You may have your killer social media campaign, and you are writing excellent blogs. That's every bright Internet marketer's foundational success steps. However, you might see a roadblock you aren't sure how to tie social media and blogging together the correct way.
In this blog, I am going to look at some great tips for tying your social media and blog together to get the most results from readers and followers. Let's get started!
18 Awesome Ways to Tie Your Social Media and Content As One, The Right Way
Here are some well-researched ideas to make sure your blog and social media channels tie together seamlessly, giving you the best results possible.
1. Repurpose Your Content for Great Social Sharing. A perfect way to tie your social media and blogging together is to repurpose your content, and share each piece of your repurposed content. This gives you the chance to get more mileage out of great topics and provides your clients with multiple formats to view specific pieces. If you have a new social channel that you didn't previously, then share your older blogs on that social channel to reach out to a newer audience and increase reader views.
2. Use Social Sharing Buttons on Your Website and Each Blog. When you set up your website and blog, you will have the chance to use social share buttons. This can help increase your social shares and get more clicks and visits to your page. Once someone has read a blog they like, if you provide them with the social share option, they are more likely to share it on their preferred channels. Always have Facebook, Twitter, and G+ available, but consider having something like Pinterest or LinkedIn as well. Just figure out which share buttons are going to work the best for your content.
3. You Need Valuable, Quality Content for Both Blogs and Social Media. Another great way to tie your social media and blogging together is always to have high-quality, valuable content on each platform. If you write a quality update about a blog that isn't high quality, you can lose people pretty quickly. Avoid making any type of low-quality content to help bring in and keep readers, and eventually customers. Remember to make sure you always spend enough time writing and create awesome, quality posts on both social media and, of course, your blog!
4. Images are Important for Social Media and Blogs. Our culture is quickly becoming a very visual one. If you go to the movies, you will notice that while you can see movies that focus on great stories, that they also all have appealing imagery. Whether The Hobbit, Ender's Game, or even Birdman, these films all have a strong focus on images and how things look. Because people love visuals, this means that images on both your social media accounts and blogs are vital. Consider using an image you used in your blog when you craft your social media update to tie them together!
5. Give Clients the Ability to Give You Their Twitter Handle. When you write up a blog, you can always end it with encouraging people to follow you on a certain social channel. However, it could be excellent for you if you also allow your clients to submit their Twitter handle or username, giving you the ability to follow them. This creates engagement on your blog, and also helps you get more followers and create greater relationships with your client base. This doesn't mean you need to reply every update they make, but if they mention your Twitter account, you can easily see it and respond right back. In fact, if they have an immediate question, by having you following them, they are able to send you a direct message on Twitter. Quite handy! Remember, make sure that your clients can submit their username in a safe manner - don't have it out there for just anyone to see.
6. Host Offers that are Only Available on Social Media and Blogs. You can quickly up your social shares and tie social media in with blogs if you provide offers that are only available to people on social media. You can write up a blog about a certain product or idea and then provide people with the ability to have a certain percentage off or something similar if they follow you on social media. You can further drive this offer by posting about it on your social channel and encourage people to share or re-tweet.
7. Promote Your Social Channels on Your Blog and Your Blog on Social Channels. Along with hosting offers for social media followers on your blog, you can also promote your other social channels regularly. When you finish up a post, say something at the end about, "Do you want to know more about this item? Then follow us on Facebook!" Encourage readers to follow whichever social channel you are promoting. On the other side of the coin, promote your blog on social media. Craft your posts encouraging people to read your latest blog to learn about a product or a DIY tip.
8. Always Share Your Posts. Never, ever avoid sharing a blog. You want people to come and read it; you've worked hard on it, so share it! Do you have older blogs that you never shared because you didn't have social media at the time? Then share those! Don't neglect your past blog posts. If they're a little outdated, consider updating them and sharing that you've added an update.
9. Share Your Posts Multiple Times Throughout the Day and Month. In order to get a great tie in with your social media and blog, you should set up a schedule to post blogs routinely for a day, week, and month. Buffer has a great resource on how often you should share your blog posts while also avoiding seeming like you are spamming your readers. Take a look and start implementing this into your social media share strategy.
