Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, says the web is for everyone. Unfortunately, that isn’t always the case.
Poor design decisions can present barriers for many different groups of people. In fact, research by WebAIM finds that across one million homepages, there were over 50,000,000 “distinct accessibility errors” at an average of just over 50 per page.
These errors don’t just make people feel marginalized; they stop hundreds of thousands of people from interacting with your brand or buying your product.
Few webmasters want to purposefully marginalize people or limit access to their site. That’s why it’s so important to understand the most common web accessibility issues and learn how to resolve them with clean design.
Let’s get started.
Why Is UX Accessibility Important?
Because the internet has become an essential part of the day-to-day lives of more than a billion people, site owners must take steps to make sure everyone can access it equally. It’s not just a matter of human rights, however. There is an obvious financial case for making your site accessible. Given that 61 million people in the United States have some form of disability, an inaccessible site could be harming your bottom line. Make your site accessible, and you potentially open the door to thousands of more customers.
Complying with UX accessibility design trends can bolster your company’s reputation. Making an effort to cater to a particular group of disadvantaged users proves your company cares about all of its customers. This added step may encourage potential customers to do more business with your brand going forward.
There’s also the small matter of legal compliance. While there’s debate about whether the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act includes websites as well as physical stores, that hasn’t stopped thousands of lawsuits getting filed with federal courts each year. You may not be punished for a lack of ADA website compliance, but the threat of legal action is clear.
Ultimately, designing with UX accessibility doesn’t just improve the browsing experience for users with disabilities; it improves the user experience for everyone. Even users with perfect vision benefit from a better color contrast and more labels — and your SEO certainly benefits from things like added alt text and better link descriptions.
The 7 Most Common Web Accessibility Mistakes
Making your website more accessible is as much about avoiding common issues as it is about integrating new technology. Avoid the following seven mistakes, and you’ll go a long way to making your site more accessible than your competitors.
1: Missing Alt Text on Images
Alt text is an HTML attribute that describes what an image represents. From an accessibility perspective, alt text provides information for screen readers to accurately describe images to visually-impaired users. If you don’t provide alt text or your alt text isn’t very descriptive, then you aren’t making your site’s images available to everyone.
There’s a difference between empty alt text and missing alt text. Sometimes images can be for purely decorative purposes. Where this is the case, an empty alt tag can be used, which appears as alt=””. This is ignored by screen readers and doesn’t impact usability.
Often, alt text isn’t empty but missing completely. When a screen reader comes across a missing alt attribute, it will assume that the image is important and inject the file name. For images like graphs and infographics that are fundamental to a user’s understanding of a webpage, the file name won’t be sufficient. That’s why it’s essential to create alt text for all of your images.
2: Weak Color Contrast
Have you ever tried to read a white font on a yellow background? Not easy, is it? But that could be how many users feel every time they visit your site. The truth is some people struggle to read text unless the color contrast between the font and the background is very stark. It’s why black font on a white background is such a popular choice.
The easiest way to improve color contrast is to avoid using similar colors for backgrounds and text. That means no orange font on a red background. Or green text on a blue background. Pay particular attention to design features like your website’s header or the submit button on forms, too. These features tend to incorporate brand colors and are more likely to cause contrast issues.
Alternatively, you can use a tool like the Contrast Checker from WebAIM to quantify your contrast ratio. The higher your ratio, the better the contrast and the more readable your website will be. The tool will tell you whether your colors pass or fail. As a rule, text and background colors should have a contrast ratio of at least 3:1 for large text and at least 4:1 for normal-sized text.
As you can see from the images below, dark blue text on a white background has a great contrast ratio.
But yellow text on a white background has a terrible contrast ratio.
3: Poor Link Text
Links are a vital part of a web page, both from a user experience perspective and for SEO. But you need to accurately describe them using link text to make them effective.
While those versed in SEO might never dream of missing a chance to add a keyword in an internal link, missing link text is surprisingly common. Logos, buttons, and icons are all guilty of having no text, which means screen readers will ignore them. That’s not great if you want users to click your CTA button.
Vague or ambiguous link text is also an issue. Not only does a phrase like “click here” offer no SEO value, but it can also hamper users accessing your site via a screen reader. Including the entire http:// link without any anchor text whatsoever is even worse. Neither version contains the information these users need.
Instead, make sure the clickable text describes exactly what the user can find on the next page. In the example below, for instance, you know that by clicking the link, you’ll be directed to a page where you can get a 14-day free trial of Shopify.
Then there are navigation links. These can also create problems for screen readers if they are poorly coded. That’s because screen readers will not skip over them, meaning users will have to listen to your navigation menu every time they open a new page. Solve this by assigning ARIA roles to your navigation menus to indicate their purpose. This will help screen readers to avoid them where necessary.
4: Missing Form Labels
I’m almost certain your website has at least one form on it, even if it’s only on your contact page. But does every field have a label telling users what information they need to input? If not, your forms aren’t accessible to everyone.
Just like with link text, form input fields need a label so screen readers and other accessibility devices can understand them and help users navigate them. A label isn’t just the placeholder text you can see in the form field, though. You also need to add a description in the form’s code. That’s because placeholder text is usually ignored by screen readers. It also doesn’t help that placeholder text usually lacks a strong color contrast.
Ideally, you’ll have a visible label inside a <label> element so everyone (users, screen readers, bots) can understand what’s meant to go in each field.
5: No Markup For Data Tables
Tables are something of a nightmare for screen readers and other accessibility devices. When screen readers come across a table, they tell the user that there is a table with a given amount of columns and rows and then proceed to list out all of the data. Unfortunately, that data may not be read in the correct order. Worse still, screen readers can’t read out tables where there is more than one set of row or column headers.
In truth, the best way to make tables accessible is to not have them at all. Of course, that’s not going to work for some websites. So, where tables are required, you need to make them as simple as possible and use the correct markup. ID, HEADERS, and SCOPE attributes should be used to correctly label each part of your table. You can also use table captions to provide additional information to users about how to best understand your table.
Another alternative is presenting your data as an image file, with appropriate alt text listing out the data. However, for complex tables, that may not be feasible.
6: Lack of Keyboard Accessibility For Screen Readers
Not everyone is going to use a mouse to navigate your website. Many visually-impaired people will use a keyboard or another accessibility device to move around your website. And that means you need to pay special attention when designing and creating the layout of your site.
Specifically, users must be able to navigate your website using the space bar and tab key. Simple sites built in semantically correct HTML may make this possible without any adjustment, but more complicated websites will need to code in digital landmarks that better allow keyboard users and screen readers to move about.
Adding skip-to-content links at the top of each page can also save your users from having to tab through every menu item every time they open a new page. These buttons, which appear when you push the tab key, allow users to navigate the site using the tab and spacebar keys to skip the navigation and head straight to the main content of the page.
7: Non-HTML Content WIthout Proper Markup</h3>
It’s easy to forget about non-HTML elements when optimizing your site for accessibility. But content like PDFs and Word documents can also be an issue. Out of the box, users cannot customize these documents to make them easier to read nor do they work well with assistive technologies. Accessibility issues are even worse when documents are produced as image-only PDFs.
One solution is to solve navigation mistakes by tagging these resources for navigation by screen readers. Another is to use Office’s built-in Accessibility Checker to improve the accessibility of these documents when you create them.
Interactive content like sliders, accordions, and drag-and-drop widgets can also affect accessibility. So, too, can dynamic content like pop-up boxes and confirmation messages. If the screen reader can’t understand when these pieces of content are loading, it won’t be able to tell users about them.
