Content marketing is part art with a touch of science.

Creating great content requires a word smith or a creative video producer. The better this foundation is, the more attractive the content is to the viewer and increasing its chances for sharing on the web.

That’s the art part.
So we all know that high quality content and social media sharing and engagement are the driving force behind traffic and conversions. Yet most people don’t have a clear strategy for tracking and analysing performance.
This is the simple science.

Most of us periodically check our Google Analytics to find the number of visitors, or referrals from Google or Facebook, but few know how to use other data available in analytics to maximize their social media and content marketing strategies.

Do you know how to use Google Analytics data to come up with ideas for new articles? Or how Pinterest analytics can help you learn more about your buyer personas, thus helping you shape your message?

In this article I will discuss 6 simple ways to use analytics data to assist with your content marketing strategy.

1. Using long-tail keywords for keyword research

Keyword research is an easy way to brainstorm content. While you might optimize your site architecture with your primary keywords, you also probably know that these should be used sparingly in order to avoid picking up red flags by Penguin.

However, the long-tail keywords you find during your keyword research can still be incorporated into your content. Keyword buckets and competitive research should yield hundreds of potential keywords that can be used as inspiration for content.

If the content is going onto your site, use keywords as the base for article titles and organize them to create a flow for an editorial calendar. High-value keywords can be interspersed with diverse and low-competition keywords, all of which will benefit your site, while allowing you generate large amounts of content and keep to a regular posting schedule.

Start by going to Google Analytics, and pulling a Search report by keyword (Traffic Sources > Sources > Search > Overview). Change the number of keywords displayed to 100. Then take those keywords and use them to run a ranking report. Identify keywords that have brought you traffic but you are not ranking in the top 5. Then use those keywords as part of your content marketing efforts.

2. Creating personas 

When publishing content you should always have a target audience in mind, but within that audience you can develop buyer personas that will help you understand who you are writing for and what their interests will be. You want to consider which stage of the purchase funnel they belong to as well as what questions they may want answered.

As you move along your publishing schedule, you will begin to see which personas respond to your content. Perhaps those in your top-of-the-funnel persona comment most on general advice articles, while those toward the bottom of the funnel are more likely to share your latest company updates on social media. You want to be aware of what they are responding to and react accordingly.

You can track social shares with a tool like TrackUr, or of course, Google Analytics.

3. Studying pinterest

When it comes to content marketing, Pinterest is a valuable social media platform. Pinterest is based solely on unique, shareable content, which makes it the perfect pool for brainstorming and testing out ideas.

Determine what category your content falls under and at a quick glance you can see what types of content are trending and getting the most repins. Look at sites like Repinly which tracks the most popular pins and boards on Pinterest to get ideas of what content will perform well on Pinterest, and what you should be pinning to gain your own Pinterest following.

Once you’ve begun pinning you can delve into analytics data with tools like PinLeague, which I use to look at the statistics of images that Iíve pinned as well as what images have been pinned from my website. You can see what images and pins are getting shared and by whom, which can give you insight into your audience demographics and help further develop your buyer personas.

4. Benchmarking real-time data

Benchmarking is also extremely important to keeping on top of your content marketing efforts. These tools can help you grasp the popularity of your content and what direction it should take by providing a range of metrics.

Cyfe is the benchmarking dashboard Iíve found most useful as it allows me to track a variety of metrics on multiple social platforms, and displays that information all in one place for quick, real-time analysis of social followers, visitors, leads and customers.

Comparing this data to a site-specific tool like Pinleague will allow you to better understand what content your audience is responding to, and the better you understand your audience, the sooner you will be able to produce content that is valuable and relevant to that audience.

Cyfe is a tool that i refer to on a daily basis. It allows me to, at a glance, see how all of my sites and clients are performing. I can see traffic trends, social shares, and much more. From this view, I can then investigate if I see a major spike or decrease of traffic. For example, if there ís a spike in traffic and social shares, I will then go to Google Analytics and find the landing page that generated this traffic and social shares. Then, based on the content, I wíll write more content specific to this topic.

5. Sharing site-specific content

Now that you have an understand of exactly what content your audience wants, you can begin to create strategies specific to each site you intend to share it on.

