How to (correctly) Use Hashtags to Increase Your Social Media Presence

16 Wednesday Apr 2014

Posted by leonidesignoryblog in Hashtags, Twitter, Uncategorized

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hashtags, Social Media, Social Media Marketing, Social Networks

Hashtags first started out on Twitter and have made their way onto all of the most popular social networks including Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram and Google+. A hashtag is a symbol used to mark a certain category on social media.

The use of a Hashtag in a strategic way can be effective when creating popularity around your brand or business. Finding relevant conversations and interesting people to follow is one of the key uses of hashtags along with increasing engagement.

It is important as a business to understand why hashtags are so important, especially onTwitter. Below you can see some great statistics around how hashtags improve a business’s online interaction when it comes to Twitter.

Hashtags have become somewhat of a trend which isn’t necessarily a good thing if a user doesn’t understand why they are using a hashtag and the reason behind why they are so powerful. Here are three benefits to using hashtags;

1)Gain Followers

Using the right hashtags when trying to build engagement can increase your following extensively over just a few days.

Improve Reputation

If you show expertise when using a hashtag to start a conversation, people will see you as an influencer and follow you because of your reputation.

Get Information

Searching the right hashtags will allow you to find vital information on an subject matter.

When using hashtags on Social Media, they can lose their value if not used correctly. Hashtags should have a purpose whether it is to increase engagement or following, their is always a reason. Below are 5 uses of hashtags that you should be aware of.

The whole idea behind a hashtag when using one is to make sure it is not to obscure or too long. Remember that a hashtag is only effective is people are actually using it. If it isn’t popular enough, it won’t help you boost your profile however you don’t want your post to get lost if your hashtag is too popular.

It’s great if you are using hashtags and you understand why you are using them but you also need to make sure you measure conversions and by this I mean making sure that you are using the right hashtags. If your key performance indicators (below) have not increased since you have changed your hashtag strategy, you might need to revise your plan.

If you don’t know how to measure the above KPI’s, you can use hashtag applications and social analytical tools to measure your businesses performance. To see how certain hashtags are performing in general, you can follow the conversations yourself or Google the specific hashtag to see how it is performing.

I hope you now know how to use hashtags to increase your social media presence.

Images taken from Digital Formation World

Facebook Has Made New Algorithm Updates: Spammy Social Marketers Beware!

16 Wednesday Apr 2014

Posted by leonidesignoryblog in Facebook, SPAM, Uncategorized

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Behavior, Best Practices, Branding, Community, Community Management, Content, Engagement, Facebook, Marketing, Research, Social Customer, Social Media, Social Media Marketing, Social Networks, Strategy

Facebook has made an update to the News Feed algorithm that has been a long time coming. If you are like me, you are very tired of being asked to Like a photo to save a baby seal or seeing the same content over and over. This kind of content is NOT social media marketing. Thanks to the most recent Facebook News Feed algorithm update, spammy marketers will have their page content devalued. These people will undoubtedly be the most vocal when it comes to the reduced Reach conversation, but that is another blog post entirely. Before we dive into the changes, let’s revisit what makes the newsfeed algorithm tick. In short, the more engagement you get, the more people you will reach. If you want a more lengthy explanation, take a peek at this great graphic from TechCrunch

You might notice that this equation doesn’t include Negative Feedback which is another important aspect of the algorithm. The recent updates were actually developed by monitoring what triggers a Negative Feedback action and appear to be a step in the right direction when it comes to user experience. Here are the updates Facebook has made to stick it to spammy social marketers.

Frequently Circulated Content

If you are in the habit of just reposting what you have seen work for other pages on Facebook, stop what you are doing. The News Feed has been optimized to de-emphasize pages that publish content that has already been uploaded to Facebook over and over again. Early testing of this update has shown that people hide 10% fewer stories overall. Many marketers switched from content creating to content curating last year, however it looks like it’s time to think about switching back.

Spammy Links

With the explosion of publishing on Facebook came the rise of super spammy links. You know exactly which ones I am talking about. Spammy links feature misleading titles that prompt users to visit websites that promise awesome things like cute baby animals but then serve a website riddled with ads. By measuring how frequently users engage with the original post containing that link, Facebook is now able to better detect these spammy links. Early testing of this update has shown a 5% increase in people clicking on links that take them off of Facebook. This demonstrates that people are seeing more relevant and valuable content in their News Feeds. Be sure that your messaging about a link is accurate and engaging enough to get people to leave feedback.