Once again, you can use ARIA attributes to resolve this issue. Tagging these interactive and dynamic elements with the correct ARIA attribute will notify screen readers that the page’s content has changed. Alternatively, you can design your site in a way that avoids the need for pop-ups and other forms of dynamic content. Static websites may not look as flashy, but they are much more accessible.
FAQs
What are the four significant categories of accessibility?
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines are built upon the four principles of POUR: perceivable, operable, understandable and robust.
What is ADA compliance?
If your site is ADA-compliant, then it meets the recommendations set out in the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and is accessible to someone with a disability.
How do I make my website more accessible?
You can make your website more accessible by improving color contrast, adding alt text, or adding keyboard accessibility for screen readers.
What is an example of website accessibility?
Allowing users to navigate your website using a keyboard instead of a mouse is an example of website accessibility. So is adding alt text to every image on your website.
Conclusion
Unfortunately, even the best designers and web entrepreneurs can create inaccessible websites. It’s why it’s so important to keep referring back to these mistakes whenever you build a website or create a new piece of content.
It’s more effort to include alt text on all images, add markup data to tables and improve the quality of your link text, but millions of users will thank you for it.
I was online, like I always seem to be, when Hurricane Ian made landfall in Florida earlier this week. I flicked through Twitter and endlessly scrolled TikTok as the afternoon stretched into evening.
It was a weird, troubling experience. Being online during a natural disaster like Ian is a strange mix of live devastation and the usual internet oddities. Flood waters rising and people memeing it in real time in an endless stream of updates. That is the essence of being online in 2022: Everything is awful, let's keep scrolling.
We're just now beginning to see the actual toll Ian took. The Sun Sentinel reported at least 21 people have died in Florida, with thousands more people left unaccounted. Millions were without power Friday after the Category 4 storm pummeled the state with high winds and flooding. Even for a state quite familiar with hurricanes, Ian proved to be particularly awful.
"This could be the deadliest hurricane in Florida’s history," President Joe Biden said Thursday afternoon. "The numbers are still unclear, but we're hearing early reports of what may be substantial loss of life."
As this deadly storm reached its peek this week, the first viral video I saw was...of a shark. It's a bit of internet lore: a fake image of a shark swimming through a disaster zone that famously resurfaces during big storms. The first illegitimate photo, of a shark swimming on a highway, appeared in 2011 amid Hurricane Irene. Since then, there's been various reiterations of the meme. So when a real video of what appears to be a small shark (or some other type of fish) thrashing about on a flooded street in Fort Myers, Florida, surfaced during Ian, people immediately started sharing it across their feeds. The short clip has since racked up more than 13 million views.
Hurricane Shark wasn't the only video to go viral as Ian hit. Some dude ran out to fly a Philadelphia Eagles flag as the storm made landfall. In another clip, people swam in the storm surge (which we definitely don't advise). On TikTok, you could watch as zookeepers cheerfully walked storks and other animals to a bathroom for safety.
I'd categorize all these videos as curiosities: surreal clips of animals outside of their habitats and people making bad decisions, two hallmarks of the internet. You might even call it fun, depending on which social media platform you were on. Because over on a different corner of the internet, the legitimate horrors of Hurricane Ian were inescapable.
On TikTok, people went live as their homes were flooded, seemingly unprepared for the damage and dealing with real, serious danger. As The Washington Post's Taylor Lorenz noted on Twitter, TikTok is the place for real-time news. Scrolling through my FYP was like watching a found-footage horror movie in real time. The footage became so overwhelming that I had to put my phone down. Seeing all these people in real-life danger was harrowing to watch, and it made me feel helpless. There was no relief from TikTok's savvy algorithm.
Of course, there was also your usual clout-grifting off the wake of the storm. Lorenz noted people were stealing streams and pretending they were authentic. NBC News culture reporter Kat Tenbarge posted that people were asking for engagement on their content as the storm played out.
This is all to say that while there may be a very real Hurricane Shark out there, swimming down a Florida street, the internet in which it exists hasn't changed very much since 2011. People are still exploiting a natural disaster for clicks, even those at the center of the storm. There's a fine line between documenting an event and filming things for clout, asking people to follow along. And even the same hoaxes popped up on our timelines (Hurricane Shark, meet Street Manatee). Even as the internet evolves, our online behavior doesn't.
As Bo Burnham once sang, the internet is a little bit of everything all of the time. Even in the eye of a storm, that remains true.
It’s finally fall–time for pumpkins, apples, hayrides and Halloween. But the first day of fall is more than an excuse to break out your cardigan collection. It’s an opportunity to leverage seasonal marketing to connect with your audiences. Bringing a little autumn coziness into your marketing strategy is a great way to keep your content fresh and engaging. We’re breaking down key fall trends so you can get inspired for #pumpkinszn.
The pumpkin spice stronghold
You can’t talk about fall without pumpkin spice. The blend of cinnamon, ginger, allspice and nutmeg shows up everywhere as soon as the temperature drops. Pumpkin spice has defined fall for hundreds of years–even making an appearance in the first-ever American cookbook in 1796. In 2003, Starbucks released the classic Pumpkin Spice Latte, creating a new generation of pumpkin spice enthusiasts. Merriam-Webster even added pumpkin spice to the dictionary this year.
With nearly 20 years of pumpkin spice frenzy, it’s natural to wonder if the trend is dying down. We used Sprout Social Listening to gauge public opinion on the flavor. In short, it isn’t going anywhere.
In 2021, Tweets related to pumpkin spice garnered 2.29 million engagements in August alone. This year, engagements hit 2.73 million for a whopping 19% increase. In September 2022, there were almost 4.4 million engagements, making for a 29% increase from September 2021’s numbers. Overall, pumpkin spice engagement is set to hit 15.5 million engagements in 2022. And, sentiment about pumpkin spice is 69% positive. It’s definitely not too late to jump on the pumpkin spice bandwagon.
Capturing the magic of fall: Building your audience’s fall faves
Pumpkin spice isn’t the only thing people love about this season. Fall is a full vibe, with clothing, music, activities and most importantly, emotions attached to it. Tapping into the connection consumers have with the season can yield incredible results. But in order to do that, you have to figure out just what your audience loves about fall.
Autumn is undeniably beautiful. Fall scenery Instagram photos basically take themselves, and warm color schemes make everything feel a little cozier. For some audiences, fall is all about visual cues.
With their photos of autumn leaves on the golf green, Golf Digest encouraged audience engagement. Golfers replied with their own fall golf photos and mentioned members of their foursome to reminisce about past games or express excitement about upcoming ones. Golf Digest leaned into the visual aspects of the game to create buzz.
Since fall marks the beginning of the school year, the aesthetics of academia and autumn have a lot of overlap. The University of South Carolina showed their audience how the changing leaves complement their campus views. Connecting the university with the nostalgia and transitional feelings of fall targets both prospective students and alumni.
It's the first day of fall on the most beautiful college campus in the world. 🍂 pic.twitter.com/kEAdw1mQPv
Fall isn’t just about the outdoor views. The indoor ones are just as exciting. The oranges, yellows and reds showing up in nature also show up in the home decor aisle. #FallDecor has over 8 million views on TikTok. Consumers wait all year to decorate their homes for fall, whether they prefer spooky Halloween vibes or wholesome nature nods. Michaels Craft Store joined in on that anticipation and excitement with a TikTok announcing their fall decor drop.
For some audiences, fall comes with a “must-do” list of pumpkin patches, corn mazes and apple orchards. Tapping into the experiential side of the season is a great way to connect with more active audiences.
