Why crafting the perfect social media post is more than a 2-minute job

The blog was originally posted in September 2018.

So how long does it take you to make a post on your personal Facebook or Instagram page?

Around the office, the answer seems to be ‘about two minutes’. Maybe a photo or video of the kids, a caption, “So cute when they play together!” and done. Or perhaps a nice view, with a glass of wine in shot, caption “Not a bad place for a Saturday afternoon!” tag the location, and done.

Ask about a social media post for a client and the answer is a little different.

Why does it take longer to craft a social media post for a business?

When we are posting on behalf of a business, there is a bit more involved.

For starters, personal posts are usually snapshots or highlights from your life (random or carefully curated, depending on your style). On the other hand, a business social media profile needs to be a consistent, planned, on-brand experience that builds the business’ digital profile in keeping with other digital assets, such as the website, blog, e-news and so on.

Posts need to be planned out ahead of time and integrated with the wider content plan and marketing plan, but then they also need to be carefully implemented.   

Picture perfect

As clients, community and prospects scroll, scroll, scroll through their feeds, having the right image to grab their attention is critical. Whether it is choosing a stock image, selecting from the client’s image library or creating an image, it is an important part of a successful social post.

Once the image is sourced or created it is time to put it into the post. This means cropping, and possibly editing again to make sure it looks right on each of the different platforms and is consistent with the brand.

#Hashtags

Researching and using the right hashtags to get the best reach for your posts is so important for profile in the social space – and it is key to driving your organic reach on Instagram.  About 25% of the time we spend on an Instagram post relates to hashtag research.

Like Goldilocks making her way through the bears’ house it is important to get it just right. A hashtag that is used too widely means your post may get lost, a hashtag that is too specialised or used too rarely means your posts may never be seen.

You also need to consider your niche – what are you the specialist in, and how will hashtags help you find your people? If you are a florist using #flowers might seem a natural move, but at last check there were 136 million posts on Instagram with that tag. However, #aucklandflorist had 13,400, #floristauckland had 530 and #aucklandweddingflorist had 1,613.

Developing a brand or campaign hashtag and then using it consistently for each post is a great practice and can be taken further by encouraging partners and customers to get on board as well.

A few key things to keep in mind; don’t just copy and paste every time, change some to keep them relevant to the post.  Also, make sure you check all your hashtags before you use them – you never know what might relate to something you don’t want to be associated with.

The fight

Our clients may not realise this, but we brave warriors regularly go into battle on their behalf. We fight with the nuances, irregularities and constant updates of the social media platforms to get each post loaded, looking right and posted.

Facebook is constantly rolling out updates and trialling new versions (to the point that we can be sitting right next to each working on a different version of Facebook) which means we have to stay up to date and on our toes.

Boost it baby

Facebook’s most recent major algorithm overhaul was to get back to connecting people, meaning posts made by individuals would have a better organic ranking than those by businesses. This means for most business posts, boosting is an important part of getting your content seen.

A boost is not as simple as just clicking the “Boost” button, but the right audience for each post needs to be selected – and again, the options available are constantly changing.

Creating a quality social presence that is an asset for your brand is not a two minute job and should not be treated as such.

If you’re serious about your brand’s social media marketing, talk to us.