Pinleague will give you an idea of what content is most shareable on Pinterest. If, for example, a company that sells study guides posts an infographic on the college acceptance rates, and gets 10 unique pins and 500 repins, then any future content they develop on college statistics should be accompanied by strong graphics so that it can be easily integrated into Pinterest.

At the same time, fans of their Facebook page might prefer study guide updates or the latest discounts, which reveals that Facebook might be the best site for attracting traffic and conversions. By paying attention to analytics data you can convert them from followers to potential clients to sales.

6. Repurpose content 

Now that you are tracking and investigating the success of your content, you have access to a wealth of data about the performance of your content. Let’s say that one of your infographics gets tons of repins. Why not convert this infographic into a video? Or write an article based on the content for the infographic, or vice versa?

Repurposing content, especially content that you already know is successful and your audience really likes, is an excellent way to increase your reach without taking much of a gamble. Youíd be maximizing your resources to create more opportunities for conversions.

How to get started

So I have given you the theory, now let’s get to practicalities:

1. Set a weekly task for yourself to visit your Google Analytics account and check the performance of your content based on Landing Pages and Keywords. Check out bounce rate, engagement, conversion rate, etc for these so you can determine how your content is performing.
2. Set up a ranking tool. If you donít already have keyword tracking in place, go to AuthorityLabs and create an account. Enter your most popular keywords, as well as keywords that are bringing you the most traffic from Google. Plan on creating more content around keywords that are bringing in traffic but not ranking in the top 5.
3. Set up social media analytics software†to track your social shares and in-depth statistics for Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and Pinterest. Cyfe is also a great dashboard to set up as an overview.
4. Use the data from all the sources mentioned above to modify your editorial calendar and content marketing strategy.

How do you use Analytics for content marketing? What has helped you maximize the efforts of your content marketing strategy? Don’t be shy….share!

So you’ve been told to create a Facebook business page right? Apparently having a page will put your business on the map, you’ll drive loads of leads to your website, blog, offers and make a ton of sales!
Along the way you’ll also build your credibility, reach and influence and perhaps become a celebrity CEO or a well known public figure (if that floats your boat!)

Well, all this is actually true! It can all happen and more, there is a “but” though and it’s a BIG one!

It will come down to the amount of time and effort you put into your page. Unfortunately we can no longer just slap a page up and people come flocking.

Oh no, times have changed on Facebook.

So what are the fundamental things you MUST do to get your first 1,000 fans on Facebook and consequently your leads & profile?

Here’s 10 Steps which, if carried out with gusto and invested in regularly will bring you untold rewards of great engagement and exposure! Ready? Let’s begin.

Step 1. Make your page interesting

I know this sounds obvious, but actually you wouldn’t believe how many boring pages there are on Facebook. This of course is great news for you as it means the market is wide open for fabulously designed interesting Facebook pages!

Here’s what I mean by interesting;


Step 2. Create epic content

This is a toughie. You would have to be some kind of Super Hero if you could create EPIC content with every post you make. But you must strive to deliver the most interesting, relevant and results based content you can for your target market.

One of the ways to do this is to ask yourself – Will this content I am about to publish create CHANGE! How can I invoke action? How can I add the most value?

All great questions to ask as you make a post and I mean any post, from a small status update to a full on promotional campaign. Need some inspiration for content ideas?

In the meantime by content I mean, status updates, videos, images, comments, blog posts, webinars, contest. Pretty much anything you publish publicly!

Step 3. Invite and tell all your friends

Facebook gives us the opportunity to invite our friends in the admin panel above our page.



So make good use of it and go and ask your pals if they’ll come and like your page.

You could also send a message out to some of your nearest and dearest and ask them to share with their community. Please note this will only work if their community is in the same niche as you. So if your target market is arts & crafts, it’s no good sending it your pal who specialises in personal finance!
Also please don’t SPAM! It’s super uncool. So don’t just send this out to a random group of people in your FB address book, hoping someone will do the right thing. You will end up with lots of people leaving your conversation, probably some spam reports and many unlikes!

Something you can do though, that is super powerful is to post about your new page on your personal wall, (include a photo), asking your friends to like it. I’ve done this very regularly and it always gets great results!

You can also set up a Facebook event announcing your new page and invite all your friends to the event and of course you can offer an ethical bribe in the form of a free gift, but people need to head over to your page to retrieve it. Very effective!