Fall leaves make for scenic drives, but they can create magical hikes. Leaf peeping–the term for going to look at foliage–is popular nationwide, with enthusiasts traveling across the country searching for the perfect vista. REI curated a list of fall gear for their audience that’s ready for autumn hikes.
Grab your layers, liquid-holders and loveseats to enjoy the best season. 🍁
Fall is a time for comfort. Fuzzy blankets, warm drinks and an excuse to use the fireplace are autumnal mainstays for a reason. And curling up with a good book falls right into that category. As readers begin to build their fall bookshelves, Goodreads provided a list of recommendations that pair well with a pumpkin spice latte.
When the temperature starts dropping, it’s time for comfort food. Fall comes with a designated menu and home chefs are eager to start preparing their favorite dishes. The Kansas Pork Association found a way to tap into their audience’s fall cravings with a relevant chili recipe.
As we said before, pumpkin isn’t going anywhere. Whether they’re at a patch or in a pie, people can’t get enough of them. Pumpkins are a fall category of their own. Something about them captures our attention, like the man who claimed a world record this year by paddling 38 miles in a pumpkin boat or the TikTok account where almost 340,000 people watch the process of growing giant pumpkins. Whatever the reason for our pumpkin obsession, pumpkins are a great way to market to your audience this fall.
It seems like everything has a pumpkin spice edition now. With so many products on the market, it’s hard for consumers to keep track of the seasonal versions they want to try. Target helped out by posting a video overview of the pumpkin spice items available in their store, cluing customers into what’s in season and what’s new.
When something becomes popular, some people will undoubtedly dislike it. While most consumers think pumpkin spice embodies fall, some people find it overrated. Dunkin’ addressed the pumpkin naysayers in a TikTok that validated everyone who has felt the need to defend their pumpkin love.
Novelty products are nothing new and the pumpkin scene has its fair share. For every coffee creamer or donut flavor, there’s also something unexpected, like a pumpkin spice Cup O’ Noodles. The Washington Post took a humorous approach to covering another oddity, pumpkin spice Spam. They leaned into the absurdity of the product by showcasing a member of their social media team eating it directly from the can.
Embracing the spirit of fall can have profound impacts on your brand. Associating your brand with fall trends and traditions can turn the emotional ties consumers have with fall into emotional ties with your brand. Seasonal marketing isn’t just about keeping your content calendar current. It’s about relating with your audience’s pre-existing values, interests and sentiments through content that matters to them.
Interested in exploring seasonal marketing? Check out Sprout Social’s free Social Media Holidays Calendar, with details on the most popular hashtag holidays.
No matter which industry you work in, you want to ensure your investments are cost-effective. In marketing, that inevitably raises questions like: is your social media advertising enough? How much are you really spending on your tech stack? Are campaigns worth the investment? These are all worthwhile questions to consider; having a social media budget outlined will help you definitively answer them.
Whether your company and wallet are big or small, budgeting is the same at its core. Once you start tracking your spend, you’ll find it easier to analyze the effectiveness of your strategy.
There are many components that make up your social media budget:
According to the Sprout Social Index™, justifying the business value of social media isn’t as difficult as it was a few years ago. But even if getting approval for a budget for social media marketing isn’t a challenge, knowing why and how you need one can help you make your case, and help you maximize it.
Increase your impact
Having a budget is the number one resource marketers say they need to achieve their goals for social. Backed by a budget, social marketers can explore more content formats, expand advertising to new platforms and invest in social tactics that hook consumers.
Not giving your social media team the budget for the tools they need is like hiring a pilot and refusing to buy fuel for the plane.
Between today’s shifting economy and high in-feed competition, having a budget for your social performance has never been more important. And today’s shifting economy makes setting—and justifying—a social media budget even more crucial.
Recession fears have put pressure on advertisers to spend less and achieve more. Keeping track of how much you spend every month reduces risk by cutting costs that come from overspending. And incorporating existing and needed spend into a formal budget secures crucial spending dollars.
Prove your ROI and justify your budget
The latest Sprout Social Index™ confirmed that proving ROI remains one of marketers’ greatest challenges. Budgeting helps you keep track of your costs, which then figures into your ROI calculations and ability to make a case for increasing investments in social. If you can’t accurately measure social media ROI, justifying future investments—from investing in new software to making a business case for increasing your social media headcount—will be harder.
So how do you get started? First, decide how you want to track your budget: with a manual spreadsheet you fill out at the start of the year? Budgeting software? A shared document you build on?
Next, consider how you want to manage the budget.
Traditional budget: This is where you start with a sum of money and then allocate amounts to each category. Once a category is depleted, you can’t move other funds into it.
Flexible budget: This is where category depletion can be fulfilled by another category. Did one run out of money and another category has extra to spare? Move it over.
Zero budget: This is when you start every category with zero at the beginning of each budget planning cycle. You increase the amounts per category, justifying the cost every time.
There are many ways to manage a marketing budget. Some teams even take a lump sum and deduct as you operate. This isn’t advisable if you have multiple components to track because it makes it more difficult to see how well your budget performs over time.
What should a budget for social media marketing include?
Now that you know why, you’re ready to dive into how to budget for social media marketing. Let’s break down some of the factors you need to consider as you do so.
Use goals as your foundation
You won’t know how to allocate your budget until you know your social media goals. For example, if you’re hoping for more brand exposure, you might invest more heavily into paid awareness campaigns and less into software upgrades.
Consider some of the top goals marketers have when working with creators—a priority you may want to include in your budget. Generating more engagement, reaching new audiences, strengthening your social community and driving revenue are the top four goals marketers have in this type of collaboration.
To help you drive your goal setting, refer to your previous year’s goals and budget allocations. Ask yourself questions like:
Did you meet those goals?
Which strategies were successful?
Did you have budget left over or were you stretched thin?
Do you want to increase resources to drive new strategies or expand previous ones?
Once you decide on goals, the next step is to consider all the different components that factor into a budget. Every element we list may not make sense for an organization’s budgeting process, so use what is most relevant for your business and objectives.
Employees and training
Social marketers are multifaceted. They often handle copywriting, data analysis, strategy, creative development and more. To excel on social—and keep your marketers from burning out—businesses of all sizes should invest in recruiting, hiring and retaining social marketers.
If you find that social growth is stalling, you’re missing engagement opportunities or you don’t have the bandwidth to collaborate with other parts of your business, it’s time to expand your social media department. And you’re not alone—social media marketers rank bandwidth as one of their number one challenges this year, according to the Sprout Social Index™. And with 88% of marketers expecting to hire a new team member over the next two years, marketing teams are feeling the crunch.
If you can, consider adding specialized roles to your team. In a perfect world, the dream social team might look like this:
Part of your marketing budget might include this team’s payroll and administration expenses, which may already be calculated into the company’s bottom line. If this is the case, you can ignore the payroll part. For a small business, having anyone dedicated to marketing is an investment: make sure you’ve included their payroll amounts and any salary increases or bonuses.
Social media is constantly changing. Keeping a pulse on industry trends and new platform features demands time. Whether you are considering a new creative format like Instagram Reels or a newer platform like TikTok, social marketers need the ability to explore, evaluate and decide how to fit these into their strategy.
No matter how big your team is, training will always be part of your budget. If you don’t learn or adjust to new features, you risk falling behind your competitors.
Content creation and production
Social media has accelerated business competition, but developing creative, informative content helps brands stand out in a crowded landscape. Consistently publishing and investing in content—especially short-form video—is imperative for achieving social goals.