Like-baiting

Like-baiting is pretty straight forward and we have all seen these posts. Any post that explicitly asks users to Like, Comment or Share the post in order to get further distribution is considered like-bait. It used to be social media best practice to include a call to action in each post. Well, it might be time to take a different approach. Facebook has made a change to better detect these posts and make sure that they aren’t shown more prominently over content from users’ friends or highly relevant pages. Facebook says that this update won’t impact pages that are genuinely trying to encourage discussion, only those pages that repeatedly ask for engagement. I would suggest that you don’t need to abandon this approach altogether, however few and far between might be the best bet.

So what have we learned? People don’t like spam in their News Feeds and neither does Facebook. These slight updates to the algorithm should hopefully make big impacts when it comes to user experience. How can you ensure that your Facebook content strategy isn’t considered spammy?

Do your best to start creating fresh content. Even if you see something that is working for another brand, try to recreate it with your own spin. As marketers we have to begin creating new stories and not just retelling old ones. I would recommend starting with a blog.
Make sure that the text and titles that accompany the links you publish are accurate. Bait and switch will no longer be effective.
Continue to encourage people to engage with your content, however do so with restraint. Great content doesn’t always need a call to action. People know what to do at this point.

Cross posted with permission from Social Media Today

Authored by: Nathan Mendenhall

Pinterest Announces It Will Be Rolling Out Ads

14 Monday Apr 2014

Posted by leonidesignoryblog in Pinterest

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Marketing, Metrics, Online Marketing, Pinterest, Pinterst, SEM, Social Media, Social Media Marketing, social network, Social Networks

Pinterest announced that they will be rolling out ads in the next quarter, great news right? Yes, but before you start putting together your next Pinterest Campaign, you might want to put together funding. Rumor has it that Pinterest will follow Twitters lead in pricing these promotions. So, what will entice brands to pony up? Pinterest hits that proverbial “sweet spot” demographically and is uniquely qualified for commerce integration.

In a recent report from BI Intelligence, we looked at the demographic breakdowns of the major social networks, as well as each one’s unique characteristics. Pinterest has a high-income user base that’s very interested in using the site for shopping inspiration.

Here are some of the top statistics on Pinterest’s users:

The scrapbooking social network skews especially toward higher-income consumers, and especially women.
Over two out of five U.S. Internet users who are between the ages of 18 and 50 have used Pinterest.
Pinterest is extremely popular among iPad users, meaning brands have a strong canvas to showcase their offerings. Pinterest users already account for 48.2% of all social media sharing on iPads.
What exactly are they sharing? Well, food and drink-related content accounts for 18% of all items shared, the most of any category, according to the classification scheme devised by ShareThis.
The best time to post on Pinterest is either between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. or 8 p.m. and 1 a.m., but you’ll want to avoid the late afternoon between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m., when many suburban families are sitting down for dinner and watching the nightly news.

In full, the special report:

The Hootlet: Social Sharing for Lazy Professionals

07 Saturday Dec 2013

Posted by leonidesignoryblog in Facebook, Google+, Hootsuite, LInkedIn, Multi Channel Marketing, Pinterest, Twitter, Uncategorized

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Best Practices, Community, Engagement, hootlet, links, Marketing, Social Media, Social Networks, social sharing, Tools & Apps

I have to say I love Hootlet. For me personally it is a blessing of time saving.
If you’re like most business owners, you probably spend a lot of time each day searching for valuable content that you’d want to share with your audience on your social networks. Even though you can copy and paste each link into the status update window, it’s a slow manual process, especially when you’d like to share multiple pieces at a time.

On a different note, social media research is a major part of any serious marketing strategy, but it’s often ignored and businesses are missing on valuable information about their brands. The Canadian social media management company, HootSuite, has been developing a really cool feature that addresses both challenges – social sharing and research – with one tool: the Hootlet.

