You're telling them something they wish they knew, not trying to convince them to believe in a miracle. Examples: •

Get Rid of Your Yellow Toenails Once and for All

•

Get Rid of That Squirrel in Your Attic Once and for All

•

Get Rid of Comment Spammers Once and for All

How to End [Problem] This headline hack is just a slight variation on the last one. The main difference is it works for problems that are not necessarily recurring. It's also

more conducive to sub headlines, allowing you to add more benefits, overcome objections, etc. •

How to End Your Fight with the IRS

•

How to End Writer's Block Forever (And Make Readers Fall in Love with You)

•

How to End a Dating Disaster Without Being Rude or Losing Your Cool

How to [Blank] in 5 Minutes When I first started writing, I thought this headline hack was sleazy. 5 minutes? You can't do hardly anything worthwhile in 5 minutes. By making that promise, I felt like writers were lying to their readers. Then I realized something. Most people are totally overwhelmed with the complicated,

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long-term advice that writers like to dispense, and they are looking for simple little tips

they can implement in just a few minutes. They're not looking to change their lives, just make a small improvement.

And there's nothing wrong with that. For the most part, change is a combination of

hundreds of little actions, made 5 minutes at a time. If you can help your readers take just one of those actions, you've achieved a huge victory. Instead of overwhelming them, you'll give them the confidence to come back to you again, and take the next action. That's what this headline hack is all about. Some writers also use it to create curiosity, using headlines like "How to Make $1,000 in 5 Minutes." And while I understand the allure, I don't recommend it, unless it's actually

something 90% of your readers can do in five minutes. If it's not, they're going to realize that as soon as they read it, and you're going to lose a small amount of trust. It's far better to give them real advice they can implement in five minutes (or whatever length of time). That way, you're delivering on your promise. Examples: â&#x20AC;˘ â&#x20AC;˘ â&#x20AC;˘

How to Reduce Your Junk Mail in 5 Minutes How to Write an Article in 20 Minutes

How to Knock $127 Off Your Phone Bill in 15 Minutes or Less

101 [Blank] Hac ks: A Cheat Sheet for [Blank] Hmm. This headline looks familiar, does it not? Somewhat of a nefarious member of the Zen family, the "hacks" headline is nevertheless increasingly popular. One of the most popular blogs in the world, Lifehacker.com, is based on it. You're also starting to see it grace the cover of national magazines. 268

And why not? All of us have a diabolical side, and the idea of discovering a "hacks" that allows us to "cheat" and get the same results with less effort is irresistible.

Note: The "cheat sheet" subheadline works well with the hacks theme, but it's optional. If you find another subheadline works better, by all means use it. Examples: • • •

101 Headline Hacks: A Cheat Sheet for Writing Headlines That Explode Traffic 21 Homework Hacks: A Cheat Sheet for Doing Your Homework in One Hour or Less

37 Income Tax Hacks: An Insider's Guide to Beating the IRS at Their Own Game

It's scary to realize how much power marketers have over how we think. For example: • •

If you want to rent a movie for your kids, what movie studio comes to mind? Probably Disney or Pixar.

If you want to build an efficient business, what company might you emulate? Probably McDonald's or Southwest Airlines.

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If you want to become a better poker player, who immediately comes to mind? Probably Phil Ivey, Daniel Negreanu, or Doyle Brunson.

Of course, it's no accident. Companies and celebrities spend billions of dollars to make

Of course, it's no accident. Companies and celebrities spend billions of dollars to make sure their name comes to mind first. It's called branding. No surprise, right? Well, here's an interesting idea: What if you can use all of those billion-dollar brands to your advantage? What if you can construct headlines that "ride piggyback" on existing brands,

immediately connecting with your audience in a powerful way? Because you can. These headline hacks help you do it.

Note: Since you are benefiting from someone else's brand, there is potential for lawsuits with this strategy. We've never had any problems at Copyblogger, and I doubt we ever will, but use these headlines at your own 26risk.

[Do Something] Like [Famous Person]: 20 Ways to [Blank] Tiger Woods, Warren Buffett, Steve Jobs, Jack Nicholson, Barack Obama. We all recognize these names, not just because they are famous, but because they are among the best in their field. Their performance is so far above average that it

mesmerizes us, and we can't help wondering if they have some secret that enables them to beat everyone else.

You can leverage that curiosity to make your posts irresistible. Just take the person who your audience is most fascinated with, and insert their name into your headline. Note: Feel free to change everything after the colon to suit your post. List and "How to" headlines tend to work well. • 270

• •

Launch like Steve Jobs: 7 Ways to Build Buzz for Your Next Product Launch Do Your Taxes like Donald Trump: 20 Ways the Rich Cheat the IRS

Run like Adrian Peterson: 10 Ways to Be the Back They'll Never Bring down

headlines tend to work well. • • •

Launch like Steve Jobs: 7 Ways to Build Buzz for Your Next Product Launch Do Your Taxes like Donald Trump: 20 Ways the Rich Cheat the IRS

Run like Adrian Peterson: 10 Ways to Be the Back They'll Never Bring down

[Famous Person’s] Top 10 T ips for [Blank] This is a shorter version of the last headline hack. In addition to leveraging the name of a famous person, it has some nice alliteration with "Top 10 Tips," making it even more memorable. Of course, that advantage is also a

disadvantage. The word "top" implies there are only a few tips. Offering your "Top 157 Tips" would be kind of weird.

So, this one works best with 5-10 tips. If you have more, use one of the other headline hacks in this section.

Examples: •

Tiger's Top 10 Tips for Improving Your Golf Swing

•

Ernest Hemingway's Top 5 Tips for Writing Well

•

David Bach's Top 10 Tips for Saving for Retirement After Age 50

T he [ Wor ld-C lass Example] School of [Blank] This headline hack is a variation of the last one, but with one important difference: the word "School."

Normally, we expect anything having to do with school to be academic and... well...

boring. The best way to use this headline is to intentionally violate that expectation, either using a bizarre teacher or a topic you would never associate with school. 271

For example, "The Jack Welsh School of Leadership" is a fine headline, but it doesn't

For example, "The Jack Welsh School of Leadership" is a fine headline, but it doesn't compel you to click. "The Tony Soprano School of Leadership" is much more interesting.

Similarly, "The House M.D. School of Medicine" is decent, especially since Dr. House is such an interesting television figure, but it lacks punch because we associate medicine

with school. A better headline would be, "The House M.D. School of Torturing Your Employees." Examples: • • •

The Tony Soprano School of Leadership

The House M.D. School of Torturing Your Employees The Yogi Berra School of Persuasive Writing

28 T he [ Wor ld-C lass Example] Guide to [Blank]

What if you want to use a famous company in your headline? Or a well-known band? The last few headline hacks can work, but they are a little awkward. For example,

companies don't really offer tips; individuals within the company do. Also, you're more likely to want to "Dunk like Michael Jordan" than you are to "Dunk like the Chicago Bulls." That's where this headline hack comes in handy. You can still use it for individuals, but it works especially well for examples involving companies or other groups of people.

On a side note, this headline hack can also work well when the topic has no apparent

connection with the world-class example being cited. It creates curiosity. How could you not click the Winnie the Pooh headline below? 272

Examples:

Examples: • • •

The Pixar Guide to Storytelling

The Winnie The Pooh Guide to Blogging The Ramons’ Guide to Killer Content

Secrets of [Famous Group] Copywriters have long known that one of the most proven ways to make an audience curious is to put "Secrets" in the headline. It works almost like magic.

Here's why: we all have a tendency to believe others are deliberately withholding success

secrets from us. Why wouldn't they? If you had a secret that gave you a competitive edge, you would do everything in your power to keep it quiet.

Use that suspicion to your advantage. If you 29 find a group of well-known and well-

respected people following a common practice they never speak about, then this headline works wonderfully to arouse the curiosity of your audience.

Note: This headline works well when used with a how-to or list-style headline. Examples below.

