Community Building

2 types of people can help you share your content

2 types of people share your content

In a previous blog post series, we covered how to implement your own community management strategy. In the last part, we introduced the importance of sharing your content. Time to get into the gritty details.

There are only 2 types of people that can help you share your content: 1. Your readers, and 2. Well, you of course!

Make your readers share your content

Do you feel that the only reason why people share is because of the interest they have for your content? Sure, but there are actually many other components.

Originality: your voice, your style, your personality, your signature. You need to be different and find your own style to be engaging. As Mark Shaeffer, author of The Tao of Twitter says:

To stand out, you need to be original. And to be original, you need to have the courage to tell your own story and have your own voice.

Visuals: including visuals in your article is another significant component. Your visuals are the first things that a reader sees and her decision to read further will most likely be based on them. Make your visuals attractive, funny, and representative of your content. Try to include text that explains what your content is about. Most importantly, don’t ever underestimate the power of visuals. Just to give you an idea:

87% of the 10% most shared posts on Facebook between February and March 2014 were photos (Socialbakers).

Photos still get the most action

Share buttons: if you are posting your content on a website or a blog, make it easy to share. Users will only share your content if it’s a one-click job. And you don’t need to be a PhD either to add social sharing buttons to your platform. Just get the basics covered: Facebook, Twitter, Google+. Also, think about your sharing strategy before you place those anywhere on your blog: do you want people to share single articles? Or a link to your whole blog? Or both?

Bear your share of the load

Ever heard that the shoemaker’s children always go barefoot? Having your audience share your content is great. But you need to serve as an example.

Social media: for a good start, share your posts in all the major social media: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+.

Specialised media: Have a beautiful picture? Share it on Instagram, Flickr, and Pinterest. Cool video? Upload it on YouTube and DailyMotion. A couple of slides? Go for Slideshare. Having a funny, interesting content that may go viral? Post it on buzzfeed and scoopit.

Email: take advantage of your mailing list, send an email to your followers and subscribers, let them know about your last blog-post.

Tools: there are plenty of free tools you can use to optimise your content outreach on social media: buffer allows you to post your content at the time you want or at the time buffer finds the most suitable. It also provides you with a powerful analytics platform you can use for monitoring your content performance on social media; Edgar helps you reschedule and reuse your content to maximize its views; wisestamp integrates links to your latest post directly into your email signature. Goodbits and Mailchimp both help you build beautiful emails for sharing your latest post.

Comments on other posts: have a look at all the blogs and forums active in your niche market; search for posts that are brushing your own content’s topic; leave an interesting comment with a reference to your own post there. Make your comments as insightful and intriguing as possible. And don’t be too intrusive; check the website rules before posting a link.

Ask close friends and loyal fans to share it too: people around you would be glad to support your business as well; ask them to share your content in their own circles!

Re-post: content writers generally don’t like it, but re-publishing content multiple times on social media is a good way to drive more traffic.

Average number of retweets for recirculation
Average number of retweets for recirculation (Buffersocial)

When re-publishing, try to hit multiple time zones and thus reach different followers. Never re-publish exactly the same content to introduce your article. Change the title, content, and if you have several visuals, use a different one every time.

Refer your own posts: all your posts share some overlaps. You can promote an article by mentioning it and linking it in another post. These cross references have a double effect: your readers stay longer on your website, jumping from one post to another; and it improves your SEO.