10. Engage With Clients Both on Blogs and Social Media. When trying to add cohesiveness to your blog and social media channels, a great idea is always to engage with your readers and followers. This can help create relationships with clients and encourage them to stick with your company. Some companies might only think they need to engage with clients on social media. If you do that, your social media and blogging practices won't be tied together very well! Instead, make sure you are engaging on all fronts - social media, blogs, and other forms of contact.
11. Use a Program Like Hootsuite to Make it Easier. When you write up your blog, you know that you need to share immediately, and several times throughout the week and month. However, you might get a little worried because you just can't think of a way to manage this with your already busy schedule. Never fear! There are excellent programs that help you schedule out your posts for days, weeks, months, and even years if you think that far ahead!
The one I recommend is Hootsuite because it is very user-friendly and it works the best for my social media management requirements! Take a look today - you can get the free version with up to three social channels and upgrade your account if you want or need.
12. Adopt a Friendly Voice for Both Social Media and Blogs. The thing with social media and blogging is that people want to read useful information, but they also want to read something that sounds friendly. You can easily adopt this into your strategy and make the space a safe and fun environment for all followers, readers, and visitors. You don't have to adopt a very laidback approach to be friendly, however, so you won't have to sacrifice a more professional tone. Take a look at some of the social and blog campaigns your competitors or similar companies are doing and look at how they utilize a friendly, yet professional, tone.
13. Put Social Follow Buttons at the Top of Your Website. When you create or updated your website, you have the opportunity to integrate your social media into, not only blogging, but all of your content. How can you do this? You can add social media follow buttons at the very top of your website to encourage followers. This will bring people to your social sites, which can also bring them to specific blog posts, and possibly convert those visitors into leads. Remember, your landing page content needs to be gripping to encourage people to use your company and follow you, but this is something you can easily do!
14. Select Which Blogs or Social Updates Go to Which Channels. While you can easily do a bulk upload with the same content across all channels, you need to consider if this is what you really want. You will also need to know if this will work for all of your social channels. There are many things you can easily share on Facebook and Twitter, but when it comes to LinkedIn, the post or social update might not be professional enough. If you write a very laidback, DIY type blog, consider sharing on sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest and share things that are more industry related on LinkedIn. Just research the social site and demographic to figure out what you should and shouldn't share on that particular channel.
15. Utilize Programs Such as StumbleUpon. StumbleUpon can be a great way for people to not only find your blog, but also your social channels. When someone "stumbles upon" your blog with this program, they will be able to read your post, and it can lead them to your site and eventually social media. In addition, it can also increase your social shares. Many times, when someone sees something they like on StumbleUpon, they are more likely to share it instantly on their social channels, which is exactly what you want!
16. Shorten or Hide Links You Share on Social Media. When you are sharing a link to social media, you should always make sure you shorten it. This will look professional and organized. It will also give you something amazing in return - analytics! That's right. If you use a link-shortening program like Bit.ly, you can get some incredible metric and analytics for free. This can help you see how many people are clicking on the link and possibly help you tweak your strategy to make it more powerful. In addition, if you are given the option to hide the link such as with Facebook, do so! If you don't need a link to show, the better your social post will look.
17. Keep Your Blog Name the Same as Your Social Username. Another perfect way to tie your blog and social media together is to keep your social usernames the same or similar to your blog or business name. This keeps things consistent and makes your website, blog, and social channels look familiar to your clients and visitors. Keeping things consistent is something that is always suggested for awesome brand campaigns, and it comes down to the username, images, and, of course, running the same campaign on each channel! People will thank you for keeping things consistent, and you'll be able to see this in the form of some pretty awesome revenue.
18. Stay On Social Channels, Even if You Don't See Traffic Right Away. You might be getting readers from your email campaigns or the clients who already found you before your social media campaign, but you aren't getting any social media traffic. Does this mean it is time to throw in the towel? It sure seems that way, but let me tell you that is the last thing you want to do! Stay on the social channels, keep updating, keep tweeting, keep promoting your blogs, and eventually the traffic will start to increase. It can take a bit for traffic to pick up, but stay strong and you will begin to see amazing results soon. Yes, that means to keep posting your blogs, too! Once you get the traffic, you want those people to see your blogs, don't you?
Tie Your Social Media and Blog Together for Amazing Results!
Try a few of these out today to see which help you! In fact, why not try several? Are there any particular ideas that stand out to you? Which ones do you plan on trying? Let me know in the comments!