Featured image credit: Ssango

The Hootlet

You’ve probably heard of the Hootlet add-on extension for Chrome and Firefox when it was first launched in 2009. The new updated Hootlet version takes social sharing and research to a whole new level. Its primary function is to simplify content sharing via HootSuite and distribute the content to multiple social networks and even schedule your posts.

In essence, Hootsuite’s Hootlet is an effective tool to:

– Search social media content next to your Google search

– Share content while you surf, without leaving the web page you’re on

– Highlight text in a page and share it directly to your social media accounts

– Discover relevant geo-located social media content

– Cross promote images and videos

– Schedule posts on your social networks from any web page

Whenever you find a page that’s worthy of a share, click the owl Hootlet button on the top right corner of your browser window and the Hootlet compose box will appear. It will automatically add the title and a shrinked URL into the share box.

Next, you can select the social account to share the article to, schedule or use the AutoSchedule feature to automatically pick the optimal time to distribute your content.

The Hootlet interface has been revamped with a modern streamlined design:

A New And Improved AutoScheduling Feature

With the previous Hootlet version, if you had the AutoScheduling feature activated in the HootSuite Dashboard, it would automatically assume that it would apply to all “on the go” shares. Now, if you want to share a post right away, you must deactivate the “AutoSchedule” option in the share box and then hit “Send Now”.

While “AutoSchedule” allows you to space out your posts when you don’t care about time intervals, there are still posts you’d like to share immediately. The new version of the Hootlet allows you to “Schedule” or “Send Now” without needing to deactivate the “AutoSchedule”.

Extended Sharing Capabilities

Before, when you clicked on a post’s sharing buttons, the Share box included a custom HootSuite button that allowed you to share that post via HootSuite. Posting visual media to social networks has always been difficult. Now, the sharing capabilities have been extended to Instagram and Flickr images, Pinterest pins and even YouTube videos.

What makes the Hootlet so effective is that it’s more than just a sharing tool. Each time you share a web page, the new version will also allow you to select text on that page, click the “Share” button and have the highlighted text appear as the text you’re sharing, instead of just the title.

Anyone can share links, but it’s the unique spin that you give to your posts that makes your content special. Quoting from a web page and commenting on it will make all the difference between your posts and other people’s. Similarly, quoting some text from your own article and sharing it is another way to get even more tweets for your post, after you’ve tweeted it once using the article title.

You can also choose which features you want to turn on. First click on the top right Chrome settings button:

Next, click on “Extensions” and then select “Options”, under the Hootlet extension:

Now you can customize your settings:

Related and Geo-Located Tweets

When conducting a Google search, you’ll see an option box that shows tweets related to your search. The tweets are displayed to the right of your search and can provide valuable insights. Let’s say you’re searching for trends in your niche by typing your keywords in Google and the Hootlet will provide relevant tweets based on keywords, location or business listing.

For instance, when searching Yelp for local information, you will see what others are tweeting about near to the location that you’re viewing.

These geographically related tweets can help you discover new customers, influencers and new business opportunities. You can reply or retweet messages directly from your current window.

Google Maps Integration

With the new Google Maps integration, you can type in an address and pull out tweets near your location that people have shared recently. This feature is especially useful for local businesses that might want to see what’s new in their area or track Twitter promotions focused on in-store campaigns. This feature is also useful for live events promoters or even media journalists covering a local news event.

Easy Cross Posting

There are a few other Chrome extensions (or services like Buffer) that do these different tasks, but the Hootlet is the only one that enables cross posting. Whether you’re on Pinterest or Flickr and want to share images to Facebook or Twitter, you can use the Hootlet to easily share that information.

The HootSuite dashboard is especially useful for small businesses who can spare no more than an hour or two each week to set up their weekly social media calendar. The Hootlet offers a great way to get everything done.

Final Thoughts on Hootsuite’s Hootlet

The functionality offered by Hootlet provides a unique social sharing experience to your daily browsing efforts. Now you have one tool to perform all your social searching, sharing and scheduling directly from the web browser.

The Hootlet extension lets you search social media content as easily as you browse Google, post content directly from web pages, select text and automatically create ready-to-share messages, search location relevant tweets and share visual media effortlessly.

I’ll give you four reasons why I’m sure you’ll love the new Hootlet:

– You’ll never have to leave your browser window to share content

– It literally consumes 5 seconds to schedule a post.