Step 4. Get networking

Absolutely necessary and absolutely time consuming! This is probably the most time consuming role you will have on Facebook but without this your business will grow very slowly!

The more you can get out into the Facebook community and comment on others posts, get involved in the conversation, like pages and generally be a social butterfly, the more you will reap the rewards!

One great tool to help you do this is “Interest Lists”. You can create interest lists for all your favorite pages and people, and then save it as your main news feed. This means you’ll only see posts from the pages and people you most want to see content from / network with and filter out all the noise!

Very effective and time saving!


Step 5.  Run contests

Who doesn’t love a good contest eh?? That’s what makes these little gems go viral! People love to win free stuff! Done correctly contests can rocket your fan base and your customer database in a very short space of time.

The key is to create a page tab for a contest and add a like-gate to the tab. That’s basically an image that overlays on top of the contest information and tells visitors they need to ‘like’ the page before they can enter the contest. You need to be creative with this as it can turn some people off, but on the whole, you’ll get a lot more likes and lots of contest entries also! (Remember on the thank you page of your contest you can encourage people to visit your website and all sorts, but I’ll save the benefits of funnel building for another post!)

Here’s my Top Tips to running a successful contest;

• Make your prize great & relevant! Not just an mini iPad. Remember you want to attract a targeted audience.
• Know the objective of your contest. If you’re simply looking to get a lot of likes and optins over a short period of time, make the contest super easy. A simple sweepstake will do, where the visitor enters their email address to enter. If you want to increase engagement, encourage reviews or create some user generated content for your site, then perhaps a picture contest or a video contest. Remember the higher the barrier to entry the less entrants, but possibly a higher quality more targeted audience.
• Make your contest easy to share! You want it to get out to as many people as possible, so add share links and encourage the entrant to share the contest for an increased chance of winning.
• Keep it short. To create excitement, add a bit of scarcity. Make the contest 1 – 2 weeks max and let everyone know as time is running out to enter. You’ll have lots of frantic activity in the last few days and a nice viral effect!
• Use a 3rd party app and ensure you comply with the Facebook promotional guidelines – https://www.facebook.com/page_guidelines.phpHave fun with it!!!

Here’s 15 more Steps for Creating Successful Social Media Giveaway Contests

Step 6. Host webinars

I LOVE webinars! When I first started my Facebook career way back when, I would say that webinars were the biggest draw of fans to my page and customers to my business! The same is true today. With every webinar I market, present and replay I gather a huge new raft of fans and potential customers.

PLUS and here’s the biggie… A webinar means you create INSTANT RAPPORT with your audience. If you invite people to attend a webinar with you and you spend an hour or so giving epic content and chatting with your audience you will find there is really nothing more powerful, except perhaps to be in a room one to one with them.

Again you can create a page tab for your webinar registration form and market the page. As people come to register for the webinar, because you have an interesting page, epic content and loads going on they will of course like your page and engage with your posts. Thereby building your fan base, your engagement rates and your subscriber database.

Step 7. Facebook ads

I couldn’t write an entire post about increasing your fan base without Facebook ads. Well I can’t nowadays anyway. I remember the days when our posts were seen by the majority of our fans!
Unfortunately this is no longer the case. Our posts are only seen by approximately 10 – 15% of our fans so to get our message out into the news feeds of all of our likers, we have to pay! Whilst I would rather get it for free, as someone who has been in marketing for over 20 years I can also see why FB are doing it this way and I have to say, Facebook ads are cheaper and more targeted than any offline marketing techniques I have used over the years.

So as business owners and marketers we really shouldn’t moan too much!


I have to tell you, the ads that get us the BEST results are page post ads. In other words, you post a normal status update, with a very interesting 90 character first line, a fantastic image and a compelling description and then use the Facebook ads platform to target it specifically. These ads show up on the right hand side of the newsfeed like normal ads, but are more descriptive and have the wonderful social element of people liking, commenting, sharing etc.

You can also get these ads into the newsfeed and hence pockets (via mobile) of your target audience by using the power editor. I’m afraid I will have to leave explanation of using the power editor to another post as it really is a subject all on it’s own. It is there and it is very effective.