Examples: • • •

Secrets of NFL Hall of Famers

Secrets of the Fortune 500: 22 Tactics That Keep Them on Top Secrets of Hollywood A-Listers: How to Look like a Movie Star

W hat [ Wor ld-C lass Example] Can Teach Us about [Blank] 273

Of all the headline hacks in this section, this one is the most versatile. Not only can you

use it for piggybacking on celebrities, groups and companies, but it works for events too.

W hat [ Wor ld-C lass Example] Can Teach Us about [Blank] Of all the headline hacks in this section, this one is the most versatile. Not only can you

use it for piggybacking on celebrities, groups and companies, but it works for events too. It's a bit tricky, however. You'd think people would be interested in learning and that

learning lessons from a world-class example would interest them, but the wording of this headline hack can actually turn readers off. The words "teach us" can sound a little...

academic, and so it's important to prop up the headline in other ways.

For example, you might use an emotional appeal like, "What 9/11 Can Teach Us about

Sticking Together and Surviving a Crisis." Or you can break expectations with something like, "What Tiger Woods Can Teach Us about Fidelity."

Usually, I like to use this headline whenever I want to bond with the audience. The word "Us" implies that you're in the same boat, and you have something to learn together. It's much less preachy than "What [Blank] Can Teach You about [Blank]," although you'll certainly see that one a lot too.

Examples: •

What 9/11 Can Teach Us about Sticking Together and Surviving a Crisis

•

What Tiger Woods Can Teach Us about Fidelity

•

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What the Horizon Realty Fail Can Teach You about Social Media

"Do You Make These Mistakes in English?" doesn't look like a blockbuster headline. It's intriguing, but it doesn't exactly grab you by the throat. The sentence structure is also

a bit odd, so you'd think maybe an amateur wrote it. Plus, it's about English, of all things -- not exactly the sexiest of all topics.

But it doesn't matter. Written by Maxwell Sackheim, this advertisement made enormous amounts of money for over 40 years, unbeaten by anyone that tried to challenge it. It's one of the most successful headlines in the history of advertising.

What's so powerful about it is how it alludes to mistakes, but it doesn't tell you what they are. You wonder, "Hmm... could I be making any of these mistakes?" And then you end up reading the whole article to find out. It works phenomenally well. When Brian Clark started Copyblogger, many of his first blockbuster posts used mistake headlines, drawing thousands of readers to the blog.

You might, in fact, say these headline hacks are designed for the beginning blogger. By describing common mistakes, you subtly position yourself as an expert by proving you

know what they're going through. You also set the stage for future, more instructional posts that'll serve as your foundation content.

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Not to say they can't work for a popular blog, because they do. Just find a way to work

them in as quickly as possible, because they're some of the most powerful headline hacks in this report.

Do You Make T hese 9 [Blank] Mistakes? This headline hack is the great, great grandchild of the "Do You Make These Mistakes in English" headline I mentioned at the beginning of this section.

The major difference is it includes the number of mistakes. It's a small change, but the

reason why it's important is because it increases the perceived possibility that you're

making one of them. The reader will see it and think, "Oh God, there are nine mistakes I can make with that? I must be making one of them."

But the core is the same. Really, what makes this headline hack tick isn't the number, but the word "these." To find out what "these" are, you are forced to read the article. It's

almost like an embedded command -- a principle from Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). You have no choice but to be curious.

The examples below will show you what I mean. Notice how you can add a context or

even slightly change the wording of the headline, and it's still the same overall template. Examples: • • •

Do You Make These 9 Parenting Mistakes?

Do You Make These 7 Mistakes When You Write? Do You Recognize These 10 Mental Blocks to Creative Thinking?

7 [Blank] Mistakes T hat Make You Look Dumb No one likes to look dumb. You might even say we obsess over it. 276

7 [Blank] Mistakes T hat Make You Look Dumb No one likes to look dumb. You might even say we obsess over it.

We practice dancing in front of the mirror. We get a friend to rehearse common

interview questions with us. We watch a TV show, not because we like it, but because 33 everyone at work likes it, and they'll be talking about it tomorrow. The list could go on and on. As a writer, it's your God-given responsibility to use that obsession to your advantage. Figure out what makes your audience feel dumb, and then insert it into a headline. Just don't forget to make fun of yourself too. Examples: •

7 Email Mistakes That Make You Look Dumb

•

Five Grammatical Errors That Make You Look Dumb

•

9 Silverware Mistakes That Make You Look Dumb at a Fancy Restaurant

5 [Blank] Mistakes T hat Make You [Look/Sound] Like a [Blank] Ever worry about sounding like a jerk? Or a wannabe? Or a tyrant? Yeah, we all do. Not only do we worry about making mistakes, but we also personify

those mistakes with a mental image of a certain type of person. It's the whole "Don't be that guy" concept.

And you can use it in this headline hack. Instead of just mentioning the type of mistakes your readers make, include a mental image of what they'll look like. 277

Be funny, shocking, whatever you want. Just make sure the comparison grabs attention.

Be funny, shocking, whatever you want. Just make sure the comparison grabs attention. Examples: •

5 Grammar Mistakes That Make You Sound like a Chimp

•

7 Resume Mistakes That Make You Look like a Loser

•

10 Overreactions That Make Moms 34Look like Maniacs

11 [Blank] Mistakes You Don't Know You're Making What's scarier than making a mistake? Easy: Making a mistake that you don't know about. It's the toilet paper on your heel. It's the rice stuck between your teeth. It's thinking

"biweekly" means twice a week, instead of every two weeks, and saying it wrong in public like twenty times.

When you find out, you're mortified. It's not just because you made a mistake; it's

because you were oblivious to it, and now everyone thinks you're clueless (in addition to being dumb).

We've all been there, and that's why this headline hack works. It promises to help you avoid all of the pain and embarrassment by telling you what no one else will. Examples: • • •

11 Fashion Mistakes You Don't Know You're Making

21 Accounting Mistakes You Don't Know You're Making 5 Cholesterol Mistakes You Don't Know You're Making

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Don't Do T hese 12 T hings W hen [Blank]

•

5 Cholesterol Mistakes You Don't Know You're Making

Don't Do T hese 12 T hings W hen [Blank] I like this headline because it's a little more... colloquial... than the others. Rather than

threatening the reader with "mistakes," it sounds like something your friend would write to warn you about things NOT to do. But it's essentially the same thing. 35 The only real difference is it pinpoints a situation, rather than a topic, and sometimes

that's better. It tells your audience when the article is useful. I don't have any marketing data to back me up, but I would guess the context makes the article more memorable, which is great for getting readers to come back. Examples: • • •

Don't Do These 12 Things When Writing Headlines

Don't Do These 5 Things When Passing through Airport Security Don't Do These 7 Things When You're with a Guy You Just Met

Talk to any successful writer or publisher, and they'll all tell you the same thing:

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How-to headlines almost never fail. In fact, many top writers start every article or letter they write with a how-to headline.

In fact, many top writers start every article or letter they write with a how-to headline.

While they might end up with something totally different, the words "How to" force

them to communicate the value they are offering the reader -- a crucial ingredient for any

headline. It's a technique I recommend to everyone, especially beginning writers. If you're

struggling to find a powerful headline for your post, type the words "How to" on your screen and then fill in the blank. No, the resulting headlines might not be sexy or surprising, but they will be effective. There are dozens of variations on the how-to headline, but we'll only go over the most

popular ones here. All of them have proven to work well, regardless of the niche or topic. How to [Blank] Called the "Granddaddy of All Headlines," this headline hack has been used for almost 100 years for countless winning ads and articles, and with good reason:

We, as readers, are naturally biased toward articles that help us do something. Ideas and opinions are great, but for most people, they have no practical value. To really get our 37 to apply those ideas in a practical way. attention, we need an expert to show us how

That's what this headline does, and it works surprisingly well. I've often been surprised by how a simple "How to" headline that took me five minutes to write outperforms an original headline I worked on for days. Sometimes, I wonder why I bother writing anything else. Examples:

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•

How to Read

•

How to Write Headlines That Work

•

How to Increase Your Blog Subscription Rate by 254%

How to Be [Desirable Quality] Thanks to modern psychology and neuroscience, most of us aren't just interested in what to do. We're also concerned with what to be. Science now us we can transform ourselves in almost any way we can imagine, and we're aching to know how.

