You have likely heard the term “social media optimization.” You may even know that a social media optimization strategy is important for businesses to thrive in this digital world. But do you know what it really means?
Social media optimization, commonly known as SMO, is a way for you to help your business stand out in the digital world. It encourages companies to adopt best digital practices and helps them adjust by being able to analyze and audit what’s working and what’s not working. It makes you prioritize tweaking your posts to perfect them to maximize their reach and effectiveness. The better your social media optimization strategy is, the more visibility you will have, which gives you greater engagements, such as traffic to your site.
Your social media marketing is key here, as the outcomes of that affect traffic to your site too. Now, how can you maximize this? Here are some tips on creating a social media optimization strategy that will make customers fall in love with you.
Know the Right Time to Post
People are on social media all the time. But some times are considered higher traffic times than others. Because of this, it’s important to consistently post content during the times followers are heavily on social media and most likely to engage.
There is no one size fits all answer—some say the best time is during normal commuting hours, that is 8:00 to 10:00 a.m. and 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. on weekdays. Others say that the sweet spot is around 10:00 a.m. on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. The best way for you to figure out what works for your followers is by doing A/B testing. Have posts go live at a specific time one week and a different time another week then compare the differences.
Make Sure the Graphics You Post Are the Right Size
Graphics are a great way to catch the eye of your followers. But you want to catch their eye for the right reasons—not because your graphics look cut off or altered because they are not the right size. Each social media channel has its own right size for graphics. Horizontal, rectangular photos work better for Twitter, whereas square photos look better on Instagram.
Your graphics should be the right size, and they should be high-resolution, aligned with your brand (such as including your business logo somewhere), and consistent with other graphics posted on our website and social media. This consistency will give you a strong, professional impression. Plus, it’ll help people know your brand better and be able to recognize it, strengthening your marketing and branding easily.
Correctly Use Hashtags
Hashtags are great! They can drive people to your posts. However, it should be done the right way. Be careful not to use too many hashtags, especially ones that do not align with your business, as this can come off as spammy and turn potential customers off.
Instead, spend time searching trending hashtags that align with your business. Integrate those hashtags into your posts to get into the conversation and open your content to a new pool of users engaging with that hashtag. In particular, use holiday and celebratory national day hashtags, as these always trend on social media, and tailoring posts to these hashtags can help further your reach and get you into the conversation.
Tag People or Other Brands in Your Posts
Incorporating posts into your social media strategy that feature other brands, customers, or local organizations is helpful. By doing this, you can “tag” that person or business in your post. This helps start a conversation, can help your posts be seen by new people (such as followers of the person or business you tagged), and will show who you’re tagging that you value them and their content, which could open more doors for a partnership in the future.
Especially if you are sharing content that is not your original work or is user-generated, it’s best practice to tag where the work originated. Tagging others in your posts should be strategic and should not be a random tag in just any post. When done right, it will increase your engagement on that post.
Be Unique
Of course, you can look at best practices regarding what works well on social media and what doesn’t. But at the end of the day, it’s important to keep your content and postings unique. Why would people follow you if you’re posting the same content that they already see in their feeds from other businesses they follow? They won’t. Because of this, you should define your brand personality and make sure your content is aligned with that. Think of who your audience is and how you can best reach them, and that will help you figure out what personality and voice will work best for you. People tend to value a more personal, human voice, so starting there may be especially helpful. Keep your tone positive as much as possible and always keep your audience in mind when writing new content.
The above are just some social media optimization strategies to help customers fall in love with you. Not only are they great places to start, but they are important tips to keep in mind while creating and implementing your SMO strategy. We understand that it can be overwhelming, so at Digital Marketing Group, we want to help. We are SMO and social media marketing experts and can help your business have even more impact in the digital world that we’re currently living in. Contact us today. We would love to learn more about your business, the strategies you currently have in place, and what your social media goals are.