Whether you produce content in-house or you outsource, it takes money, time and lots of planning. On average, video production costs between $880 and $1200 but can vary by location. But given that video is the top content format for achieving social goals, you should definitely include it in your strategy. And don’t forget post-production—editing, audio and graphic design work also takes time and money. Don’t let your content fall flat because you forgot to budget in crucial post-production effort.
Finally, if you are going a paid content route, you’ll need to include that content creation here or in the general advertising budget.
Brands publish an average of 11 posts per day across social channels, but the number can vary depending on industry. If your content strategy requires a higher volume of daily posts, your budget in this area might be much larger than that of a brand that posts a few times a week.
One way to alleviate costs is to build a user-generated content strategy to supplement some of your content calendar while also building brand loyalty. Another idea is to repurpose your existing content across multiple channels and media types. Can you edit a video into a GIF? Or turn article quotes into graphics?
Software and subscriptions
Plenty of social teams use resources that come with recurring monthly or annual costs. They include subscriptions to social media management and analytics tools or customer support and email platforms.
Relying on native social networks to manage all the moving parts of your social strategy can hinder your progress. Social media tools enhance efficiency, empower creativity and generate data that benefits your whole business. Some of our favorites, which range in price, include:
Dropbox to easily save and share social content, especially videos
Grammarly for checking your social media copy quality
Whatever keeps your social marketing running smoothly should be included in this area of your budget. If you are considering changes or new software in the coming year, consider including some padding here.
If you’re not sure when to upgrade your social media management software, check out this article where we walk through considerations to think about before committing to a tool.
Advertising and paid campaigns
Advertising is another big-budget area for social, and for good reason—59% of consumers say social media ads are an influential information source on purchasing decisions. With organic reach down and competition high, having a social media advertising budget is a key way to stay top-of-feed, and top-of-mind for paying consumers.
For companies executing multichannel campaigns, you’ll need to decide how much to allocate for each channel.
If Facebook is your biggest channel, it makes sense to devote more money there. The average Facebook ad cost per click hovers around the $0.94 mark but fluctuates based on industry.
If you want to grow your Instagram audience, invest more of your budget in Instagram ads. Thankfully, you can manage Instagram and Facebook ads from one location, and even serve the same ad across both platforms.
If you’re just starting out with social media advertising, we suggest learning the basics first and experimenting with different platforms, targeting options and content approaches.
Influencer, creator and other business partnerships
Between brand collaborations, the booming creator economy and influencer marketing campaigns, brand partnerships are everywhere on social media. They effectively increase your brand presence and get new customers to your virtual door, but they do cost money to implement, especially depending on the reach of your partner.
When it comes to working with content creators, marketers cite budget as their biggest challenge. Do your research and decide which channels and content types to prioritize early to make a better case for your creator-focused budget.
Pop-Tarts x Depop is here. Inspired by 5 flavours, 5 creators have curated 1 sweet clothing collection. Head to @poptartsus on #Depop to pick up pieces for $3.59 – the same as a box of Pop-Tarts. Hurry, every purchase comes with a free Pop-Tarts x Depop box of random flavours. pic.twitter.com/1CUvLGlmTh
A celebrity will inevitably be more expensive than a microinfluencer, so it’s important to do your research to choose the right partner for your brand and reap the greatest ROI.
Similarly, the cost of your partnerships can depend on content type, as well as the platform you’re requesting content for.
While you’re cementing your contract with brand partners, make sure to incorporate a mutually agreed-upon social reporting plan so both parties can track how well the partnership performs.
Analyze everything to back up your social media marketing budget
Budgeting isn’t a one-and-done exercise. Was that campaign actually worth the time and money you put in or was it a sinkhole? Could you have spent less on advertising but had the same outcome? These types of questions can be answered by continually tracking social metrics to reevaluate and get more buy-in for your budget.
For example, a tool like Sprout Social tracks content performance, hashtag analytics and more. All of which can help you inform the budget considerations above.
With Sprout’s Premium Analytics, social marketers can create custom reports that pull the most important data points into a single source of truth that you can share with stakeholders. Once you have it all laid out, it’s much easier to determine your ROI and identify potential adjustments.
Create your social media marketing budget to set yourself up for success
At the end of the day, a budget helps you organize your team and your strategy. And it has benefits that extend beyond simply boosting posts—from securing the software you use, to guiding your advertising strategy, fueling paid partnerships and more.
Whether you need a bigger budget, analytics tools or a new team member, your next step is to build a business case to secure executive buy-in. Download this free template to build a compelling foundation for your proposal to prove that an investment in social media is an investment in your business.
Facebook is constantly introducing new updates to enhance the user experience. Many of their new features–from Stories to Facebook Live–have been a hit with users. In fact, more than 1 billion people now use Stories.
Marketers need to constantly stay on top of these updates so they can make full use of the platform’s potential and keep up with the competition.
On that note, let’s take a closer look at one of the latest features–the option to hide likes on Facebook. We’ll dive into why you may want to hide likes on Facebook and walk you through how to do it.
Why you may want to hide likes on Facebook
As much as we try to deny it, it’s easy to let those engagement numbers get to you. But with the hide likes feature on Facebook, you can now keep those metrics private. Let’s look at a few more reasons why you may want to hide likes on Facebook.
1. You don’t need to create content just for likes
Many social media users are using the number of likes on their posts to validate themselves and the content they create. In their minds, the more likes they get, the better their content is. So, before creating or posting anything, they’re asking themselves, “Will people like this?” As a result, they end up not creating or publishing the kind of content they want to create.
2. Few likes may send a negative signal to your audience
It’s not just the Facebook algorithm that’s counting likes as a way to rank posts on the platform. Social media users are also using those numbers to judge the quality and popularity of the content. If they see that a post has a ton of likes, they immediately decide that it’s a hit with other users.
So, instead of looking at the actual quality and content of the post, they’re letting those numbers decide what content to like, share or interact with. In other words, there’s a chance the number of likes could affect your Facebook engagement.
3. Creates a more positive environment
Facebook designed the option to hide likes so that users will focus more on the photos and videos rather than the likes. This could make for a healthier, more positive environment in which users have the freedom to express themselves. As a result, we may be able to see creativity flourish as creators get the courage to experiment and exhibit their originality.
4. Benefits brands just getting started on Facebook
For many brands, turning off like counts on Facebook is a great way to encourage your audience to judge the content objectively. This is particularly helpful for brands that are just starting to grow their presence on the platform.
National Geographic doesn’t hide likes but here’s a peek at what this post would look like if they did:
5. Improves mental health
Unfortunately, like counts not only affect the content creation process but also people’s mental health. Experts have found that getting fewer social media likes can decrease feelings of self-worth in adolescents.
The lack of validation could lead to increased negative thoughts about themselves. This may even increase symptoms of depression and anxiety over time. So, one of the most obvious benefits of hiding likes on Facebook is the possibility of improving users’ mental health.
Why you may not want to hide likes on Facebook
On the flip side, hiding likes on Facebook may not always have positive results. For instance, influential users may be unable to demonstrate their content performance. As a result, they may have a harder time scoring brand partnerships.
For brands, not displaying your Facebook likes may come across as deceptive or questionable. In a world where transparency has become the key to winning consumer trust, this could put a damper on your relationship with the audience.