That's the question this headline answers. By figuring out which traits your audience most desires and then putting it into this headline, you can harness the natural curiosity people have in transforming themselves into something more. Examples: • • •

How to Be Interesting How to Be Creative

How to Be the Life of the Party (Even If You're a Closet Introvert)

How to [Blank] (Even If [Common O bstac le]) 38 Have you ever been reading a headline and thought, "That'll never work for me because...?" For instance, you see an article about How to Lose Weight, and you think, "That'll never work for me because I can't stick to a diet." Or you see an article about How to Make Money Online, and you think, "That'll never work for me because I'm no good with

computers." Or you see an article about How to Save $10,000 on Your Taxes, and you think, "That'll never work for me because I can't figure out tax forms."

Regardless of the situation, everyone believes their circumstances are unique, and they

look for ways to prove that advice for other people won't work for them. And that puts you, the writer, in a tough situation. Somehow, you have to write a headline for an 281

audience that is already convinced you can't help them.

Fortunately, some smart copywriter (I have no idea who) came up with this headline

hack. It acknowledges the reader’s perceived differences at the end of the headline, giving them the impression it was written for a person in their exact situation. Simple solution, but it works like gangbusters. Examples: •

How to Lose Weight (Even If You Can't Stick to a Diet)

•

How to Make Money Online (Even If You're No Good with Computers)

•

How to Save $10,000 on Your Taxes (Even If You're a Tax Dummy)

How to [Blank] Without [O bjectionable Action] Where the last headline hack is about self-doubt, this one is about a concept

psychologists call cognitive dissonance.

Lots of times, we want something, but we don't want to do what it takes to get it. For 39 instance, a woman might want to get a date, but she feels the only way to make men notice her is to dress like a slut, and she doesn't want to do that.

Just because she believes it's impossible doesn't mean the desire goes away, either. In fact, the tension between two conflicting desires probably makes her pay more attention to it.

This tension is called "cognitive dissonance," and everyone experiences it, not just women who are looking for dates. Consciously or not, everyone is also looking for a way to get rid of it. It's almost like your mind gets stuck in a loop, wanting to get rid of it.

That's where this headline hack comes in handy. It relieves the cognitive dissonance by showing you how to do one thing without doing the other.

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Examples:

showing you how to do one thing without doing the other. Examples: •

How to Get a Guy's Attention Without Dressing like a Slut

•

How to Take Your Family to Disney World Without Spending a Fortune

•

How to Work at Home Without Quitting Your Job

How to [Do Something] W hile You [Do Something Else] Can you start a small business while holding down a job? Can you get married while going to college? Can you travel while raising small children? Whenever I'm doing a webinar or a speaking engagement, these are the most common

types of questions people ask. Everyone wants to know whether or not it's really possible

to do X and Y at the same time. They think maybe it is, but they're not sure how. So they wonder. And where people wonder, writers answer. This headline hack jumps in and explains how to do two seemingly contradictory tasks at the same time. Not only does it resolve the

mystery of whether or not it's really possible, but it also tells them how to do it, which is 40 what readers really want to know. Examples: •

How to Get Smarter While You Watch Television

•

How to Be Productive While You're Waiting in Line

•

How to Create Dreamy Content While You Sleep

How to [Blank] and [Blank] Ever heard of the book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie? 283

Who hasn't, right?

How to [Blank] and [Blank] Ever heard of the book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie? Who hasn't, right? Yes, it's a classic book, but its title is also one of the most famous "How to" headlines

ever. It's a perfect illustration of a headline hack that lets you offer two benefits, instead of just one, while also allowing you to play with the relationship between the two benefits. The most popular structure is to hint at a connection between the two benefits. For

example, Carnegie's headline implies winning friends will lead to influencing people. It's

subtle, but readers pick up on it subconsciously.

You can also setup an intriguing contrast. "How to Read Less and Learn More," for

example, would probably be popular in any student magazine. It sounds impossible, and the idea of an article telling you how to do it is irresistible. Examples: •

How to Work from Home and Get Twice As Much Done

•

How to Do Less and Get More

•

How to Eat Junk Food and Still Lose Weight 41

How to [Do Something] T hat Your [ Target Audience] W ill Lo ve These days, everything is social. It's not just the Internet and the proliferation of websites like Twitter, Facebook, and 284

Digg. Our offline lives are social too. Psychology has proven again and again that people

with strong connections to their family, coworkers, clients, bosses, and friends are not just

Digg. Our offline lives are social too. Psychology has proven again and again that people

with strong connections to their family, coworkers, clients, bosses, and friends are not just "more successful;" they're happier, live longer, and make more money. "How can I make so-and-so like me?" used to be a question of idle curiosity, but not anymore. Now it's a question of necessity, and we're all playing to win.

This headline promises to show your readers how. You can't use it often, but if you pick the right target audience at the right time, it works well. Examples: • • •

How to Pick a Movie Your Date Will Love How to Give a Toast Your Boss Will Love

How to Build a Treehouse Your Kids Will Love

How to Use [Blank] to [Blank] Remember 2001, A Space Odyssey, where the monkey-thing looks down and sees a

bone? Then the dramatic music starts playing? Then he picks it up, realizing he can use it

as a club to beat other monkey-things to death with?

It's funny to watch this simpleminded discovery, but what's even funnier is realizing the

point of the scene: it was only the beginning. Sure, our technology is more advanced, but innovation is still basically the same process.

We come across an amazing tool, and then we go out looking for something to do with 42 aisles of Home Depot. it. It's the story of every man wandering the It's also the power of this headline. Show your readers how to use one of their tools in a new and amazing way, and they'll love you for it. 285

Examples:

Examples: • • •

How to Use Twitter to Grow Your Business

How to Use Food from Your Freezer to Create Napalm How to Use the "Rule of Three" to Create Engaging Content

How to [Blank] in [ Year] Once upon a time, wisdom used to last. If you picked up a book from 20 years ago,

chances were that the advice was still good. It wasn't because the wisdom was timeless, necessarily, but because the world hadn't changed very much.

Not anymore. Now, the world changes lickety-split, and the wisdom of today is the

stupidity of tomorrow. Sure, the book’s advice might still hold true, but there's a better chance it's a bit outdated. The world is changing too fast for publishers to keep up.

For readers, this is a problem, because they want the most up-to-date wisdom the world has to offer. The newer it is, the more we trust it. So, why not give them exactly what they're looking for? Write an article with the year in the headline. It's a subtle way of telling your readers that your article is packed with the newest and greatest advice, and they need to check it out ASAP. Otherwise, it might expire. Examples:

• • •

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How to Write an Ebook That Sells in 2009 43 How to Meet Your Soul Mate in 2010 How to Dress like a Rock Star in 2010

How to [Blank] -- T he U ltimate Guide

How to [Blank] -- T he U ltimate Guide Who could resist this one? Sure, an article with a few, quick tidbits of information might be nice when we're mildly

curious about the subject, but where are we going to turn when our ass is really on the

line? An "Ultimate Guide" sounds more reassuring. It promises to tell you everything. If you can live up to that promise, as the author, and really put together a resource-rich

article for your readers, this headline hack can be a blockbuster. People will bookmark it, tell their friends about it, and retweet it. You can get traffic from it for years.

It's a lot of work, yes, but it's well worth it, especially if you're trying to grab attention in a competitive space. The links it draws are perfect for SEO. By and large, it's one of my favorite headline hacks, as evidenced by the links below. Examples: • • •

How to Attract Links and Increase Web Traffic -- The Ultimate Guide How to Conquer Writer's Block -- The Ultimate Guide

Speech Recognition for Bloggers -- The Ultimate Guide

How to Be Smar t in a Wor ld of Dumb [Group] Okay, this one takes some guts. 44

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Not only are you saying the majority of people in a certain group are dumb, but you're

implying your audience is dumb, unless they read your article. It has great shock value. It also fits into the worldview many people have, which is "Everyone else is an idiot, but not me."

