Social Media

Lesson 3: Social Media

In the previous lesson, we briefly introduced the concept of SEO, and how you can help protect yourself. We will continue with aspects beyond your blog with creating social media accounts for yourself to help promote and create a community for your blog.

Social Media Platforms

It is important to create social media channels for your blog. It creates a social environment for you to interact with your audience outside of your blog. It also helps you promote your blog to a larger audience. However, social media is just as big of a commitment as your blog. If you are already lacking time to work on your blog and meeting the consistency that is required with that, you probably should not add a social media channel to that workload. Only create as many social media channels as you have time for. Consistency is just as important when it comes to social media.

This list is not in any order of importance, but this does show our progression into social media (with some additions that we do not have)…

Facebook

With the largest number of users of any social networking website, this is one you should consider joining to promote your blog. You can create a page for your blog through your Facebook profile page. This is excellent for long posts that other social media sites would not let you do. It is a good idea to post one or two times per day on Facebook to remain consistent, but to also not overwhelm your readers’ timelines.

Instagram

Another great platform to join, especially if photography is your passion. It recently released a business profile for accounts that allows you to see analytics of your page. It is definitely worth it to join and post regularly. It allows for long posts as well, so try to offer more insight to each picture or even your story. Do be careful to not constantly make posts preaching your blog site and linking to it. Instagram is more about sharing photos with one another. Add a link in your description to your website and that should be good enough for those wanting to see more from you. Post on Instagram once to three times a day, but be careful not to run out of content to post.

Twitter

A great platform to connect with others and join the conversation on certain topics. Though you are limited to 140 characters, that should be enough to post about your new blog post and begin a conversation. This is a great network to get in touch with influencers in your market. Post on Twitter around ten times per day and engage with others.

YouTube

Much like if you are into photography for Instagramers, if you are into video then YouTube is your platform. Create a video, upload it, and begin creating a brand around those videos. Leave insightful comments, subscribe, and network with those in similar markets to start building your following. Try to post a video every week to remain relevant.

Google +

This is a great platform for relationship building, though it is not a network we are too familiar with.

Pinterest

Sharing photos from around the web, as well as your own photos and ideas, is pinned on your Pinterest account for all to see This platform holds an overwhelming female audience, so if your target audience is female, then this is the social media network you will wan tot invest some time in.

Tumblr

This is a microblogging platform to allow you to share small posts.

Reddit

A strong community that allows you to subscribe to subreddits based on certain categories. This is a good place to join the community and see where you can help people by offering value to conversations. It is not a good place to promote your link on every post. Read the guidelines and see how you can promote your blog.

Quora

Very similar to Reddit, Quora is separated into topics where users ask questions and get answers. This is a bit more friendly for inserting a backlink to your content, but do not get carried away with this. Offer value with your answers, and you can insert a link in your bio.

After you create a social media account, create a bio related to that network. Do not create one and copy it to every bio section to each of your social network channels. Remember to add a link into your bio. Avoid spamming people to check out your website, rather let them find your link in your bio if they are interested. Start your account by adding people within your network, and make your first post.