Social Media Savvy?
Hey friends! How are you? I'm back in business after a few weeks away and some spotty blogging/social media-ing. One of the things that I was able to squeeze into my schedule was a social media marketing class at my local CCE (Cornell Cooperative Extension). I talked about it briefly over on instagram and had some questions from some of my fellow homesteaders so I thought I would share the highlights here.
I'm happy to report that most of what we discussed in the workshop, I am already doing. Some of it I'm not doing well and other things I've locked down already. So let's discuss the main points. I'll even tell you what I'm not doing well!
One of the things that we discussed but I am not doing, are videos. And not necessarily the youtube length videos (some of you are fantastic at that! I am not. Nor do I want to attempt that right now. Maybe in the future). But we discussed the short instastory videos. I have two favorite instagrammers who do this really, really well: Liz from Blackberry Hill Farm and Ashley from Ashley Marie Farm and Bakery. They both have the videos locked down. They are good in front of the camera. They're also both really good at adding a mix of themselves and also what they are respectively doing (Liz makes soap and Ashley makes bread. They both obviously do more than that!). They're both so talented so I've really been watching and learning from them both.
The reason behind sharing the videos, for me anyway, would be to show people who I am since I want to teach classes and have people come to the homestead. People don't know me so they want to see who I am, how I teach and interact. Or at least that's the theory. So I've been trying to share some videos everyday just to get used to it and share more of who I am and what I do. Here's a quick glimpse. You can follow along over on instagram for more!
Speaking of instagram, one of the other things we discussed was not over using hashtags. I am SO guilty of this. The marketing guru told us that if we use a lot of hashtags (anything over 11 hashtags is considered a lot. I was using about 20!), if someone reposts our posts, it will cut out the caption due to space limitations. So I'm trying to cut back on the hashtags and only use what is appropriate for my posts but I also noticed that my interaction has been down. But that could be because I've been absent from instagram for a few weeks. So I'll test that theory once I'm consistently back on insta. Also, another thought, which I didn't ask or think about at the time, was putting the hashtags in the comment section. I see a lot of people do this. I might test that theory too.
Another thing we discussed was wordiness on an event flyer that you share on social media. The marketing guru said we should keep the flyers simple, with just the heading. And to double check the size on things so they don't get cut off when we post it. Boy! I had to go back and resize things on facebook. I didn't realize how bad it looked, cutting off the words, etc. So I resized everything and I think it looks better. For the most part I didn't remove the words, I just resized the image for "Facebook post" and then moved it around to cut off the rest of the words. If you click on the picture you can see the full sized flyer with all the info. See this event for an example.
A note on resizing. Do a quick check online to see what the current picture specs are for each platform. This is quite helpful! I created a facebook cover photo and used the 'facebook cover' sizing in Canva (more on that below) but the specs were incorrect. So after the workshop, I googled "facebook cover specs" and got the current specs, resized the photo, uploaded to facebook, and viola! It looks so amazing! Oh! Another note, if you are on a desktop computer, make sure you look at everything on a tablet and/or phone to see how it looks. The cover photo mentioned above looked fine on my laptop, but once I looked at it on my tablet, yikes!
I also created the maple syrup flyer above and did the same thing (where I resized and reshaped it) but then I recreated the flyer as such just to give you an example:
I think this is more of what we were discussing. Less words. Cute background. Then you can have the full sized flyer available for other resources. But, one of my later thoughts was: I like having the full size flyer with all the information on it that people can click on (such as we discussed above) and if I only have something with just the title, how does that work? I know people will see the information in the event, but I like the idea of them just doing a quick drive by, clicking the image, and getting all the information without having to weed through a facebook event. But that's my unprofessional opinion. So I compromised and resized and readjusted the image but kept it a full size flyer.
We discussed some tools of the trade. One of my favorites that we discussed (and I had just discovered it) is Canva. There's a free version and a paid version (I pay for the full thing). You can create anything! Instagram posts, flyers, business cards, resumes. You name it, you can create it with Canva. You can see some of my 'creations' above. You do need to be aware that some of the images are copyrighted and you have to pay extra for those. And the free version limits you to downloading as a pdf only. Once you opt to pay for the full site, you have multiple choices on how to download.
We also discussed using HootSuite to schedule posts. I don't use this because I usually just post whenever I can. If I post on the blog then I almost immediately post to instagram and facebook. Otherwise I just post on insta when I get a minute. Same with facebook.
Another thing we discussed was not using hashtags on facebook. You can link your accounts and share from insta to facebook, but the guru suggested going to facebook and 'cleaning' up the post. Adding links, changing words (if necessary), and removing hashtags. I'm guilty of leaving the hashtags in. She said that facebook isn't really using the hashtags like instagram so it looks 'messy'.
A big thing we discussed was ads--both on facebook and instagram. We spent a lot of time doing through how to do an ad and to be honest, it was a lot of information. So much so that I don't think I can share it all here. I will say a few things about ads though. First, make your ads for FB and IG different. Don't use the same ad for both platforms. It's kind of the same principle as above--making your posts slightly different for both platforms. You do the ads for both platforms via facebook. Also, make sure you are setting aside enough time and money to see how the ad is working. You don't have to spend a gajillion dollars (although I'm sure FB would love for you to do that!) but you need to spend more than say $10. I did an ad before and I only spent like $6 or so! So I will readdress that on some of my upcoming events.
You also want to narrow down your target audience when boosting an ad (for the record, we discussed boosting events, not posts). I didn't do this well enough when I spent that whopping $6. So I really want to try again. I might dedicate $50 to boosting my events and really narrowing down that target audience.
So I think it all comes down to this: establish your brand. Figure out who you are. Find your clarity of voice (I definitely need to work on this!). Craft that story then tell it at every opportunity. But remember, be a good global citizen. Share other's stories. Partner with other people, your local community. Be a good friend. Encourage others. Interact with others (I only follow people back on insta who are interactive. I LOVE interacting!).
What are your thoughts on being social media savvy? Have you covered these topics, used the resources? Who do you learn from? And for the record, we didn't cover blogging or websites, but it stands to reason that we can translate these ideas and opportunities into the blogging/vlogging world!
til next time-
xoxo
-k