Step 8. Interesting threads

OK, we’re heading towards the home stretch here! I have seen some great threads over my time surfing the Facebook landscape. But I have to tell you, they’re few and far between. Most of the stuff you’ll see coming down your newsfeed is absolute drivel! Sorry posters, but it’s true.

Much like Point 1, this leaves it wide open for you to get in there and be original and interesting!

An example of an interesting thread is when it’s more focused on the customer than your business. I saw a speed coaching thread recently that made me go and instantly like the page.

The host had posted – in the next 30 minutes I am going to answer all of your questions, post NOW. He had absolutely loads of comments and questions being fired at him and he went through and answered every single one. It was an amazing thread of info. Another idea is having a guest ‘poster’, So getting someone well respected in your niche and having them come to your wall for a couple of hours to answer fan questions.

Something we used to do was at a specific time on a specific day have a themed event, ie., one very successful one we ran was 60 book suggestions in 60 minutes. We had hundreds of comments, book suggestions and discussions that everyone could get a lot out of. Plus of course a whole load of new likes!

Please note to run these type of ‘wall’ events, you need to be consistent. Just doing one won’t cut it. So only start this if you have the resource to keep it going.

Step 9. Add a Facebook “like” box to your blog/website

Super important and super easy! Add a like box to your blog.

Here’s how.

1. Go to https://developers.facebook.com/docs/plugins/
2. Click on “Like Box”
3. Enter the URL of your fan page
4. Copy the code and paste into the sidebar of your blog or wherever you want it to show on your website.

People can now “like” your facebook page from your website.

Step 10. The engagement circle

This is a little diagram I created maybe a year or so ago and I affectionately called it “The Engagement Circle”.


As you grow your Facebook page and your business, you will build a customer database or a ‘list’ as it’s known in the online marketing world. As you create more content and more posts and hold more events etc, you should be emailing your database and inviting them to come over and like and engage with your page. Not everyone who signs up will have liked your page, so you need to ask them to!

Why do I need them to like my page if they’re already in my email database Jo, I hear you cry? The answer is you want to be able to communicate with your prospective audience on a multitude of platforms. Email, Social Media, Skype, Instant Messaging, Evernote, Drive – there are so many more options these days.

The more channels you can disseminate information across, the more chance you have of getting in front of the eyes of your target market. Remember there is a lot of noise out there, it’s your job as a marketer to cut through that noise and directly impact your potential customers with your Epic Content!

I’m sure you’ve heard this before many times, but please remember it’s about quality not quantity. There’s no point in having a page with 100,000 fans if no-one engages, gets involved or turns into a customer! This is a business remember!

But know this, getting to your first 1000 fans is just the first step. Next you need to turn your fans into customers, but that’s another story coming to a blog post near you soon…..

Now don’t just read – go out and take action on one of these steps today! Right NOW!

Have you ran any super successful fan getting campaigns? If so I’d love to hear about them! Let’s chat! Comment or leave feedback below, I will respond to every single post!

Thanks so much for reading! I hope this post has been useful!

Do you often update your Facebook business Page with new photos?



Do you have a particular posting strategy or just publish random pictures from time to time?

The fact is that with the latest Facebook policy changes, photo updates are now getting less organic reach than ever before. Nevertheless, the popularity of photo posts remains unshakeable: the majority of content posted on Facebook is pictures.

How can you use photo updates on Facebook to drive more engagement including likes, comments and shares?

Here are seven practices picked from popular Facebook Pages to help your photo posts get higher viral results and make more people learn about your business.

#1. Appeal to Personal Experience

On the whole, Facebook fans are ordinary people with similar tastes and habits. So photos appealing to fans’ personal experience have a good potential to reach large audience on Facebook. Fans more willingly respond to familiar things and situations, when they can say “Look, it’s about me!”.



Caption: AXE makes their fans recollect best school moments. Result: 34.5K likes, 2.1K shares.

There are some general themes everyone can use in this kind of photo update: memories from childhood, hard Mondays and long-awaited Fridays, Internet addiction, well-known movies and games, handheld gadgets, etc.

Perhaps, such a picture won’t tell much about your company or product (unless you try to tie it in). But this helps you to increase engagement around your photo update which will give you better exposure in news feeds and attract others to your page.