Still, it's hard to pull off. The writers who use this headline most effectively take a

conspiratorial tone, almost like they're pulling you aside to show you how things really work behind the scenes. You're not like everyone else, and they want to see you succeed, so they're going to fill you in on the details most of the morons in your niche will never realize.

Top marketers call this "Us Versus Them," and it's one of the most persuasive strategies in existence. If you do it right, you can establish an emotional bond with your audience that gives you enormous influence. If you do it wrong though, you might insult your audience and destroy your bond with them. Is it worth it? You decide. • • •

How to Be Smart in a World of Dumb Drivers

How to Be Smart in a World of Dumb Shoppers How to Be Smart in a World of Dumb Investors

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It's easy to get sick of list headlines. Everywhere you turn, there's a "7 Ways to Do This" or "141 Ideas to Help You with That." They crowd the covers of magazines, the posts in your RSS reader, and even nationally acclaimed newspapers like the New York Times. Why are they so popular? Well, it's simple, really: They work. Of all the popular posts we have published at Copyblogger, more of them have list

headlines than any other format. The same is true for social bookmarking sites. Just glance at the front pages of Digg and Delicious, and you'll see they are dominated by list headlines.

The truth is, if you're not writing at least one list post per week, you are missing out on traffic. They are that powerful.

The only challenge is making sure you don't repeat the same headline too often. There are many variations of the list headline, and most bloggers deliberately cycle between them, so the headlines stay fresh.

Here are some of the most popular ones, as well as notes on when and how to use them. 289

7 Ways to [Do Something] Nothing exciting here, right? You've probably seen this headline a million times. But have you ever stopped to consider how it works? If you'd never seen a headline before, you'd think this one would turn people off. Most of us aren't looking for seven ways to do anything. We're looking for the one way that's going to work.

So why promise 5 or 7 or 51 ways to do something? It's all about perception. Subconsciously, I think we all have the tendency to believe most

of the ideas in an article won't work for us, but maybe we'll find one idea that will. The

more ideas the article offers, the better our chance to find one that applies specifically to our situation.

Based on that line of thinking, this headline hack usually works best when your readers

are searching for a range of options or ideas, and they plan to decide for themselves which idea is best. It does NOT work as well when your readers are searching for the best solution, and they don't want to be bothered with the rest.

For instance, "7 Ways to Buy an Engagement Ring" would probably flop because guys

don't want options. What they want is to get a good deal on a ring they've already picked

out. A Headline like "7 Ways to Negotiate Your Local Diamond Dealer into the Ground" would probably be much more popular. Examples:

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73 Ways to Become a Better Writer

•

10 Effective Ways to Get More Blog Subscribers

•

5 Simple Ways to Open Your Blog Post with a Bang 47

101 [Blank] for [Event/Cause/Process] You see this one a lot on the covers of magazines. It works best when you have a long list of bullet points on a topic, and you don't have to offer a lot of explanation. It also works best when it's a big number for a fairly narrow

subject, and the reader is like, "How the hell did they come up with so many ideas for that?" The curiosity will get them to read. Examples: •

101 Hors D'oeuvre Ideas for Your Next Dinner Party

•

21 Traffic Triggers for Social Media Marketing

•

72 Home Remedies for Curing Insomnia

72 Killer Resources for [Audience/Process] The web is chock-full of information on every imaginable topic, but the problem is

finding it. Sure, we have search engines and directories and social bookmarking, which

are great if you know what keyword to look under, but what if you don't? What if you're a beginner who knows next to nothing?

In that case, what you need is an expert on the subject to compile links to all of the most useful webpages. You need a resource list -- an article you can bookmark and come back to over and over again, slowly learning everything you need to know from one central depository of information.

That's what this headline hack promises. Resource list are a lot of work to put together, but it's worth it. If you pick the right topic, 291

you can often pick up big bursts of traffic from social bookmarking sites, as well as long48

term residual traffic from search engines. Plus, let's not forget that your readers will love you for gathering so much useful information into one place for them. Examples: •

72 Killer Resources for Modernizing Your Kitchen

•

87 Killer Resources for Incoming Freshmen

•

101 Killer Resources for Making Money As a Stay-At-Home Mom

T he Top 10 [Blank] Ahh, how could we possibly talk about headlines without mentioning the illustrious Top 10?

Sometimes, people don't want 73 techniques, 101 resources, or 21 ideas. Their head is

already spinning, and they want you to reduce their options, not increase them. They want you to give them the best and exclude everything else. And what better way to do it than a Top 10 List? It has alliteration, making it more appealing to our phonological loop. It's also a short headline, giving you ample room to expound on what your top 10 list is about. Then there is the number 10 -- a nice, round figure that's not too high and not too low.

Overall, it's one of the most effective headlines we have, which is probably why you see it

so often. You can use it for almost anything. Examples: • • • 292

The Top 10 Beaches in South America Top 10 Blogs for Writers 2009

The Top 10 Anniversary Gifts Your Wife Will Adore 49

7 [Blank] Secrets Ever y [Audience] Should Know You can't see this headline without wondering what secrets you're missing. It's instant

curiosity. Plus, it implies they are secrets other insiders already know, and you're woefully ignorant for not knowing them.

Wrap all of that allure and social proof up in a list, and you can't help but have an irresistible headline. No wonder it's so popular in Cosmo magazine. Examples: •

7 Sex Secrets Every Cosmo Girl Should Know

•

14 Bedtime Secrets Every Parent Should Know

•

5 Secretarial Secrets Every Salesperson Should Know

7 Sur pr ising Reasons [Blank] Most of the headline hacks in this report are designed to make the reader curious. They use power words or easy-sounding lists or hints of threat to "trick" the reader into checking out the article.

But sometimes, the smartest thing you can do as a writer isn't to manufacture curiosity; it's to harness the curiosity that’s already there. All of us have, at one time or another,

wondered why the sky is blue or why we have to pay taxes or why a customer refuses to

buy from us. No, it might not be urgent for us to find an answer, but we are curious, and we'd happily read an article promising us "surprising" answers.

This headline hack is all about helping your readers scratch that itch. It promises to satisfy their curiosity by giving them a few unexpected reasons why such and such

happens. And who knows? It might just give them something interesting to talk about around the water cooler tomorrow. 293

Examples: • • •

7 Surprising Reasons Why You Feel Depressed during the Winter

11 Surprising Reasons Cops Pull You Over (and Not the Guy beside You) 21 Surprising Reasons Why Your Teenage Son Won't Talk to You

T he 5 Laws for [Blank] "Laws" is one of those emotionally charged words, isn't it? Some people love laws, going out of their way to learn and follow them. Whenever they

see this headline hack, their first reaction is, "Goody! Someone is going to tell me how to play the game." On some level, they might also wonder if they are breaking some of the laws, and that worry will compel them to read.

Other people hate laws, intentionally subverting them at every opportunity just to prove how "stupid" they are. What's ironic is this headline hack still works on them. Almost

like criminals study the law to figure out how best to flout it, rebels study it to find places where they can innovate and crush their competitors.

For both groups, the end result is the same: curiosity. Regardless of whether they want to obey the rules or break them, they need to know what those rules are, and so they read.

Another side benefit of this headline hack is that, if you're using it for a blog post, it can generate a lively argument in your comments section. Readers will agree and disagree with you about what the rules are, and your post can rack up quite a few comments. Examples:

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The 10 Laws of Super Bowl Parties

•

A Dad's 7 Laws for Dating His Daughter

•

The 5 Immutable Laws of Persuasive Blogging 51

7 Steps to [Blank] Another oldie but goodie. Like the "7 Ways to" headline hack, this is essentially another "How to" headline, but

with one important difference. It's finite. All you have to do is five or seven or howevermany steps, and you'll achieve the promised result.

