Social Media Branding

social media blog

Social Media Branding With a Twist…of lime

I’ve been discussing social media, SEO, auto posting and more over in my Facebook Group, Social Sharing for SEO.

social media branding What I love most about this discussion is that many marketers are sort of anti auto posting tools like Hootsuite and Buffer. I totally see their perspective but here’s why I see a value in those tools. You don’t have to auto post everything with scheduling tools, in fact I don’t recommend that at all. Scheduling tools can be a huge time saver when you have the right strategy in place.

Consider this; Google looks at links back to your site as a way of measuring the authority of your website. The more often you put content out there, you increase your chances of stronger organic ranking. The next part to that is engagement. If you have a bunch of link out there and no one clicks on them or interacts, you are putting out a lot of work with minimal return. Unfortunately, brand strategy doesn’t mesh with SEO strategy so we have a fun little formula for achieving both. Bottom line, be strategic about what you share and where, but don’t be shy about posting content from your site on all of the strongest platforms, you never know who might find your blogs or articles useful.

The Cosmo of Social Media Recipe

Vodka = (Do I have your attention yet?) The Fun!
Let your audience see the culture of your company, introduce yourself with a fun photo from time to time, feature fun behind the scenes moments. Give your business some personality.

Gin = Your Classy Sophisticated Side.
This is where your business related quotes and examples of your work at its best come in.

Splash of Cranberry = Networking!
Align your business with brands that have similar audiences yet don’t compete with you and cross promote. Contests, giveaways, event sharing etc.

Splash of Lime Juice = Charity or Community Involvment
Choose a local charity that you can engage with, help push out their initiatives, volunteer with them, or simply donate.

Garnish = Sale, Promo, Offer.
Here is where you get to self promote, once every 10 posts or so. Share a blog post, or special offer, something that will drive traffic back to your website.

You can find a complete version of our Social media branding article in the Boss Babe Guide to Social Media.

Boss Babe Guide to Social Media

I recently had the pleasure of working with some amazing Ladies lead by the talented Elizabeth of Iterate Social to create an E-Book called, The Boss Babe Guide to Social Media where we discuss the proven best practices in Social Media today. Each contributor comes from a different background and brings a unique perspective on how to grow your business via Social Media.

We cover in-depth social media topics like:

  • Branding Your Social Media

    • (This is the topic I cover in the E-book!)

  • Growing Your Social Media Following
  • Photo Styling for Social Media

    • And More….

    boss babe guide to social media Here’s what you do, Head over to http://www.iteratesocial.media/bossbabeguide simply enter your email address and our 27 page guide to social media will be sent straight to your inbox! So, what are you waiting for? Download the Boss Babe Guide to Social Media today! We hope you love it. Be sure to connect with me via Social Media to let me know what you think! #BossBabeGuide

How Pinterest can help your SEO efforts

pinterest for SEOOne of my favorite articles about How Pinterest can help your SEO efforts was published almost a year ago by Search Engine Land. The article titled, Pinterest SEO: 7 Tips From A Pinterest Engineer really got my wheels turning about how my clients could leverage this social channel for SEO. Pinterest may not seem like a fit for the home services or dental category but the domain authority of Pinterest is undeniable. If we could somehow create interest in our Pinterest boards the value of the client headed over to our site is high plus the link strength gives our site more authority with search engines.

So here is my take away from the seven tips from a Pinterest Engineer and some other easy action steps for businesses to take to get the Pinterest train rolling.

Pinterest Strategy for Small Business

The reality of running a small business is that you could spend all day producing social media content and that would be great if you had nothing else to do right? So I challenge you to set aside 30 minutes, one day per week and get the Pinterest ball rolling. Now, as Martin Beck mentions’ in his article, you may not even have a Pinterest page set up correctly, so you will need to follow his steps to set up a Pinterest profile for your business that is optimized correctly. Take some time to do that and once you have completed his steps, come back here.

Your Pinterest business Page is set up! Congratulations, now what?

As I mentioned before, calendar 30 minutes a week to pinning. Below are some goals for effective Pinterest activity in those 30 minutes.

You want to set up boards that match the core of your business and branch out from there. EX: You are an Endodontist: Core boards could be, Myths about Root Canals, Tooth Saving Tips, Root Canal Safety, Facts about Dental Implants.

Pin 5-7 blogs and graphics from your website per week

Follow 20+ businesses in your geographical area a week – If 5 follow you back, you’re in good shape!

Re-pin 10+ pins from industry leaders.

Add one new board a month. Be sure to ad geo tags to each board based on where your business is located if you have a brick and mortar.

Last tip, Don’t get sucked in! Pinterest is fun, and it’s easy to get sucked in to searching, before you know it you’re 20 minutes in to your weekly pinning session and have only accomplished researching your latest crock pot experiment. Set an appointment with yourself to be focused and accountable. If you can accomplish the above list once a week you will have a rich flourishing SEO focused Pinterest Account in no time.

Don’t believe me?, let’s do the math:

One Week: 15 pins & 20 follows

One Month: 60 pins & 80 follows

One Year: 780 pins & 1,040

I know what you’re thinking, you want to jump ahead and dedicate 3 hours a day for 6 weeks to growing your Pinterest page. Don’t. You will burn out and never log back in. Not only that, SEO is a constant effort, it would be easy to create an awesome Pinterest account and never have to touch it again but that’s not what the search engines want to see. They want consistent effort to creating interesting content for your audience. I’m challenging you to do it my way! I have created a private Facebook group called Social Sharing for SEO where like minded businesses can collaborate and support each other’s efforts. Click here to JOIN.

Best,

Lauren