#2. Use Humor

Most likely, the products or services your company offers have little to do with humor.

However, is there a way for you to use funny pictures around your product features?



Caption: Firefox shows their page display options in such a funny way. Result: 9K likes, 1.7K shares

There are lots of cool images on the Web to make your fans laugh (or at least draw attention to your post in the news feed).

Put yourself in your fans’ place. Pick a funny picture your fans will understand and try to connect it with your brand or product.



Caption: Intel jokes on the “conception” of computers. Result: 105K likes, 36K shares.

Don’t go too far with black humor or vulgarity; otherwise the message of your update will be lost.
Images that are too provocative may encourage your fans to unsubscribe from your Facebook Page.

#3. Ask for Likes and Shares

Nobody welcomes long complicated comments that accompany photo posts; they’re simply ignored by fans in the news feed. So when you write text to go with an image, keep it short and ask your fans to like or share the update if they agree or feel the same.



Caption: Skype asks fans to like the post if they occurred in the similar situation. Result: 1.7K likes.

You may even invite fans to vote for one thing or another by using Like and Share buttons.



Caption: Walmart launches Facebook voting for the best Monopoly token: “Like” for cat, “Share” for iron. Result: 48K likes, 2.8K shares.

You won’t get valid stats using such a polling method, but inviting social sharing can increase the virality of such posts.

#4. Capitalize on Current Events

Use news or sensational topics as a way to remind fans about your brand. This could include political happenings, business or tech news, sporting events, upcoming holidays, etc. Just be sure you pick a tie-in that isn’t obscure; you want to find one that the masses will understand.


Caption: Lay’s plays around the election topic. Result: 6.3K likes, 3.3K comments.

Or you could just post a funny picture to provoke a discussion.



Caption: Freemake asks fans to share their opinion about Apple Maps. Result: 1.1K likes, 492 shares.

#5. Post Coupons and Giveaways

Though Facebook has a paid app called “Offers”, most businesses continue to post discount coupons and giveaways in the form of photo updates. Quite simply, photos are widely seen in the news feed and you don’t have to pay money to reach your customers globally or locally.

Such posts also have potential to attract new customers when seen by your fans’ friends.



Caption: Community Coffee grants 20% discount to all fans who manage to see the promo code.
Result: 2.2K likes, 347 shares.

#6. Provide an Inside Look at Your Company

People are curious by nature. That’s why to learn more about a person, we’d rather look through their photos than their bio. That said, try to put faces to your business.

Facebook fans will definitely love to see photos of your employees, especially if the pictures are done in an original way.

Show your employees as they assemble products, meet customers, or even ask a celeb to participate.



Caption: Dropbox employees meet Bono and The Edge (who actually invested into project). Result: 2.4 likes, 297 shares.

Photos that show what happens behind the scenes are a good way to enhance brand credibility.

#7. Push Fans to Comment

Comments are an important component of photo virality, so put thought into what you post. People comment when they have something to say in response. So why not publish content that will urge your fans to comment?

A simple question posted as a status update may easily be ignored in the news feed, while a question presented as a photo update will attract more attention and push fans to answer it.

Try to ask your fans something general about your product or their everyday life, so that everyone could answer your question.



Caption: A simple yes/no question got 3.6K comments from Microsoft fans.

You don’t have to stick to questions, though. You may post a quiz or a funny experiment; anything that pushes fans to share their opinions in comments.



Caption: A funny Freemake’s experiment with cell phone name brought 2.2K comments (vs. 269 likes and 289 shares).

What do you think? What other image posting tips have you had success with on Facebook? Share your thoughts in the comments below.











































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Brands that want to succeed on social media know the number of followers they have isn't as important as how engaged those followers are.

But engaging followers is no easy task.


You have to know what kind of content your customers like, and when they use various social media sites.

To help you out, an infographic from Fusework Studios offers a few general guidelines on how to get more engagement on Twitter.

For example, tweets sent on the weekend get 17 percent more engagement than tweets sent during the week. Wednesday and Thursday are the days with the lowest engagement rates.

Also, tweets with less than 100 characters see 17 percent more engagement than longer tweets.

Are you looking for more retweets? Just ask your followers. A tweet's retweet rate increases 12 times when you ask followers for a retweet. Only 1 percent of brands actually do this.

