Social media marketing requires patience, discipline, and knowledge. So, it goes without saying that you can’t expect the desired results if you fail to get even the basics right. For instance, you must ensure that all your social media profiles are optimized so that your campaigns reach the target audience and penetrate wide markets. For that, you can follow these steps:
10 Ways to Ensure That Your Social Media Profiles Are Optimized
1. Use the Same Image for Every Profile
Here is something that you absolutely need to know- consistency is the key to successful branding. In fact, it’s a golden rule that every branding expert swears by, and you need to apply it on your social media profiles too.
It’s understandable if you want to be creative with different social media accounts and use creative images for each one. However, picking different images for different channels will only serve to cause brand dilution and lower the overall impact.
2. Choose the Image Size Carefully
Your followers use all kinds of devices- mobile phones, tablets, desktops, and laptops, and all of these are available with different screen sizes. This means that your profile images will appear differently based on the device someone is using. So, to ensure that all your profile pictures look crisp and sharp irrespective of the display, you must choose the resolution of the images carefully. The social media platforms have made it easier for you as they have provided the optimal image sizes. The following are the sizes for some of the popular platforms:
- Facebook profile picture: 170 X 170 pixels
- LinkedIn profile photo: 400 X 400 pixels (minimum)
- YouTube profile picture: 800 X 800 pixels
- Instagram profile picture: 110 X 110 pixels
Apart from the profile images, you also need to use the correct size for the banner photos. For instance, if you are using a logo, and you need a logo to make a strong first impression and stand out from your competition, then you must check out the optimal size suggested by the platform that you are uploading it on.
3. Fill Your Profiles 100%
You can’t afford to be lazy when you want to capitalize on social media marketing. So, when you create profiles on different platforms, make sure that you fill every field that’s available. Use the space to tell what your brand does, what it’s mission and visions is, and other basic details like opening and closing hours of the business, contact details viz. email, phone number, website link, etc.
4. Add Keywords About Your products and Services
Having a well-researched and well-executed keyword strategy is one of the critical components for digital marketing today. So, be sure to add relevant keywords about your business, products, and services in your social media profiles. This will help your followers and potential customers to find you easily via the search engines. For instance, if you offer 3D printing services, then you can add keywords like “affordable 3D printing services in the UK”, “cheap 3D printing services”, etc. Of course, you can use tools like Google Search Console, KeywordTool.io, etc. to learn about the trending keywords in your industry.
5. Remove Yourself from Bad Content
If you want to make your brand bigger, then you need to disassociate your social media profiles from bad posts and photos. For this, you need to regularly check and review the content in which your fans/followers have tagged you. If you find an image or video which doesn’t comply with your brand’s values, then you should untag immediately. Otherwise, if you are tagged in such posts frequently, then you can also change your privacy settings to prevent the users from tagging you altogether.
6. Test the Links
Bad links are more common than you think. It takes small mistakes like omitting a character or adding an unwanted dot (.) or dash (-) in a link to make it inaccessible. If you won’t test the links that you put on your social media profiles which include website links, blog links, and the links for other social media accounts, then you may lose out on tons of new followers who are interested in becoming paying customers but can’t visit your website.
7. “Pin” Important Content
Did you just write one of the most detailed and comprehensive blog posts about a subject that’s trending in the blogosphere? Or maybe you are looking to host a new and exciting webinar? If you have created an important event or content, then it’s a good idea to pin it to the top of your social media page so that all the visitors don’t miss it. You can easily do it on platforms like Twitter and Facebook by checking out their tutorials. You may also read about the best practices on how to go about it and make each one count.
8. Use Call-to-Action for Engagement
You must have read statements like “order (ProductName) today to take your business to the next level” or “(ProductName) can give a boost to your marketing strategies unlikely anything else. Book a demo today to see for yourself” on business websites and blogs. These are called call-to-action (CTA) statements which encourage the leads to convert into paying customers. If you want to improve your social media profiles, then you should incorporate statements like these into them as much as possible.
9. Post Quality Content
The content you publish on social media should also match the quality of your profiles. So, choose the images and videos that you share carefully. It’s better to post just one quality image of video a day rather than 10 that are sub-par and uninspiring.
10. Be Active
Social media platforms like Facebook have become quite massive today. So, if you want to appear in lots of searches and be visible in the news feeds of your fans, then you should upload fresh content on a regular basis. When you are not doing that, then you should share the content of others, comment on posts, and reply to the comments on your own posts. In other words- be active!
So, that’s it- some of the ways you can optimize your social media profiles and get the most out of them. Try them out today and see the impact!
See also: Social Media Marketing Tips From 16 Marketing Experts