How to hide likes on Facebook: Your posts
Have you decided to try out this new feature? If so, it’s super easy to set up. Here are three simple steps to hide the like count on your Facebook posts:
Step 1: Go to your brand Facebook Page and click on the profile icon at the top right-hand corner of the screen. From the drop-down menu, select “Settings & privacy” and then choose “Settings.” You can follow the same steps for your personal profile if you want to try it out for your personal Facebook account.
Step 2: Once on your “Settings” dashboard, click on the “Privacy” button from the left-hand panel of the screen. This will open all your privacy-related settings. From here, you can change settings for your Page information, tagging actions, blocking and messaging.
Step 3: From the left-hand panel, select “Reaction preferences” at the bottom. Then toggle on the option to hide the number of reactions on your posts.
That’s it–your posts will no longer display the number of likes you’ve received. Once you’re ready to start displaying the number of likes again, you just need to follow the same steps as above and then toggle off this option.
How to hide likes on Facebook: Pages you’ve liked
When everyone can see the Pages you’ve liked, it’s easy for your information to get compromised. By default, everyone can get an idea of your interests and values based on the Pages you’ve liked.
Malicious users could manipulate the info to their advantage. This may involve running elaborate scams with targeted messaging. They may even be able to use the info to imitate your brand, which could threaten your brand reputation.
So, hiding the Pages you’ve liked is an excellent way to prevent becoming overexposed on the platform. That way, you can retain some of your privacy and significantly reduce the chances of your account getting compromised.
Additionally, brands may also want to hide the other Pages they’ve liked to streamline the information they display on their Page. When people come to your Facebook Page, it’s to find more info about your business. They may want to see your photos and videos or get involved with your community.
However, they’re not necessarily interested in finding out what films, sports teams or TV shows your brand likes. So, when you hide them from your Page, it becomes easier for people to find the info that they really need.
For example, Califia Farms chooses to display sections about their events, reviews, photos and videos. Additionally, they choose to include sections about their brand and their community. This keeps the Page minimal while displaying only the most important information.
Here’s the step-by-step process of how to hide the Pages you’ve liked on Facebook:
Step 1: Go to profile and click on the “More” button. You’ll find this in the toolbar under your cover photo. The same option is available on your brand Page if you want to hide the Pages that your brand has liked on Facebook.
Step 2: Select the “Likes” option from the drop-down menu. This will open your “Likes” dashboard, which displays all the pages you’ve liked across Facebook.
Step 3: Click on the ellipses button from the top right-hand corner of the screen. This will open a drop-down menu with two options. Click on the “Hide Section” button to instantly hide all the Pages you’ve liked. Select “Edit the Privacy of Your Likes” to manually edit the privacy for different categories.
Step 4: Now you’ll be able to see a list of all the Page categories that are available on Facebook. You can manually change the privacy of your likes for each category. Click on the globe button next to the category you want to edit and then select “Only me.”
Note that this option is only available to personal accounts. So, you won’t get the option to change the audience settings for separate categories for your brand Page. The only option is to hide all your liked pages. To do this, just follow the instructions above i.e., clicking on the “Hide Section” button.
Bonus step: You can further edit the sections you want to display on your Page to keep it clean and minimal. To do this, click on the “More” button and select “Manage Sections” from the drop-down menu. Then uncheck all the sections you want to hide from your page.
We suggest keeping only the most essential details about your business. This includes your “About” section and your photos and videos. Additionally, you should also give your audience the option to check out your groups, communities, events and Live videos.
Consider if hiding likes on Facebook is right for your brand
Hiding your like counts on Facebook allows users to focus on the content of the post. That way, they can judge the post objectively and decide how to interact with it. As a result, brands that are just starting to grow their presence on the platform could strategically leverage it.
If you decide to hide your Facebook likes from the public, you should still make use of engagement data internally. Check out our complete guide on Facebook analytics to help inform your strategy.
Researching keywords, optimizing your website, measuring the results, and tweaking your strategy are the fundamentals everyone should take to heart if they want to increase their leads and enhance their conversion rates.
However, we aren’t discussing any of that today.
Instead, I’ll explain how to use video transcripts to boost your SEO efforts.
This method is proven to enhance your search engine optimization, but it’s all the more vital today.
Most surveyed marketers realize how essential using video marketing is. In fact, according to research, 86 percent of businesses use video marketing, and 92 percent state that it’s an ‘important part’ of their marketing strategy.
However, if you want to get the most out of your videos, you can take it a step further and use video transcripts to maximize your SEO.
That’s not all, though.
There’s another reason video transcripts are so essential, and that’s accessibility, but more about that later. For now, let’s just focus on SEO.
Video Transcripts and SEO
Video transcripts are a valuable tool for SEO, and there are several ways that they contribute to your site’s visibility.
First, transcripts make your video content accessible to a wider audience, including those who are d/Deaf or hard of hearing or prefer to watch videos with the sound down. This can help you attract more viewers and get more engagement on your site.
Looking for a way to get your videos indexed by search engines? Then add transcripts. They enable search engines to crawl your video content and give context to the information you’re sharing. You can see your indexed videos in GSC’s new video indexing report as well.
You can use transcriptions for internal link-building opportunities on your website. Do you have content complimenting your transcriptions and giving the visitor extra value? Then link to it and keep your visitor on your site for longer.
Transcripts provide valuable keywords and phrases that you can use to optimize your videos and improve your ranking in search results.
Finally, evidence suggests that captions can enhance video view times by around 12 percent, according to Facebook internal testing. In addition, closed captions give search engines crawlable content, increasing the chances of your content getting indexed.
Additionally, you can use transcripts as part of your overall SEO/content strategy. For instance, you can use them to create various forms of written and visual content, including:
blog posts and eBooks
individual quotes for social media
graphics
infographics
How To Start Transcribing Your Videos
So we’ve established that video transcriptions can be an SEO boon for you. But how do you get started?
One method open to everyone is manual transcription: just typing up the content word-for-word yourself. Of course, this is the most affordable option, but also the most time-consuming. You don’t just need to type it; you need to edit and format it to perfection.
Now, I can understand if the manual option doesn’t appeal to you, but other methods are available to you, like:
Mobile apps: There are now many mobile apps that can be used for transcription purposes. Some of the best mobile apps for transcriptions include Otter and Trint.
Use Google’s automatic captioning: YouTube’s speech recognition software creates automatic closed captions for YouTube long-form content, live videos, and Shorts.
Speech narration and dictation software: You can use software like Dragon Naturally Speaking to dictate transcripts, but you’d still have to edit, proofread, and format the completed piece.
Free transcription tools: Descript and oTranscribe are just two of the resources that allow you to do transcriptions. Descript also has paid options.
Google’s doc’s voice commands: If you have Chrome, you can use Google’s free voice typing. To use it, open a document, go to docs, select ‘voice typing’ and wait for the microphone icon to appear. Click the icon, and you’re ready to start dictating. To finish the transcription, click the ‘microphone’ icon again.
Speech-to-text application programming interfaces (APIs): Amazon Transcribe and Deepgram are two examples, but there are many more to choose from. Deepgram gives you a free $150 in credits when you sign up, and new users to Amazon Transcribe get 60 minutes free a month for the first year.
Use captioning: By 2050, the World Health Organization predicts that almost 2.5 billion people will likely experience hearing loss, while 700 million may need hearing rehabilitation. Providing closed captions is a simple way to make video content accessible, and you can add them automatically to your YouTube content.
Best Tools for Video Transcriptions
Transcription services have come a long way since they first emerged. Over the years, the quality of transcription services has improved drastically, and as I highlighted above, you’ve got plenty of methods to choose from.
Here are a few to consider, many with a free trial if you want to give them a spin.