Check out the infographic for more:



 

After all the buzz and commotion about “this” new site that is taking over social media, you have signed up for it and started using some of its features.

Reading article after article, you have finally convinced yourself to join the new social media site on the rise, Pinterest. That was pretty much my story with my encounter of Pinterest. I joined the site, setup my Pinterest profile, setup some new boards, and went on to repin some of the content on there.

Same with you, you  started the Pinterest journey. Everything is going well and you hit a wall.

Or maybe you are not quite happy with the results you are getting from the engagement you are putting into Pinterest. This can certainly happen after the “beginner” stage has disappeared and you are diving into a more advanced stage. You may be worried sick that you are not using Pinterest correctly and that this social media site is not what everyone said it was supposed to be.

This article is just for you and me who have joined Pinterest for a while and wants to bump up his engagement and get those amazing results the pros are getting!

Make Pinterest your Number 1!

When you have more than three children, you try to love them all equally. But among all of them, there is a favorite child that you love to give the extra for. You love Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, and Pinteret; you try to give them all the love equally.

But have you noticed that they all receive mediocre results?

But you are looking for results out of this world on Pinterest! Now is the time to focus all of your energies into one social media site and love Pinterest the most. Engage the most with Pinterest and I guarantee you will love the results that come with it.

You are still stuck on multi-love for social media!

Mention your love for Pinterest all of the time!

Mention to your readers you are on Pinterest! Show your readers that you love them on Pinterest! Talk much about your love for Pinterest!


What are you saying through those three statements?

I am saying that if you are looking to gain more followers on there, they have to see you actually care about using Pinterest.

Add here and there in your article, encouraging them to share the article on their pinterest profiles.

Remember, the more mentions on your blog, the more chances the reader will understand your point in getting them to follow you.

Create Separate Sharing Boards

My special strategy I use on Pinterest is to create separate sharing boards and pin all of the articles I like from around the internet onto specific sharing boards.


This helps me separate my own pinned articles from the pinning of other articles from around the internet.

Now I can go along Pinterest and pin as much as I would like without burying my own articles in the mix.

Add More Diverse Boards

I have many types of boards on my Pinterest profile.  The more boards you have, the better the chance of gaining a new follower or the repinning of one of your own pins.



It gives a very good impression to a new visitor and a very good chance to take your pinterest results to the next level!

Like and Repin Some More!

If you are getting not so great results from the activity you are placing on Pinterest, then your activity could be not well enough.

One way to dramatically increase results and engagement on this social media site is to “like” constantly while you are browsing.



It is so easy to like pins around the site and doing this will let the Pinnner know that you have liked on of his pins.

You may never know if he will follow your boards right back or like your stuff in return.
Repinning is the greater version of liking!


Repinning will generate more buzz and activity back to your profile even more than just “liking”.

Just setup some sharing boards like mentioned previously, and you’re good to go on “repinning” your neighbor’s pins!

Get out of the rut

The rut is a horrible feeling and you just want to get out. Well, you have read an article that will lead you out to the promised land of many followers and massive repins!

Keep up the work you are putting into Pinterest and add some of these techniques into your mix of engagement.



























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Twitter sometimes feels like a spectator sport. You sit on the sidelines and watch the passing parade with bemusement, interest and often amazement.

The torrent of tweets and interactions vary from hard sell, links to valuable content and humor all the way to inspirational quotes. It is nothing more than a snapshot of humanity in 140 characters.

It is the good, the bad and the ugly.

Despite its simplicity it has nuanced  customs that people new to Twitter need to understand. Good habits always go a long way in any society and correct Twitter manners are important if you want to impress the netizens of the online equivalent of texting on steroids.

Twitter and dating

When on a date, one should have proper etiquette! Just like being on a date, when you are tweeting away on twitter, one should also have proper etiquette. TWITIQUETTE if you prefer!

So how does one have awesome Twitiquette?

Follow these simple rules and you will get more followers and better engagement.

Rule #1

Don’t start a tweet with a hashtag. Let us see your thought, idea, comment, or story first.

Rule #2

Please, please don’t use more than 3 hashtags in a tweet. If you do use three hashtags, do it sparingly. It’s just annoying.