It makes it sound easy, and that's important. Sometimes, a reader might not read a

traditional "How to" headline because they assume it's going to be too much work. For instance, a certain percentage of readers will ignore an article titled "How to Build a Seven-Figure Restaurant Business" because they assume (probably correctly) it's going to

take years of hard work. Changing the headline to "7 Steps to a Seven-Figure Restaurant Business" might work better because it sounds easier, and they'll be curious to see what the steps are.

Just as with many headlines, it's all about managing the perceptions of the reader. Examples: •

7 Steps to a Seven-Figure Restaurant Business

•

10 Steps to Becoming a Better Writer

•

3 Surefire Steps for Beating the Boring Content Blues

Get [Blank]! 10 Ideas T hat Real ly Work In crowded niches, writers will often "wear out" popular topics. For instance, how many times have you seen articles promising to help you lose weight? 295

Or make money by working at home? Or build a website that gets lots of traffic? 52

These topics are popular for a reason: audiences care about them. Eventually though, everyone stops believing another headline promising "How to Lose 20 Pounds in 30 Days" or "27 Profitable Businesses You Can Start from Home." They've already read dozens of articles making the same promise, and it hasn't worked.

They're still 20 pounds overweight and stuck in the same job, and they can't see the point in reading another one. Obviously, it's just an empty promise (or so they think). That's where this headline comes in. By offering "ideas that really work," you're subtly validating their skepticism and putting

yourself on their side. You're saying, "Yeah, I know you've already read a dozen articles on this, but this is the one that will actually deliver." The more jaded your audience is, the better it works. Examples: • • •

Get More Traffic! 10 Ideas That Really Work Get a Great Man! 10 Ideas That Really Work

Get Rich from Home! 10 Ideas That Really Work

7 T hings Your [ Target Audience] Needs to Hear You Say Who doesn't wonder if they said the right thing? We're never quite sure if we answered the questions correctly at an interview or if we said the right thing when our spouse was upset or took the right tact with a client. Maybe

they didn't react the way we expected, or maybe it's just really important to get it right, and we find ourselves agonizing about it for hours, trying to figure out what to do.

296

This headline hack pokes at that insecurity. To use it, pick out the person most important to your audience and insert them into the blank. You can also include a context to make it even more powerful. Examples: •

7 Things Your Teenage Son Needs to Hear You Say

•

Want a Promotion? 7 Things Your Boss Needs to Hear You Say

•

5 Things Your Wife Needs to Hear You Say on Your Anniversary

W hat to Do Next So, you successfully plowed your way through all 52 headlines, hmmm? And now you're wondering what to do next? My suggestion: Keep writing headlines. When I started writing for Copyblogger, I wrote more than 50

headlines per day, and it was only after writing thousands of them that I really felt like I was getting good at it.

The same will most likely be true for you. The sooner you get started, the better. If doing it for your own good isn't a powerful enough reason, I'll give you another one.

I'm probably going to regret offering this, but if you write a blog post you're particularly proud of and you'd like me to read it, email it to me at Jon@BoostBlogTraffic.com, and 297

I'll take a look.

I'll take a look. I can't promise I'll leave a comment. I can't promise I'll link to it. I can't even promise I'll read the whole thing.

But if it has a good headline, I will glance at it. I promise. Don't say I never did nothing for ya. :-) Best, Jon Morrow Associate Editor

Copyblogger.com 55

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Hootsuite Helps You Organize and Manage Your Social Media

hootsuite.com http://socialbusiness.hootsuite.com/rs/hootsuitemediainc/images/hootsuite-quick-start-guide.pdf?mkt_tok=3RkMMJWWfF9ws RoluqvJZKXonjHpfsX77uwpUaK%2FhIkz2EFye%2BLIHETpodcMT8diNK%2BTFAwTG5toziV8R7TFK81vw88QXxng

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QuickStart Guide

HootSuite Helps You Organize and Manage Your Social Media

Adding More Social Networks in the Dashboard

HootSuite is a social media management dashboard. You can use HootSuite to manage all of your social networks from one place. In this QuickStart Guide we will cover how to use your HootSuite dashboard. Starting with set-up and rolling through advanced features and additional resources, this guide provides a fundamental outline to supplement your understanding of the HootSuite dashboard. Before getting started, sign up for a HootSuite account and follow the account set-up process.

Inside the dashboard, you are able to add up to four more social networks by clicking the Add Social Network button in the upper left hand corner of your dashboard.

From the pop-up, choose which social network you would like to add from the list on the right. Follow the instructions to connect and authenticate your selected account.

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QuickStart Guide

Add tabs to the Dashboard Adding Tabs to your dashboard is a great way to keep your dashboard organized. Tabs are completely customizable. For example, you can have a Tab for your Twitter account, a geographical location, or even search word results.

Customize your dashboard: Move, Rename & Delete tabs

• To add a Tab, click the small plus sign at the top of your dashboard.

• Under Tabs, you can add a variety of different Streams according to the Social Networks you have added.

Horizontally move tabs to organzie your dashboard to match your workflow.

Add a Stream On your first visit to the dashboard, you will be prompted to add three Streams. The types of Stream that you will be able to add depend on the Social Network that you chose upon registration. For example, from your Twitter account you can add streams like Sent Tweets, ReTweets, and Mentions. From your Facebook account, you can add streams like Wall Posts and News Feed - Most Recent. In the Add-Stream Helper, choose which Social Network you would like to add. From the Select the type of Stream list, choose which Streams you would like to appear in your dash.

Simply click on a tab name to rename it. Organize tabs by network type, theme, organization—your choice.

Tabs are easily deleted with the ‘X’. Set up temporary tabs for special events— you can always delete, customize, or add more later. 2

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QuickStart Guide

Publish a Message Ready to share a message? Composing and sending messages allows you to create custom content for your selected Social Networks.

Share from anywhere with the Hootlet The Hootlet for Chrome extension allows you to quickly write messaging, schedule, and publish webcontent across your selected social channels without having to leave your browser window.

1. To share a message, first choose which Social Networks you would

like to share with from the Profile Picker in the top left corner of your dashboard.

2. Type your your message in the Compose Message box. To share

immediately with your selected social networks, click Send Now.

Schedule a Message The scheduling feature allows you to create messages in advance and send them out on the day and time that best suits your social schedule.

If you didn’t install the Hootlet in your initial tour of the dashboard, visit the Chrome store to download the Hootlet to your browser. Once the Hootlet is installed and you come across a page or article you would like to share, click the Hootlet Icon next to your browser bar. A pop-up box will appear, populated with an ow.ly link of the page you are browsing. Write any messaging you would like to accompany your share.

• To schedule a message for later, click the calendar icon to view the drop-down calendar. Set the date and time you wish to send your message and hit Schedule.

You can share it immediately, schedule it for later, or Autoschedule and let HootSuite select the most optimal time to share.

• Alternatively, you can turn on AutoSchedule to have HootSuite choose the most optimal time of day for you.

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QuickStart Guide

Reply, Retweet and Like Messages You can quickly perform a range of social actions on messages from directly within a Stream. Engage with your social network by replying to questions, retweeting relevant content, or liking posts across your various social networks. To respond to or Like, hover over the relevant message. Hovering over the message will make the interaction icons appear.

Add Apps to your Dashboard

Access the App directory from the Launch bar

To get to the App Directory, hover over the Launch bar at the left-hand side of your dashboard and click the puzzle piece icon. Once inside the App Directory, you can choose from over 50 apps that help add diversity and functionality to your dashboard.

The App Directory lets you to add extra functionality to your HootSuite dashboard. You can add apps like Instagram, Flickr, YouTube, Tumblr, MailChimp and many more apps to your HootSuite dashboard. To add an App from the AddStream-Helper, click the Apps button. You will be able to directly add any of the Apps you currently have installed, or click the “Get More Apps” button at the top to add to your selection. You will be redirected to the App Directory, where you can browse our collection of 50+ Apps. Simply click “Install Now” and authenticate your account. Voila! A new stream will appear, populated with your app-account information.

