When your task within your business is to “post on social media”, it can seem like a daunting chore, especially if it is not something you do with your personal social media accounts on a daily basis or you haven’t done it in your past careers. It’s definitely a specific way of thinking, using social media for your content marketing strategy, and having the collateral to create the content you need. To help, we’ve created some tips you can use to make content creation a slightly smoother process that doesn’t take up your whole day or wake you up at midnight with the thought that you forgot to post.
Types of Content for Social Media
First of all, you’ll want to create various types of content. Although video works well currently, it wasn’t all that long ago that beautiful staged still images reigned supreme. Short video was the way to go at one point but it’s slowly moving into slightly longer form videos with a bit more substance. Some formats like links, others don’t. Long explanation short, variety is best unless you truly see a type of content working extremely well every single time for your company.
- Stock Images: These are the most basic forms of images but sometimes it’s what you need to work with. Try not to use a free stock image that you’ve seen a million times. And be sure it’s free. Don’t just use Google image search and steal the image. Most of the time, those images are not truly free to use. But putting an image with your written content is very important so pick a good one, even if it’s stock.
- Original Photography: Whether you pay a photographer for images for your business or you just snap some photos with your cell phone, original photography is the best option for social media (and your website) as far as still images go. Cell phone photography is so advanced now that you can get a nice photo with a quick snapshot of your daily office life, new products, menu items and more. And these seem genuine and personable because your clients will recognize the people and locations. We have lots of tips for this type of photography that you can find HERE.
- Video: Whether you capture video using your phone, hire a professional videographer or use stock video, the movement is always appealing to your audience on social platforms. If you use stock, be picky and try to edit it at least a little bit. Make it make sense for what you’re posting about. And consider your platforms when you post your videos. Shorter format does better on Instagram, Facebook, etc., while longer, meatier videos do better on YouTube and your website. Be sure to consider sound as well. No sound with captions is better than noisy, hard to hear situations. And don’t use copyrighted music, it won’t play anyway.
- Links to your website: You want to use your social to get people to your website where they can purchase from you. But you need to do it the right way or sometimes people don’t actually see the links at all. In most cases, links do better in your comments on Facebook and LinkedIn but on Instagram, you’ll need to send people to your bio where you have a link to your website (unless you have a very large account or you’re doing a paid ad or posting in Stories). On YouTube, most Links will be clickable in the description of your video, with a few exceptions (like YouTube Shorts).
- Alternative Posts: Text only, polls, shares from other accounts, graphics, etc.
How to Save Time Posting to Social
Now that you have an idea of the types of things people post on social media, let’s get to what you’re here for: how to save some time posting.
To begin, you’ll need the content. Create it all in one shot. Focus on one type of content, like photos of your food or videos of the different departments hard at work. Create a gallery of images and videos you can use easily. If you’re using stock images, pull ones down and save then to a file that you know will work great for the types of items you post about.
Batch creation looks like this: Create 4 or 5 infographics covering a series of topics at one time to be used once per month. Create 4 or 5 images with 5-star reviews. Crop 4 or 5 images of your most popular menu items. Save 4 or 5 photos that will work well portraying your services. Make a list of 4 or 5 upcoming events to create. Schedule a ‘video day’ where you create 4 or 5 short videos answering frequently asked questions.
Once you have your content created, it’s time to create a content calendar if you didn’t do that before your batch creation. Don’t have one? We have one you can download for FREE, right HERE.
Now use that calendar to preschedule your social posts. You can use built in tools like the ones that are found on Meta or LinkedIn or you can use a 3rd party app. But post out at least 30 days at a time. You can use the open spaces in your calendar to get that “in the moment” content that always does so well.
This is the simple explanation for batch content creation and scheduling for your business. We know it’s easy for us because we do it day in and day out and this might not be something your team has the skillset for. So if you really want to save time, the pros at Green T Design are here to support your business in the ways you need, from a simple marketing plan to creating all of your marketing tools for success. If you’re ready to grow your business, but need some help, let’s get a conversation scheduled!