Rule #3

This rule is going to go against what most “tweeps” believe! Don’t strive for followers. Strive for engagement. Ask people questions and engage with them! They’ll like it. In the long run, you’ll get more followers this way.

Rule #4

Some people just don’t follow back. That doesn’t necessarily mean they won’t interact with you! Tweet them a question, idea, or story.

Rule #5

Even though you have a maximum of 140 characters, you don’t have to use all 140 characters. Try using around 120 characters. This will allow other tweeps the ability to retweet you.

Rule #6
Add a profile picture. Enough said. You’d be surprised at how many people don’t add a profile picture.

Rule #7

If you were selling your house, would you make it look nice for an open house or showing? Absolutely! Same applies for you twitter handle. Add a background, make it look nice.

Rule #8

Should you come across a spam account (and you will) please report them. The less spam accounts there are on twitter, the better it will be for all of us.

Rule #9

Add a description. By looking at some of your information, Tweeps who don’t know you will be able to find out what to Tweet with you about?

Rule #10

If you’re struggling on determining how long your tweet should be, what your tweet should contain, hashtags, etc. remember to K.I.S.S. (Keep it simple stupid.).

Rule #11

In the end, just be yourself. Be authentic. Create value and enrich people’s tweets with great content!
After all it’s just Twitter, it should be fun































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Social media is emerging from its adolescent phase and is rapidly maturing.


Initially social networks had an image problem with some CEO’s and executives thinking Facebook was for teenagers to post the weekend’s party photos and Twitter was for narcisstic attention seekers with a limited vocabulary.


There was also an initial perception that because the platforms were free to use that participating was cheap and easy. Experience has shown otherwise.

Social media, blogging and digital content creation are resource intensive and doing it right takes time and money.

Tools and time saving apps are emerging to help companies to be more efficient and able to manage, control and  monitor social media. These functions and features are also being integrated into Enterprise class software solutions.

Social media has grown up and is now accepted as mainstream by companies including the Fortune Global 100. These companies include Ford, Walmart and BP.

Facebook , Twitter, Google+, YouTube and the fast emerging Pinterest have all been embraced by the top companies as they find ways to leverage their brands globally.

Burson-Marsteller first launched a study in 2010 that looked closely at how companies were adapting to this new media. Here are their 2012 findings

5 Insights into Global Social Media

In 2010 the Fortune 100 were participating on social media but not to the extent they are now. The social networks were used for broadcasting but there was limited engagement. In 2012 they are having constant conversations with their customers and followers and creating vast amounts of  digital content.

What are the top 5 findings from their latest research?

1. Twitter is more than 50% of the Conversations

Corporations, Brands and organisations have realized that  social media spreads stories in real time and at high velocity. In 2012 the Fortune Global 100 are mentioned 10.4 million times per month with Twitter transmitting 5.6 million of those conversations. This represents a growth in Twitter conversations of over 700% in just 2 years.

Gone are the days when PR companies were clipping media mentions from newspapers and magazines and posting them to the corporation via snail mail.

2.  YouTube is a Serious Media Channel

In just one year YouTube use has increased by 39 percent. It is no longer considered a channel for just entertainment but also education and positioning and branding. Corporate YouTube channels are averaging over 2 million views. This growth in conversations and views by customers is making it compulsory for companies to participate on social networks.  The social networks are proving to be a great source of free media attention that is not paid but earned.

3. Engagement is the Norm

Organisations are not just broadcasting but engaging with their customers and prospects. On Twitter 79 percent of companies are engaging via retweeting and @mentions. On Facebook 70 percent of brands are are responding to comments on their walls and timelines.

4. Multiple Accounts are Common

The average number of multiple social media accounts has soared since 2010. The number of average Twitter accounts is now over ten (up from four since 2010)  and over 8 YouTube channels (up from 1.6 in 2010). This is because companies have realized that they need to target audiences by geography, topic and service. The larger organisations now have both the tools and the resources allocated.

5. Companies are Rapidly Adapting to New Platforms

In the last twelve months Google+ and Pinterest have entered the social networking ecosystem. Companies have quickly embraced these channels with  nearly 50 perecent of the Fortune Global 100 on Google+ brand pages and 25 percent on Pinterest.


Infographic source: Burson-Marsteller







































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