based on model by Jay Baer

You have a lot of stuff to say.  And,  a lot of your stuff is really good.  But what if no one ever sees it?  Here are a couple diagrams you may find helpful for creating content, organizing and scheduling distribution, and measuring your results.

Much of this information was inspired by Jay Baer’s blog, Convince and Convert.  His Content Ladder helped me to look at my own create-distribute-re-purpose cycle from a different angle, which is also diagrammed here.  I’m finding that both of these approaches have merit, and deciding which to use will depend on what you’re currently doing to get your message out. That will be your starting point.

Social Media Content Ladder

1. Understand Taxonomy: the most important link between social and search marketing; When creating and promoting social content, include specific relevant keywords and search phrases wherever possible.
2. Seek Content Inspiration (using keywords)
3. Understand your frequency schema; one rung per SM platform, a frequency (x/day) schedule allocated to each rung, and metrics you’ll measure.
4. Test and Track
5. Tweak and Re-purpose

There are several key concepts included in the five points above.  Understanding the value and importance of keywords — how to identify your own, how to use them in your content, and how to use them in your research – cannot be overemphasized.

Developing this understanding comes at the beginning of the social media learning curve.  Don’t skip it!

Creating a schedule for posting your content requires you to consider several elements.  Ideally, you want to post on the right day of the week, and at the right time of day. The “right” time will depend on your industry, your audience, and the platforms you’re using.  Dan Zarella, the Social Media Scientist, shares his techniques and studies on his blog, which is worth checking out.  But to know for sure what will work for you, do your own study based on your own unique variables.

Hub-and-Outpost Model

Social Media Outposting Model

Re-purposing, or reusing your own content has a number of benefits.  It allows you to make the same points but in different ways.  E.g., simplify the blog  messages for distribution on microblogs; summarize the messages for e-newsletters; personalize (familiarize) the messages for Facebook.  Same message.  Different audiences and platforms.

Re-purposing means you have to come up with fewer topics – which addresses one of the most frequently heard concerns from would-be bloggers and creators.

Also, each time you post on a particular topic, you can include a link to one of your other platforms.  An example of cross-posting is diagrammed here. (I also call it the hub-and-outpost model).

Worksheets for creating your own Content Ladder and Hub-and-Post plan can be found on the Resources page at 3D Communications’ website.

If you have developed your own method for optimizing your content, let me know by leaving a comment.  Or, if you can offer suggestions for improving the models here, I’d love to hear them.

Twitter Stats

Social media metrics are important for many reasons. Related to your own objective for using social media, these metrics serve as an indicator and a guide for how effectively you’re using social media.

Twitter is one of the more widely-used social networking tools, and the ability to track Twitter metrics can be key to your overall strategy. Here are a few tools you can use:

Twitter Counter This tool will keep track of the number of followers you have and display that information in a line graph across a three month period of time. This allows you see the growth of your follower list. You can compare your growth rate with that of any other account holder by typing in their Twitter name.

Twitter Grader This tool by HubSpot, a company that provides inbound marketing software, is one of their many free resources to help you become a sophisticated user of social media. They will grade your Twitter account (on a scale of 1 to 100), and even offer suggestions for improvements you can make to your account. There’s also a link to view your follower and following history for the past three months.

Tweet Stats From the first time you access this tool, it will start tracking the changes in the number of followers you have and the number of people you’re following. Immediately, however, it will show you a number of different bar charts showing your tweet stats (e.g., average number of tweets per day, retweets, @ replies) and activity patterns such as density and frequency.

Although these tools are similar, they each have their strengths. Depending on what you’re tracking and why, you can use any or all of them. A Google search of ‘twitter ranking tools’ will give you hundreds of other options. But the three above are ones that I have found to be useful when setting goals and tracking my progress toward them.

If you use a tool for tracking your Twitter metrics that you like, please leave a comment here with the information so I can check it out.

3D Communications

Anyone who has a website or blog knows the importance of driving traffic to it. But how do you know how much traffic you’re getting and where it’s coming from?

I received a bit of advice through my Twitter feed this morning from social media maven, Guy Kawasaki. He provided four steps to track your social networking success . The first step very emphatically reminded me of the importance of Google Analytics. I was aware of this tool, but haven’t spent the time to learn how to use it. Today was the day.

I spent about 10 minutes reading and following simple instructions for getting started with Google Analytics and another 9 minutes watching a YouTube video about how to use the analytics reports. I’m feeling pretty smart for getting it figured out, but pretty dumb for waiting so long to do this!

The 10 minutes of reading included actually installing the tool on each of the six pages of my website. Honestly, it was a matter of copying & pasting code into the five Java Script blocks that were clearly marked and easily accessible on my website’s dashboard. According to something I read, it takes about 24 hours for the analytics tool to start capturing data. But, for some reason, data for my site was available immediately. After viewing the above-mentioned video about the reports and then reviewing my reports, I realize I need to look very differently at my whole strategy for my online presence.

Things I need to do to my website:

• Consider it an ultimate destination, and therefore, develop a plan for making it
  1. a valuable source of information,
  2. interactive,
  3. a place for creating connections (through a “call to action”)
• Include links to it in my social sites and activities
• Set goals related to keyword searches, page views, and time spent on my site that can be measured (a function of Google Analytics) so I know if I’m making the desired progress.

I still have much to learn, but by following the above steps I will be learning in a very productive way. Considering how much I value both “learning” and “productivity,” I’m pretty happy with this plan.

If you’d like to help me, please click on the link to my website so that I have some traffic to analyze. And, while you’re there, if you see something that needs to be improved, I’d love to hear from you. Suggestions, ideas, anything at all will be much appreciated!