Rev
Rev is a popular transcription service that offers high-quality, accurate transcriptions of audio and video files and a simple pricing structure of $1.50 a minute.
It couldn’t be much easier to use. Simply go to the audio and video transcription option and click the ‘upload your files’ button. Next, upload or drag and drop your files, or paste the URL. Then sign in/register, and pay.
The standard package starts at $10 an hour and is suitable for shorter projects. Premium is $5 an hour plus $22 per month per user and is best suited for teams. For Enterprise pricing, you need to speak to the Sonix team.
Features include 35 languages, automated subtitles, an SEO-friendly media player, and secure storage.
Scribie
Scribie is a transcription service offering fast, accurate, affordable transcripts. The company has a team of transcribers who are experts in different fields, such as medical, legal, and academic transcription.
The company has 40k transcribers and converts transcriptions from audio to text. Pricing starts at .10 cents per word for automated or .80 for manual transcriptions.
You can also choose from three pricing packages: pay-as-you-go, Pro and Enterprise. Pro is $9 monthly, and yearly subscriptions are available too. For Enterprise subscription pricing, contact sales.
A few more worth a mention include:
TranscribeMe: This transcription service offers high-quality transcripts at an affordable price. They also provide a free trial so that users can test out their services before committing to a purchase.
Trint.com: Trint is a web-based platform that uses AI to transcribe your videos. It offers three paid plans, monthly and annual subscription options, and a free seven-day trial.
Best Practices for Using Your Video Transcripts To Boost SEO
Creating transcripts is not just complementing your video, but also providing additional content that is beneficial for SEO purposes.
Here are some tips for using your transcripts to optimize your videos for SEO:
1. Make sure the keywords and phrases you include are relevant to the topic of your video. For example, if your website is about aging well, you could include ‘tips for aging well’ or ‘advice for aging well’
2. Use a variety of keywords and phrases throughout the transcript. Keyword stuffing, the practice of adding excessive keywords without proper context, must be avoided at all costs.
3. Place keywords at the beginning of sentences and paragraphs whenever possible.
4. Check the accuracy of the transcript against the audio track to ensure accuracy.
Video Transcriptions and Accessibility
Away from SEO, there’s another reason why you’d want to use transcriptions and closed captions with your video.
It stands to reason that the more people can access your content, the wider you can spread your message. Providing transcripts helps the millions of people who have hearing problems or are registered as d/Deaf. 61 million people in the U.S. have some form of disability, so it’s important to use all accessibility measures to open doors for those people.
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) means websites must be accessible. Providing transcripts helps achieve ADA compliance.
While there is some debate on the exact nature of legal requirements, there can be consequences. Therefore, if you’re unsure, get some clarification from an expert familiar with the laws.
FAQs
How Can I Transcribe My Videos?
There are several free and paid options available. As well as software, you could use transcription agencies; however, this may be a more expensive option. On the other end of the spectrum, you have manually transcribing them yourself, but this can be extremely time-consuming.
What Are the Best Video Transcription Tools?
It all depends on what you’re looking for and the volume of content you need transcribing. For example, if you’ve got a lot of content to transcribe, a subscription may work out cheaper. Alternatively, if you’re looking for the occasional transcription, then pay-as-you-go services may be better for you. Take advantage of some free trials and see which option works for you. Then, look at whether the tool is within your budget and offers value to your overall SEO efforts.
Conclusion
Sold on transcripts for your videos yet?
Providing video transcripts can help boost your SEO in several ways, such as helping the search engines index your site, increasing your ranking, and providing link-building opportunities.
However, video transcripts do far more than give your site a valuable SEO boost: they also provide greater accessibility for people with hearing loss and for people who may prefer to watch content with the volume turned down when they’re in public.
By using video transcripts, you can get the most out of your online video content by using it as part of your overall SEO strategy to get your content out to more people.
Do you use video transcripts for SEO? How do they help you and your visitors?
from Neil Patel's Digital Marketing Blog https://ift.tt/t3QoWRw
via IFTTT
Social media has given brands and businesses a platform to engage with their customers. But rather than just nurturing your relationships with existing customers, you can also use it to find and convert valuable leads.
We spoke to several social selling experts to understand what it means and its value to salespeople. Along with David Sullivan, a Strategic Business Development Representative for Sprout Social, we reached out to our friends at Chili Piper to help us break down the art of social selling from the brand account.
Meryoli Arias, Senior Social Media and Community Manager, and Daniel Cmejla, Senior Director of Community, Customer Marketing, Events, PR, and Social, of Chili Piper gave us an inside look into how they approach social selling.
We’ll also explore 10 tips and tactics you can use to execute social selling like an expert.
What is social selling?
Social selling is a lead generation strategy designed to help salespeople interact with prospects through social networks. With this strategy, salespeople use social listening to learn what their target audience is talking about online. They use the insights gained from social listening to authentically connect and build relationships through social conversations that matter most to their audience.
Social selling challenges the transactional experience customers and companies traditionally experience, leading to more natural relationships with leads.
The immediacy of social makes it easier for salespeople to connect with, engage and nurture top prospects. It has created a 1:1 experience where salespeople are able to leverage their relationships beyond the internet. A well-managed online connection can lead to in-person interactions and eventually closed deals.
What are the benefits of social selling?
If you have a social business page on Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn, you may already be engaged in the basics of social selling without realizing it. Let’s dive into some of the benefits of social selling so you can take advantage of your own brand.
Generate leads and drive revenue
One of the biggest benefits of social selling is lead generation. To generate revenue for your business, you’ll need to find your audience and connect with them on a deeper level.
Finding an audience and discovering opportunities for connections was once difficult, unrefined and limited. Now, social media makes it easy to specifically target the kind of people most likely to buy from you. Salespeople can use social media data for their sales strategy, which is the top use case for social data according to the Sprout Social Index™.
“Social networks are one of the main places where information is exchanged. It’s one of the preferred places for potential customers to discuss their concerns and needs. Social media can be a huge ally for lead generation if you have a comprehensive strategy with social listening and personalized messaging in place,” Arias says.
“Creating personalized messages and listening to what people are saying about your brand on social media are great ways to understand your potential customers. Once you understand them better, you can speak directly to them about their concerns and the problems you can help them solve,” she adds.
Along with lead generation, social selling allows you to drive additional revenue without expanding your sales team or ad budget. Many social media tactics are free and they can increase your sales if executed properly.
Create authentic relationships with prospects
Social media is a powerful networking tool, so salespeople can use it to thoughtfully engage with potential customers and form genuine relationships.
You can get a sense of a prospect’s personality, interests and pain points by following them on social and paying attention to the content they post, share, like and comment on. You can also find people already in your network that can help introduce and connect you to them.
This process may sound like you’re on the verge of stalking, but it’s actually just research and it serves as a foundation for forming the relationship you want. When you react to your prospect’s posts with your own observations, suggestions and useful links, you’re growing a connection.
Just don’t be that person who Likes everything (we all know that person). Focus on thoughtful, authentic engagement that will help build rapport over time. It could even lead to interacting with the prospect beyond the screen.
Personalize sales pitches and provide added value
As you learn more about your customers, you can create customized sales pitches designed to improve your chances of a sale. Showing you took the time to tailor your pitch according to a prospect’s interests and needs could impress them and seal the deal.
However, nurturing prospects goes beyond giving a sales pitch and answering questions about your brand’s products and services. You’ll need to provide value in other ways to develop your rapport.
According to Cmejla, being helpful is how you maintain authentic relationships within online communities.