– You can auto-schedule your posts

– You get the automatic ow.ly URL shortener and analytics

No more copying and pasting content that you want to share with your fans and followers! Thanks to the new Hootlet , social sharing is as easy as one click and all your links are trackable via your Owly Stats.

The updated Hootlet extension can be located on the Chrome Web Store and you can watch this video to see how it functions in practice.

Shared by permission, this post The Hootlet: Social Sharing for Lazy Professionals appeared first on LatestCrunchs.

4 Actionable Tips for Increasing Your Twitter Followers

02 Monday Dec 2013

Posted by leonidesignoryblog in Twitter

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Best Practices, Community Management, Engagement, how to get more followers, Influence, Loyalty, social influence, Social Media, Social Networks, Strategy, Twitter

Here is me not being either silly or greedy: I found this helpful — If you did too, don’t be silly and greedy, share this on Twitter and be sure to tag me @jonharules.(See tip #4 on why 😉

This article was authored by Jonha Ducayag Revesencio

You don’t have to be great to start, but you have to start to eventually have a great following.

It doesn’t matter where I am — whether I am on a date or at a high school reunion — I usually get the same question whenever I tell people that I work as a social media strategist and a Rebel Wizard.

“So, how do I increase my Twitter followers?”

It’s funny how people who don’t even fully understand what I do each day would come to a conclusion that all that matters in today’s heavily connected world is to increase their Twitter followers.

I could go on and on about why the number of followers isn’t the most important; rather, it’s about authentic engagements in whichever platform you choose to be a part of. But I guess that’s for another discussion.

This post is my attempt at providing simple yet actionable tips that you can immediately start today to boost your Twitter followers.

1. Optimize your Twitter Bio
While it is going to sound cliché, Twitter is just like any other platform — the only way to be found is through your keywords! Be sure to optimize yours and include keywords that you want to be found and make it clear as to who you’d like to follow you.

Here’s a nice play at keywords by Kas Thomas (@kasthomas):

Humanist. @BigThink blogger. Opiner. Artificer. Followed by a president, a prime minister, and a certain musician’s artist-widow. And you, I hope.

Inspired by his Bio, I’ve changed mine to reflect not only with the keywords I want to be found but also a play at who I’d like to follow me.

Have a look at my Twitter bio (Erm. Wouldn’t hurt if you’d follow me too 😉

2. Connect with these two types of Twitter users
There are several types of Twitter users — broadcasters, occasional users, connectors and amplifiers.

Not all of them will be most helpful in boosting your Twitter experience so I’d be highlighting the two types of users that you can connect with (list of specific accounts that you should be following and engaging with).

Connectors — When starting out, Twitter is pretty much like your college frat where you need power users who will connect you with other users in their existing network who might be interested in what you tweet about.

These are not just Twitter users who have large followings but those who actually engage with their followers and are happy connectors.

Below are some of the users who are pretty good at that and topics that they tweet about.

1. Sean Gardner (@2morrowknight) — tweets about social media tips and social good
With over 500,000 Twitter followers, he is always part of Twitter Influencers lists.

Forbes #1, Social Media Power Influencer

100 Tweeters of Social Good You Have to Follow in 2013

Top 100, Must Follow Business, Leadership, and Tech Twitter Feeds

And the list goes on… it’s because he’s genuinely engaging with his followers, always looking to connect similar-minded individuals and constantly sharing (read: retweet) content that his followers will find most valuable.

2. Chelsea Krost (@chelseakrost) — tweets about millenials and branding
A quick look at Chelsea’s media appearances will make you immediately love Chelsea and her works. She’s a trusted voice when it comes to millennial branding and an over-all wonderful person, always responding to her followers and even introduced me to other inspiring millennial bloggers on the Thanksgiving eve! She’s always engaging, listening and looking to help build relationships with others.

3. Christel Quek (@ladyxtel) — tweets about social media for business
One of the Twitter Powerhouses, she constantly shares updates that are useful for businesses and always willing to connect individuals that are interested in the same topics. You’ll appreciate her fresh and interesting take on things so kickstart a great conversation on Twitter by following her.