Installation is easy: simply click the Install App button next to the app you’d like to add. Voila! The app will automatically create a new stream, from which you can authenticate and connect your account.

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QuickStart Guide

Additional Resources • Visit the HootSuite Help and Training portal for access to live and on-

Download the Mobile App

demand Training, FAQs and articles, our friendly user Community, and our Support Team.

• Follow @HootSuite_Help on Twitter for troubleshooting tips and more. • Enroll with HootSuite University to help you maximize your understanding of the dashboard.

• Hoot100 is a great introduction to the kind of learning HootSuite University has to offer.

• You can also check out a selection of HootSuite University courses available on our YouTube Channel.

• Want to make it official? Enroll and become certified with HootSuite

HootSuite is available as an app for your mobile device (iPhone, iPad, and Android), and can be downloaded from your device’s app store.

University. HootSuite Certification delivers recognized credentials for today’s social media professionals. Click here to learn more.

• Visit our blog for news, events, product releases, and use-case

resources. We are constantly adding to our collection of HootTips, case study videos, downloadbale PDFs, and more to give you ideas for using your HootSuite dashboard.

Driving Loyalty | 315 Clay Street | Cedar Falls, IA 50613 | (319) 553-1111 | www.drivingloyalty.com 304

When to Post on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, and Pinterest

socialmediatoday.com http://socialmediatoday.com/pamdyer/2240271/when-post-facebook-twitter-google-linkedin-and-pinterest

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Generate SEO Friendly Blog Post Titles & Kill Writerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Block

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blog.firebrandtalent.com

http://blog.firebrandtalent.com/2014/02/10-social-media-marketing-trends-to-watch-in-2014/?fb_action_ids=10152274748867028&fb_ action_types=og.likes&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582

10 social media marketing trends to watch in 2014 Today social media has become serious business. The legacy players in technology – IBM, Oracle, and Adobe amongst others – have acquired start-ups, built and are evolving “Enterprise Class” social media marketing platforms and infrastructure. Facebook and Twitter have become public companies and social startups are not just seen as the playthings of geeks.

The game is still changing though, and you will need to continue or even start to adapt and evolve. The old analog paradigms of print and mass media marketing and publishing are being pushed and pummelled. They are being held more accountable and measurable.

So what are the emerging social media marketing trends in 2014? #1. Pay to play Facebook ‘likes’ were the start and the finish of Facebook marketing. Obtain 100,000 likes and you could reach a big crowd. Facebook becoming public means the shareholders want a return. That means that free reach is diminishing and paying for it is almost becoming the necessary evil. Twitter has developed self serve ads like Facebook over the last 12 months in the USA and is now rolling it out into the UK and beyond. Yes, even Pinterest’s first promoted pins and advertising went live in October 2013. It is becoming pay to play on social. The free lunch is looking a touch smaller. #2. Planning becomes a necessary evil No longer is it enough to say that you do social media marketing because you have a Facebook and Twitter page. The increasing complexity means you need a strategic social media marketing plan. This means defining your goals, audience, and allocating a budget and appropriate resources just for starters. It’s now time to write that social media marketing strategy. #3. Brands out-publish traditional publishers Social media has given us the power, platforms, and world reaching networks to all become publishers. Innovative and creative brands and businesses are realising that social media and content publishing are synergistic cousins and cohorts. Create multimedia content and share it on social networks and you start global conversations. Brands such as Red Bull, General Electric, and Lorna Jane are becoming media companies and publishers with powerful results. Red Bull even has its own media company with nearly 150 employees. The humble blog is leaving its training wheels in the shed. Content is now where it’s at. Mass media is starting to struggle to compete with the amplification and viral velocity of social content driven by the crowd. Octoly discovered that 99% of brand conversations on YouTube are created by fans and followers. Crowd sourced marketing is now becoming the norm rather than an afterthought. 313

#4. Visual social takes centre stage Visual social content is now a serious contender in social media marketing due to the convergence of a few factors. - The rapid market penetration of smart phones and tablets. - The widespread availability of high speed wireless networks. - The decreased cost of data that makes high definition uploads cost effective. - The emergence of focused visual media social networks such as Pinterest, Vine, and Instagram. Add the emergence of visual content marketing platforms such as Shuttlerock and it’s a trend that is helping companies drive brand awareness and sales. #5. Social mobile is now mandatory The rise of mobiles and their almost universal acceptance and use means that optimising your social content for mobile is vital. This runs on a few levels including: - Make sure your blog is viewable on mobile devices by using responsive WordPress templates - Visual content such as images and video needs to be made easy to view on smart phones and tablets 12 months ago it was a ‘nice to have’ but is now becoming essential. #6. Social media automation is no longer a dirty word Automation used to be a dirty word on social but doing “social at scale” means that you have no choice. New emerging startups such as Sprinklr are helping brands do social and digital marketing efficiently. Traditional technology companies such as Adobe, IBM, Oracle, and Salesforce are acquiring and integrating Enterprise class social media infrastructure into their product offerings. This trend is also seeing the maturing of previously free platforms such a Hootsuite to grow up and offer platforms that offer a solution and ‘all in one’ portal for your social media marketing. #7. Wearable social takes big baby steps “Google Glass” is offering the promise of doing social at the blink of an eye and with the movement of lips. 2014 will see the emergence of wearable technology that takes social out of your hand and onto your wrist and face. Samsung is also in the game with other startups trying to get a position on the starting line. The other vendor to watch here is Apple. Will they or won’t they play? The two other important questions on this trend are, “what will be the adoption rate?” and “what will be its impact for social media marketers?” Look forward to reviewing the numbers in 2015. #8. Google+ starts moving content Facebook’s necessity of monetising its social network to appease shareholders and become a sustainable business could be creating an interesting tangential sideshow. It could be pushing users into Google’s arms by using Google+. Google+ is not a source of revenue and doesn’t need to make money. It is helping feed the search beast’s golden search goose called “Google Adwords” With over half a billion users and growing, it is now becoming a vital cog in SEO, social media marketing, and content moving. My blog has seen an increase of over 300% in content amplification in the last 12 months on Google+. Google+ needs to be on your social media event horizon. #9. The increasing authority of online influencers Klout and Kred were two of the first movers to allocate online influencers some credibility. This was at first seen as imagined rather than true and authentic. As online influencers in their niches have grown tribes and followers on social networks, brands are starting to come out to play. Brands have done this in the past on traditional media and that is why mass media influencers such as Tiger Woods is sponsored by Nike. There is no reason why this should not also occur with social media. This is a trend that is starting to happen. The question isn’t “should we?” It is more about ”how can we?”. The power of the social micro niche influencer on a global scale is now becoming evident and real. Expect to see this trend become more visible in 2014. #10. Brands start ignoring mass media in larger numbers The first inkling of this was seen when Beyonce launched a new album in December last year. She ignored the traditional mass media release of a radio campaign, multiple TV appearances, and retail and consumer brand promotions. Instead she announced it on Instagram to her 8 million followers with the word “Surprise” and proceeded to launch the 14 songs and accompanying 17 videos on iTunes. A success? The unofficial numbers are said to be 365,000 album downloads on the first day and 1.2 million tweets in 12 hours. Beyonce has her own distribution network and its called “social media”. The power of her fans and crowd sourced marketing is now apparent to all. An interesting question here is “does she need traditional mass media?” 314 Expect

to see to see more of this in 2014.

Sensible Social Media Checklist for Business

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SPRING CLEANING - Perform You Own Social Media Audit

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Spring Cleaning: Audit Your Social Media Accounts Performing regular social media audits will help your brand minimize the gap between the current state of your social media profiles and your annual goals. An audit will help you determine areas where you are excelling and areas that have room for improvement. Regular audits gives your brand a competitive edge while providing valuable insight into your customers’ wants and needs. A social media audit helps ensure that your social media team is on the same page, driving better results from your social media efforts. After performing an audit, you’ll be able to identify areas to streamline your process and take on a more holistic approach in producing content that drives results. In short, auditing your social media accounts and performance is just as important as auditing any other area of your business. In this guide, we’ll show you how to perform a comprehensive audit of your social networking accounts to help define and drive business objectives and give you insight into the real ROI of your social campaigns.