“When you approach something by offering help, everything else falls into place,” he says.
For example, if a prospect posts on social about upcoming vacation recommendations, and you honestly have some, jump on it. You never know–they may have the time of their life and return wanting to do business with you because of your great tip.
Along the same lines, you may notice a prospect is looking for a professional recommendation—an SEO expert for example. If you’ve worked with an SEO super-star, share. If your prospect and your vendor enjoy working together and you were the hero matchmaker, you’ve opened a door for yourself.
Expand your network
Social selling is the fastest, most organic way to get your name and your company’s name out there. Your comments will appear on hundreds of people’s feeds. Even if your original prospect doesn’t engage, a new prospect may surface in the comment box.
Remember the more you interact with prospects using authentic and useful content, the closer you are to winning a deal. It won’t happen overnight, but it will get you there faster than sitting on the sidelines.
Social selling examples: The art of the sale from the brand account
Social selling is an art form. Let’s take a look into how Chili Piper and Sprout Social approach social sales across several platforms.
LinkedIn
Your favorite social selling platform will vary depending on your company and industry, but since Chili Piper is a B2B Saas company, LinkedIn is a huge platform for them.
“We leverage LinkedIn, specifically our company page, to educate and talk about the topics relevant to our niche and personas. Also, our sales team creates more direct relationships with people on LinkedIn,” Arias says.
For example, Chili Piper uses an optional prompt after people fill out their demo requests that asks, “How did you hear about us?” For a recently closed-won deal, 25% percent said they heard of the brand via social media.
“And we even had some respondents saying they heard of us through ‘Sarah Brazier’s comment on LinkedIn’,” Cmejla says.
Sarah Brazier is an Account Executive at Gong and a Chili Piper customer. Her positive commentary illustrates how an online authentic relationship can inspire prospects to learn more about your brand’s product or service.
“How does a comment lead to a demo request? More crucially, how does one encourage this type of interaction? We believe that investing in your customers is the highest ROI of any investment. By building relationships with customers and ensuring they have visibility into threads that mention your solution, you can create an organic process where evangelists represent you because they trust you. And you, in turn, can help them build their own brand,” he adds.
Sullivan says his favorite social sellers on LinkedIn create a content mix.
This includes informative, emotional and personal content. Informative content illuminates how your company can help solve a problem your ideal customer has while emotional content makes your audience feel something. Tears from laughter or crying are equally powerful.
And personal content reveals your personality.
“What’s a hobby you picked up recently? Where did you go for your last vacation? Do you believe PB&J sandwiches are meant to be cut into triangles or squares? You get the idea,” he explains.
Instagram and TikTok
Arias says the B2B brand uses Instagram and TikTok to create a window into the company and those who are behind Chili Piper.
“We use Instagram and TikTok to show the things that matter to us. And let people get to know what Chili Piper, and the Pipers who work there, believe in,” she says.
“For example, we might write a post about why it’s important to have a diverse team. But we’ll also post videos and pictures from team members located all over the world. We don’t just talk about things — we show them, too,” she adds.
Consider each platform’s nuances
Sullivan says that every platform has its nuances. Instagram is highly visual while TikTok is very trend based.
“Regardless of medium, I believe every great social seller does two things: They create content that adds value to their audience. And, they have authentic interactions with other creators in their niche,” he explains.
He points to this TikTok from Zoom as an example of great content:
The TikTok adds value because it’s timely and funny. When the video was posted many businesses had started implementing hybrid work models, so the subject matter was top of mind. The clip points out the difference in how we behave when working remotely versus in the office, and does so in a hilarious way.
“You know a brand is incredible at social selling when their name becomes a verb–and that’s exactly what Zoom has accomplished. During the pandemic, their service kept millions of personal relationships intact and helped hundreds of thousands of businesses continue to grow during a time of unprecedented uncertainty. Every piece of Zoom social content is human, and adds value,” he continues.
As you develop your sales skills, stay on top of content and timely trends, especially on the social selling platform of your choice. Doing so will illuminate how to better reach your audience.
Social selling: Tips to share with your internal teams
As you can see, social selling has a lot of benefits for the brand account and individuals. Here are 10 tips to help your sales team get started:
1. Look your best
Your image is just as important in the digital world as it is in the real world. Your profile image is the first thing prospective clients will see. Make a good impression with a professional photo that strikes the right balance between authenticity, trustworthiness and friendliness.
The copy in your social network bio has to accomplish everything a greeting, handshake and elevator pitch would do in person. Write every word with your prospect in mind and write in the first person. Be clear about sharing your contact info, sharing multiple avenues if there’s room.
On LinkedIn, you have more real estate in your summary section to tell a story about who you are, why you do what you do and how you can help. Remember, LinkedIn is different from a resume. Use your headline not just for your title but for a short phrase explaining how you help your clients.
According to Sullivan, when you’re crafting your online profile, keep in mind that the person viewing it may have zero prior knowledge of your company.
“On LinkedIn, describe your role and subject matter expertise using simple language, and avoid using industry jargon and buzzwords. Bonus points if you can do it in a way that reveals your unique personality and background. My colleague Chris Long does a fantastic job at this,” he says.
As you expand his bio, notice how he explains his job description in a digestible way. He also includes fun facts and personality traits. Also note how he has a professional headshot and banner image that shows the company he works for.
Make sure you also highlight your abilities and expertise by getting your colleagues, clients and employees to endorse you for all the skills you have. These skills will be featured prominently in your LinkedIn profile.
2. Build your credibility
Social networks can help you build your personal brand. With every Tweet, LinkedIn comment or Facebook post, you can grow your reputation and establish a solid foundation. It’s a record of your authenticity and a great place to demonstrate your understanding of your industry and potential clients.
“Quality social selling isn’t about slipping into someone’s DMs in a ‘classy’ way. It’s about being recognized in a public way as the leaders within a certain space. People at companies like Chili Piper have built massive inbound interests in their products by humanizing their brands and developing affinity with relevant audiences on the individual level through employee accounts,” Arias explains.
Sullivan says the easiest way to build trust online is by having public conversations that showcase your unique perspective on topics you care about.
He advises social sellers to try interacting with the following groups:
Respected influencers within both your role, and the niche your company serves
Prospects at companies that would directly benefit from having access to your product
Your co-workers! Show them love by engaging and commenting on their posts
You can become a thought leader by sharing relevant articles about your industry, adding thoughtful insights to conversations and solving problems your prospects may have. It’s all in the name of establishing trust. When you share interesting thoughts, others will re-share them, tag you or start a conversation with you.
You can even use LinkedIn’s publishing platform to write original articles relevant to your industry. In fact, this is one of the tactics Neil Patel uses to share his marketing expertise.
Another way to build credibility and social proof on LinkedIn is to ask for recommendations or endorse others in hopes that they’ll endorse you back. Lastly, encourage your network to share and comment to get the conversation started around you.
3. Find your prospects
Pay attention: where do your potential clients seek more information about problems they may have? Is it a LinkedIn group? A weekly Twitter chat or Twitter Space? A private Facebook Group? Plant yourself there, listen to their conversations and get involved.
While LinkedIn is the place to turn for business connections, Twitter has a stronger search function and a lower barrier to entry. You can follow anyone you want, from a CEO to a celebrity, and they don’t have to accept your request as they do on LinkedIn or Facebook. They might even follow you back.
You can also use the Twitter Chat Schedule on Tweet Reports to discover upcoming and/or trending Twitter Chats. Look through conversations relevant to your industry, join in on the chat and start following the best prospects.