Amplifiers — These are Twitter users who constantly share your content. Connect with them and be sure to thank them for being so wonderful!

1. NAMELESS™ (@iNFutures) — tweets everything awesome

2. Mehul V. Pithadia (@DeumIntra) — tweets inspirational quotes

3. Ben Francia (@BenFrancia) — tweets internet marketing tips

4. Michael Tan (@TanonStreet) — tweets social media and social good

3. Create a list of interest and importance
List posts have been proven to capture interests of readers, and people included in the list will most likely share that list because after all, we all want to be part of something bigger than we are.

Start by creating a board on Pinterest with a list of influencers that you’d like to connect with. Think of this as you master list of whom you’d like to engage with and whom you’d like as a follower.

Think of the influencers in your industry that you’d like to connect with and create a Pinterest Board — which you could then easily share on Twitter and @mention them!

Who are the most influential people in your topic or industry, and what are they tweeting about?

Go to their Twitter profiles, copy their names, topics that they‘re passionately tweeting about and make sure to include their @handle. It’s very important as you eventually notify them that they’re part of the list and click on the “Post to Twitter” option when posting on Pinterest.

In doing so, you are creating a visual list of people you want to connect with and at the same time, you’re notifying them that they’re part of the list (via cross-posting on Twitter).

I’ve discussed a bit more about the process on my post: 4 Steps to Increase Followers on Twitter and Pinterest and here’s an example of my Top Social Media Resources on Twitter and Top Community Managers in Asia (Sorry! As narcissistic as it may seem, someone requested that I include myself in this list. Arrrgh)

A little caveat though is that you have to ensure that the list is carefully handpicked and not just some list of people you’re currently friends with. Think of people beyond your existing network that are influential whom you’d like to engage with.

4. Search and be found
Unless you’re Justin Bieber or Taylor Swift, followers don’t just come naturally. You have to work for it!

Using Twitter’s search tool, find people of similar interest by searching specific keywords that are relevant to the industry that you’d like to be found (e.g. social media, engineering, cats)

Follow the first interesting person that comes up in the search results. The reason for doing this is that chances are Twitter will eventually recommend related users (again, see step 1 as to why)

Look at their Timeline and share their most interesting articles. Make sure you don’t share them all at once!

You’ll end up flooding and annoying your existing followers. Use a scheduling platform. I’ve found HootSuite Hootlet available on Chrome to be most helpful for this as I could easily RT the tweet from the @influencer then add my take.

Of course, retweets usually don’t really matter. Your opinion does!

Find influencers in your industry or topic you’d like to be found and share their most viral / retweetable articles. Be sure to add your take. And oh, don’t tweet them all at once. Use a scheduling tool like HootSuite. Include short commentary on the article, key takeaway, favorite part of the article or even a quick call to action.

Example structures below:

[Really loving this article by @author] Title of the Article (link) #hashtag

[Must read!] Title of the Article (link) #hashtag

You don’t have to constantly blog in order to have a voice in your industry. You can be an influential curator.

Start by spending at least 5-10 minutes per day, search for articles that are relevant to your industry, schedule to share it with your followers and make sure to include @mention the author of the post in the tweet and if the characters allow it, add your brief commentary.

So to summarize, here are the 4 actionable steps to get you started in increasing your Twitter followers:

1. Optimize your Twitter Bio keywords to be found (don’t overdo it!)
2. Connect with connectors and amplifiers (thank them!)
3. Create a list of interesting influencers (engage with them!)
4. Share insightful articles to connect (learn from them!)
Trying to build the number of Twitter followers take time but if you’re doing it right, engaging with the right people and offering value (not just on the receiving end!), you’ll gradually earn not just followers but actually the trust of the people in your industry.

Be authentic, and always provide value no matter which platform you may be in.
If you find this helpful — don’t be silly and greedy, share this on Twitter and be sure to tag me @jonharules.(See tip #4 on why 😉

Do you have specific strategies that have been helpful in increasing your Twitter followers that were not included in the article? Share them with us in the comments below!

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The Hootlet

A New And Improved AutoScheduling Feature

Extended Sharing Capabilities

Related and Geo-Located Tweets

Google Maps Integration

Easy Cross Posting

Final Thoughts on Hootsuite’s Hootlet

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