When Should You Audit? The social media audit process is important for any new business, any business that’s matured in their social media efforts and needs to discover the next steps, or any business looking to gain insight on what their competitors are doing. It’s useful for any business asking which social platforms they need, any business launching new products into the market, or any business working on their longterm strategic plans. Businesses use the audit process to maintain their current business trajectory and measure their ROIs. It’s a great tool to discover what people are saying about their brand or their industry and for reputation management. Audits are a common process for managing marketing strategy, and the process helps show marketing managers how to build advocacy among a brand’s target audience.

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There are three primary steps for any audit: 1. Data collection/Inventory 2. Analysis of data 3. Findings and recommendation (the report) Before you start the audit, pick the time frame you will be analyzing. This will help you focus your data collection and analysis as well as explaining your findings in the context of the time frame you decided to analyze. Anything outside of that time frame will be irrelevant to your analysis. In this guide, we’ll show you how to take an inventory of your brand’s social media presence. We’ll talk about how to make sure your social media presence fits your brand’s messaging strategy, and how to analyze all the data to set up measureable Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that will help direct your strategy going forward. We’ve also created an easy-to use document that you can download to track your audit process.

What to Audit Network Inventory: The first thing you’ll need to do to perform a social media audit is to inventory all your social profiles and assets – where does your brand have a presence, and which social networks are you currently leveraging? Once you have a complete inventory, you’ll be ready to dive into the analytics that will help you determine how your social media presence measures up. For each social network, determine the following information: Is my brand Active? Reactive? Inactive? What’s my URL? What’s my profile handle? Who has administrative access and what’s the login? Who has posting access/ownership? Does the profile use ads? Who is our ads administrator? What is the login? We’ve provided a form to get you started – See Worksheet Section 1

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Keeping a running inventory of this information is important in ensuring you have the ability to collect all the data you need to perform your audit, and that you know where you’re currently focusing your efforts. This includes knowing who “owns” these social profiles at any time (who is responsible for posts on your Facebook Page, for example), and knowing who has what type of access to the accounts. You’ll also want to note whether or not you’re using paid or owned media, or both.

Policy: Next, you’ll want to determine whether or not you have a social media policy that’s applicable to your network presence. Your social media policy will include things like who creates the content to post and who posts that content. Your policy should outline guidelines for post topics or types based on your brand’s “voice” (photo, video, links or text) and guidelines for responses to users mentioning your brand. Your policy should also include web service level agreements for those networks – guidelines for monitoring metrics associated with that network, performance indicators and troubleshooting. For example, if your brand focuses on having stellar customer service, you’ll want to determine whether or not your brand needs a dedicated customer service handle on Twitter. If so, you may need to ensure you have an appropriate policy to route customers to that handle for customer service issues. You’ll want to set goals for response rate and response time when users mention your brand. In addition, you should know how to handle different types of social posts regarding your brand – whether they’re positive or negative.

Note: In our most recent study of customer service on Twitter, we found that the demand for customer support through the social network has grown by 44% year-over-year.

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Profiles and Messaging: Look at each of your social media profiles and assess their status as part of your brand messaging. On each network, determine who is your target audience, and how your brand is portrayed. You’ll want to look at your brand’s overall messaging and targeting strategies in conjunction with your social profiles to ensure that each profile adheres to your brand’s image and guidelines. For example, answer the questions in Worksheet Section 2. Note that we added an area for unofficial brand handles – this is very important because you want to make sure your brand has all the social networking accounts that could be affiliated with your brand. Any page that uses your brand handle and logo should be owned by your brand, as unofficial accounts can be confusing to customers and detract from your brand’s social networking performance. Once you’ve audited all your profiles against your brand’s overall messaging guidelines, you’ll begin setting baselines for your social networking posts that adhere to that messaging.

Activity Baselines: At this point in the audit, you will want to set baselines for your posting activity on each network. Break this part of the audit down by network, and determine your current baselines for each network. When looking at your post activity, it’s helpful to know what data or information your post frequency is based on, in order to determine whether or not you’re using the right data to set goals. Note this content in Section 3 of the Worksheet.

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Content Next, we’ll move on to content. What types of content does your brand push out on each channel and why? Who is responsible for generating that content? Are you using paid advertising on any of these channels, and who is responsible for that component of your social media strategy?

Here, take inventory on the types of content you produce, and where that content is used: Normal post - shared on which network – how often? Video - shared on which network – how often? Photo - shared on which network – how often? Link - shared on which network – how often? Paid or Promoted Content - shared on which network – how often? Comment - shared on which network – how often? Response - shared on which network – how often? Shares - used on which network – how often? To note this, use Worksheet Section 4.

Keywords and Copy: One place targeting is immediately apparent is through the keywords you use in your content. You may be familiar with keywords as a part of search engine optimization (SEO). In SEO, keywords are targeted in web content, in your web page titles and in URLs, as a way to help gain visibility in search. They are related to your brand’s business goals and should be based on key terms your customers would use to search for you or your product on the web. Now ask yourself: are you optimizing your social profiles as well (social media optimization, or SMO)? Many marketers forget to optimize their social profiles like they would optimize their website for search. This can be detrimental to your brand’s overall social media strategy though, since many users have much more exposure to brands’ social profiles through mobile applications than they have to a brand’s actual website.

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Why is it important to optimize for keywords in your social strategy? With the rise of mobile devices in internet usage, more people are accessing brands through social apps rather than via a web browser. Think of your phone or tablet – you probably have a Facebook app and it’s likely you have a Twitter app. If you have an Android smartphone, you’ve definitely got Google+ integration on your system, and being a business professional it’s not unlikely that you’re also using an app for LinkedIn. Being able to easily find those profiles in a mobile setting means that those mobile profiles need to be optimized for search. It’s likely you have a list of keywords for your SEO efforts and you should use the major keywords related to your brand or industry in your social profiles.

Note: Mobile internet use is rising! Consumers are buying more mobile devices than ever – including smartphones and tablets, which they use to access social networks. In fact, nearly 40% of all internet use in 2013 was via mobile devices. Optimize the use of mobile advertising to access the most users.

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If you’re new to the idea of using keywords to optimize your profiles, you can create a keyword list by considering keywords your clients and customers might use to search for your product or brand. Using both specific and general terms will increase your visibility for a wider range of topics.

To do this, outline your audience by: who, what, why and how. Then identify major search terms and keywords that might come up based on this outline. Use Section 5 to note down this information. Who are my customers? What are their needs? Why do they need my brand? How will they search for my brand?

Promoted or Paid Content Facebook has recently rolled out updates to their Ads platform that are designed to make the paid/promoted posts process easier. In addition, Twitter allows for promoted Tweets that are targetable by several criteria. As these social platforms are updated to better serve end-users, businesses are seeing a true need for paid media as a way to help bolster their social campaign performance. This means that as a major brand, you’ll need to consider paid media in the audit process in order to audit your presence holistically. In your overall social networking presence, look at which social network had the most leads, which had the highest quality leads, which leads cost the most and which leads cost the least. In doing this, you’ll get an overall feel of which ads best benefit your company. You can do this with the grid in Section 6 – noting that your conversion type may be a lead, a click, a purchase, a like, or any other action you want your customer to take.

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Note: Some of these channels may not have a paid media option, or you may be using an outside solution to drive conversion for these channels. Having an inventory of these factors will help you determine which channels have the highest value for your brand in terms of paid media.

Creative Content While you’re auditing your content strategy, ensure that the content you’re producing meets your brand’s marketing standards for style, quality, and voice. Use your brand’s messaging guidelines to ensure your content meets brand standards. For example, if you’re promoting blog posts on Facebook, you’ll want to consider whether or not to feature an image, what your call to action should be, and whom you’re targeting with the content. Doing this for your content will help tailor that content to your audience’s needs. You may find it easiest to come up with a document outlining the recommended style and tone of your social media posts. Think about: Who are we writing for? What is our relation to that audience? What tone of voice should we take with that audience? Use Section 7 to answer these questions.