On Twitter, search certain industry-specific hashtags to see what your potential clients are talking about and what’s important to them. Once you’ve found some prospects, they may be able to lead you to others. For example, see who they are following and start following those people as well.
After identifying potential clients, stay organized. You can use Twitter Lists to create personalized public or private feeds, which maximize your time. Create a private Twitter List with your top 25 prospects, or create additional lists for competitors, influencers and current customers. Each time you visit the network, visit the list and you’ll get a quick snapshot into the minds of those who matter most, and you can more easily start conversations.
4. Monitor relevant conversations to find prospects
Using social listening for sales and social monitoring are the most effective tactics to understand what your prospects want and need.
Monitor relevant conversations about your brand to see what issues existing customers are experiencing. Maybe they’re venting their frustrations about your service on social media. Or they could be raving about you but mentioning some possible areas that need improvement.
Social media monitoring also enables you to keep track of other relevant conversations you can use to enhance your social selling strategy. Find out what your target audience is saying about your competitors or the industry in general to discover their pain points. Maybe they shared a blog post that’s relevant to you and you found it really enjoyable. Or maybe you have a shared interest.
You can use Sprout’s social media monitoring tools to track relevant conversations about your brand, your competitors and your industry. You can even use Sprout’s engagement features to respond to the conversations you’re interested in.
Use all this information to create personalized messages, which will set you apart from other brands.
You should also leverage mutual connections you might have with your prospects. Instead of reaching out to them on your own, ask your shared contact to introduce you to the prospect.
5. Participate and engage in relevant online communities
There are so many social media networks out there for social selling, but you don’t need to be active on all of them.
“Picking the right online community to accelerate your professional development starts from understanding what questions your prospects are asking. Not only about your product, but about the problems they face in their roles,” Cmejla says.
Cmejla advises sales professionals to focus on leveraging the appropriate online community.
“Once you understand the information modern buyers need to digest to be more efficient, you can map that to communities that occupy that intellectual space,” he says. “For us, this means communities around marketing and revenue operations excellence like WizOps, the M2 Community, Sales Assembly and the active following of influencers on LinkedIn.”
LinkedIn Groups are an excellent source of prospects—especially for B2B companies—because some of the best conversations happen in industry-specific groups. All you need to do is find relevant groups, submit a request to join and start conversing with members. You can easily search for relevant LinkedIn Groups using the right keywords. Make a list of keywords relevant to your industry, service or product. Enter these keywords in the search window and filter the results to only show groups.
For example, if you offer services or products that would be helpful to startup businesses, you can use keywords like “startups” to find relevant LinkedIn Groups to participate in.
You can also check your prospects’ profiles to see which groups they’re a part of, then join them. Share your valuable expertise and content, ask relevant questions or engage with group members to build a relationship.
The relationships you form can be crucial for nurturing them as leads. You can inform them of new product launches or recommend relevant services they might need based on their conversations.
6. Stay active and provide value consistently
Social networks are a time commitment. Once you’ve started following the right people, you must continuously provide valuable contributions. So choose your network wisely and don’t spread yourself too thin.
Every Tweet, comment and post matters and you don’t want to disappear for weeks at a time. An abandoned network could call your reputation and trustworthiness into question.
There are plenty of ways to stay active on social media:
Share your expertise
Offer up solutions
Always stay focused on the potential buyer
Use relevant hashtags on Twitter to target your content more appropriately
Follow industry influencers so you stay relevant and up to date
If you don’t offer consistent value or remain active, there are repercussions. People will unfollow you, block you or hide your notifications. You don’t want to be ignored, so maintain an active presence.
7. Nurture your prospects
You don’t necessarily have to create your own content or fill your feed with generalized tips that appeal to everyone. A crucial aspect of any social etiquette—and especially that of social selling—is to pay attention to and respond to what others share and say.
When starting a conversation or participating in a pre-existing one on a social network (like a Twitter Chat), remember it’s just that, a conversation. Be sure to listen. Every day you should leave comments or ‘Like’ posts from others.
More importantly, respond to people who are trying to reach out to you like Salesforce has done in the Tweet below. It’s an easy way to show that you’re listening or to offer up your expertise or insight. It’s also an easy way to find what you have in common.
We see gold in these photos! ✨👀 Thanks for the visit! Astro loved hosting you all! 💙😉🙌
You can also repost content from someone else. When sharing content from another user, be sure to tag or thank them for their initial post.
8. Earn trust by sharing success stories
Your company may boast about providing exceptional service, or you might highlight impressive features of your product. But these are just claims in the eyes of potential customers and they may not trust what you’re saying. To earn the trust of prospects, use social media to showcase proof that will back up your claims.
Showcase success stories and reviews from your existing customers. Share links to the success stories published on your site. Or create custom images with a photo of the customer or the brand logo and a brief summary of the results they achieved with your help. You can even do a full-fledged interview with them and share their story on your social media.
Cisco does a great job of sharing success stories on social media. In the following Tweet, they’ve shared a video explaining how they’ve provided free technology-based education. This is a great example of content salespeople can reshare on their own social profiles.
.@Cisco knows education changes lives. Over the past 25 years they have provided free technology based education to over 17.5 million learners —with the hope of educating 3 million in the next year! #GlobalCitizenFestivalpic.twitter.com/7MC4w2Md4r
Once your prospects see that you’ve delivered impressive results for real people, they’ll be more interested to work with you. You can even encourage your customers to leave reviews about your business on Facebook. Then, you can point other prospects to those reviews and share them on your own social profiles.
If your prospects are interested in reading reviews, they can click on the star rating section and gain access to all the reviews your existing customers have left about your business.
9. Track results of your existing social selling efforts
The best way to get better at social selling is by learning from your existing efforts. Research and pay attention to the social selling metrics that are the most relevant to you and your brand.
Collect insights from your current efforts and see what’s effective as well as what isn’t. Use native analytics like Twitter Analytics to determine the performance of your personal posts. What posts do your prospects respond to the best?
Based on this data, ask yourself what you should do differently and what you can do better. This can help you gain a clearer direction of how you should adapt your efforts to deliver even better results.
Although it can be challenging to understand how social media referrals are behaving on your site, Sprout Social’s Salesforce integration can help you. You can even keep track of social interactions beyond potential customers, such as company partners.
Along with Salesforce, Sprout offers other features that salespeople can use to help manage their social media presence.
“One of my favorite Sprout features that maximizes the effort you put into social selling is Optimal Send Times. It tells you the best time to post on each network, based on your personal audience’s historical engagement patterns,” Sullivan says.
Long story short, data can help you identify your warmest sales leads and which types of content interests them the most. With this information, you can enhance your messaging so that it appeals to them and delivers better results.
10. Get offline
If you can convert your social media followers to email conversations, that’s a great first step. But what you really want to do is convert these digital friends into real-life connections. Use social media to establish that warm connection.
Once you’ve established a back-and-forth conversation with someone on social, it’s easier to suggest a phone call or coffee date via a Tweet, direct message or email. Think about it: a prospect might be more likely to open an email with a subject line referencing your Twitter conversation. Now it’s up to you to ensure your real-life persona is just as great as your digital one.
Take your social selling strategy to the next level
These tips can help you promote your brand effectively through social media, resulting in loyal customers and increased conversions. Now you just have to develop a comprehensive social selling strategy that will help you make the most of these ideas.
But social selling isn’t limited to your sales department. Employee advocacy enables social selling to flourish across the company. Learn more about employee advocacy in our guide–we break down what it means and how it works.