Campaigns Next, you’ll need to audit your campaign strategy – especially if you have product or content launches, major product updates, or just general advertising or awareness campaigns. Answer the questions on Section 8 to audit your campaign strategy.

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Outlining this information will give you KPIs to monitor the campaign process and measure your campaign performance on each network. In addition, consider your cross-channel promotion and how you’re maintaining a consistent message on all your networks. You’ll want to be strategic about how you promote campaigns across channels for maximum impact. You may find that promoting Facebook campaigns via Twitter lead to more likes, or that promoting campaigns on Pinterest using visually stunning graphics has the most desired effect.

Analysis and Findings By now, you’ve aggregated a massive amount of data that you’ll need to analyze. Using the above inventory items you should now be able to audit your performance.

Channels: While you’re looking at your presence across the major social networks, take note of which channels seem to perform well. You can confirm this through data analysis.

The Simply Measured Complete Social Media Snapshot, for example, will show you your metrics for engagement across all your social profiles to give you a quick look into which channels are the most successful. In the above report, we see that the brand’s most active channel is Twitter, but Instagram seems to do well in highest engagement per post, and has the most engagement as a percent of audience. This means that the brand may want to consider building more of a presence on Instagram.

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Channel by channel, youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll want to go through the data you collected and analyze your community â&#x20AC;&#x201C; from how many actions your posts drive, to the rate of engagement, to how quickly you respond to customers. Use Figure 9 to audit your channels using the following metrics:

Community Size: How large is your audience on the social network?

Community Growth: By what percent should your audience grow each reporting period?

Desired Action: What action are you trying to drive on that social network? Is it clicks? Likes? Shares?

Number of Actions: How many desired actions have come from the social network over the reporting period?

Action Value: What is your cost per action? If you donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have a cost, consider ranking them on number scale, or using subjective values like high, medium, and low.

Engagement Rate: What percentage of your community engaged with your content (engaged users/total audience)?

Response Rate: What percentage of audience-generated posts do you respond to?

Response Time: How long on average does it take your brand to respond to audiencegenerated posts or requests?

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Brand Mentions: How many overall mentions and/or shares does your brand have? This could be retweets and @mentions on Twitter, shares on Facebook, Google+ or LinkedIn, reblogs on Tumblr, etc. Compare this data between reporting periods to find out how your brand is performing in each area. Then using that data you should be able to assess your performance by channel.

Keywords: On your social channels, take note of which keywords perform well in posts. The Simply Measured Conversation Driver Analysis report will tell you how keywords perform across all social networks so you can get an idea of how your SEO keywords work in a social networking environment.

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The top performing keywords for weekly Twitter chats in May 2012 are shown above. If a brand wanted to run its own social media Twitter chat, they would want to use these major keywords in their brand profile and in their promotions for the event to optimize for search.

Determine: Which keywords are used the most? How frequently are they used? Are my social networking profiles branded with these keywords? List your keywords in Section10.

Content: Take note of what performs well among your audience â&#x20AC;&#x201C; whether itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s video, photos, or text posts. Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll want to compare this with your current social media strategy to make sure that your strategy aligns with what resonates with your fans and followers. Using the Simply Measured Facebook Page Insights report for example, you can drill down the data to find out what type of content resonates best with your audience, which days and what times your current audience is online, and more.

Here, we can see that the brand focuses on Twitter posts, but the engagement on those posts is relatively low compared to the engagement on photos on Facebook and Instagram. Examining how well different types of content perform across channels will give you insight into how you can adapt your content curation to drive more brand awareness. Use Section11 to examine your content.

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Paid Media: When auditing your paid media options, youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll want to look the cost and quality of your conversions. You may find that high quality conversions cost more, or that youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re not targeting a social network that has decent low-cost leads. You should be able to answer the questions on Section 12.

Social Campaigns Evaluate your social media campaign on a broad scale to get an overall look at how your campaigns perform. Looking at your campaigns as a function of both engagement, and engagement by post type will give you insight into how well certain types of campaigns perform on different channels. Do this using Section 13.

Audience When we talked about auditing your keywords and content we mentioned your audience. Answering who, what, where and why will help your brand decide how to effectively target your social networking presence to a specific audience.

Using reporting tools in conjunction with your audience targeting will allow you to you glean extra information to make informed decisions about which audience segments have the most value. The Simply Measured Twitter Follower report, for example, tells you your audience breakdown by Tweet activity, by Klout score, by the keywords they use most and by their time zone. In addition, it will show you who your most influential followers are so you can engage the users that drive the most valuable content for your

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brand. If you’re a brand whose product is a tool to help users manage their social media post content, you’ll likely want users with high Klout scores similar to your own.

Here, Use The Audience Questions You Wrote Down To Answer The Following: Who are your target audience? How does your true audience differ? How are you targeting content towards your target audience? What keywords are you using to target them? What content is the most engaging? What social network provides the most engagement? We’ve provided space under Section 14 to answer these questions.

Competitors One of the basic tenets of market analysis is competitive analysis within your industry. As an industry leader, you’ll want to assess your competitors’ performance to identify areas of success and areas of improvement. Use Section15 to track your competitors. After taking a general look at your competitors, drill down your analysis and try to answer the following questions:

Branding: What is their overall image or theme? How do they portray themselves? How do they portray the brand or industry?

Engagement: What’s their engagement rate? Is it higher or lower than your brand’s?

Frequency: How often do they post? Do they use multiple channels?

Popularity: How many followers/likes does the brand or influencer have?

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Types of posts: What topics do they frequently discuss and how do the posts perform?

Running reports like the above Facebook Competitive Analysis report will give you an idea of how well your brand performs in your industry. The report will tell you what types of posts your competitors use most, how often they post per day, and what their average engagement is per post.

Outlining this information for your competitors gives you insight into how the industry is trending so that you can take advantage of social networks that perform well and discuss topics relevant to your industry. Taking this proactive approach will also allow you to easily adapt your strategy to audience segments and trends.

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Reporting Your Findings Having done your analysis you’ll now be able to report on the above bullet points and make recommendations based on that. You’ll be able identify areas for improvement and current successes. For reporting, we recommend a template laid out in the following way: Introduction 1. What are the goals of your audit and what are your recommendations? 2. What are the technical details of the audit – time period, networks, etc. 3. How is the audit organized? a. Network Inventory b. Content Inventory c. Paid Media Inventory 4. Who should implement the recommendations?

Findings 1. Introduce the concept you’ll discuss in your finding. 2. Introduce the importance of that finding. a. How does that finding affect your business process? b. What are your current benchmarks for this finding? c. What are your goals for this finding? 3. Show specific examples of the finding. a. Show specific examples of success. b. Show specific examples of how to improve.

Recommendations 1. Re-introduce the finding. 2. Make recommendations based on your areas for improvement. 3. Introduce KPIs for each finding. 4. Lay out the steps for achieving the KPIs. 5. Set a timeline for achieving the KPIs.

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Conclusion As you routinely take stock of your social accounts, highlight new or different key performance indicators (KPIs) that will help you measure and improve your social networking performance across each social network. For each one, rank your brand in each area to find out where you stand. Then, set goals with which to assess your future performance. From there, you will have a better understanding of which social networks are the most effective for your brand and how you should create and distribute your content. A social media audit is a must for any business thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s looking to expand, to change, or to grow their social networking presence. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s important to perform an audit at least yearly, if not quarterly, to find out how your brand is meeting KPIs. It will help you determine which social networks have the most benefit for your brand so you can focus on building social audiences on those networks. It can also help you determine where you should expand your reach and develop more targeted content. Using tools like the Simply Measured social media analytics reports will make it easier perform a social media audit. The reports have the data to show you facts about your audience or your content that you may not have previously known, discover the KPIs you should meet, and monitor and track the success of your social media strategy.

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