Tag: social media

Entrepreneurship/

Use These Tips to Create Popping Social Media Captions for Your Brand

As a copywriter and story strategist for my clients – and for my own business, digital magazine, and personal brand, I know one thing to be true. And that’s the fact that compelling captions are a crucial part of your brand’s social media content. The caption is the most important part of the post, because it can make or break what you’re trying to say. Here are some guidelines:

A good idea…

A good idea is one that stands out. As the saying goes, this phrase is more than just a cliché: it’s a rule of thumb. If your caption is a great idea that can’t be found anywhere else online, you’re on track to building trust with your audience and establishing yourself as an authority on whatever topic you’re discussing.

A good idea should also be relevant to the post. If your caption doesn’t fit what’s going on in the picture or video, people may think that it doesn’t fit at all—and they’ll wonder why you’re wasting their time by posting it anyway!

It’s also important to keep captions short but sweet—especially if they include hashtags. You don’t want someone scrolling through their feed only to have their eyes glaze over when they see your caption!

…and a relevant piece of content.

A good caption should be relevant to the image or video you’re posting. Your caption should also help the reader understand what is happening in the image or video.

…written in one of your brand’s voice.

One of the best ways to get your ideal client or customer to engage with your content is by using captions that are written in one of your brand’s voices. Your brand’s voice is a collection of words and phrases that convey the tone, style, and attitude you’d like to portray on social media. It can be as simple as changing up some words here and there, or it could be more strategic by focusing on a specific type of language (e.g., conversational) or even tone (e.g., funny vs serious).

…that’s complete and concise.

A good caption should be complete and concise. If you’re sharing a photo of your family, then just share the photo! Don’t try to force in information about how much you love them or how cute they are. It’s fine to mention that they’re your family, but adding more information is unnecessary and will detract from the message you’re trying to convey.

Also, avoid over-explaining or rambling on with an explanation of what’s happening in the photo—you can say it once back at home base and let people click through if they want more details. Similarly, don’t use too many hashtags or emojis. Their purpose is not so much for conveying meaning as for categorizing content for search engines (and other users)

…that’s consistent with your other posts.

Consistency is key. If your social media posts are all over the place, you’ll confuse your audience and look unprofessional. When writing a caption, it’s important to think about how this particular post fits in with your other posts as well as what kind of tone and style they have.

If you’re posting on a regular basis and want to be consistent with your content, I recommend using a social media calendar or planner so that you don’t accidentally forget an important post or event!

…that is designed to engage your audience.

While it’s important to use your best judgment, there are a few general tips and tricks that will help you write social media captions that are designed to engage your audience:

  • Use a question.
  • Give them something to look forward to.
  • Make them feel something.

…with a hook that provides an incentive or some kind of reward for the reader.

A good social media caption can be the difference between a post that connects with your audience and one that languishes in obscurity. And what makes it so effective? A hook, of course! The right kind of hook—one that grabs your audience’s attention and holds it long enough to read the whole thing—can turn an otherwise unremarkable post into something worth sharing.

What exactly is a hook? It’s basically any reason or incentive for someone to read your blog post: a question, statement, promise or other element of surprise. They don’t have to be complicated; they just need to make you stand out from the crowd by providing something unique about your content.

Good social media captions are original, complete, concise, consistent, engaging, and rewarding.

To be considered a good social media caption, the following must be true:

  • Originality. There are no generic quotes to be found here! Make sure you come up with something original for your caption.

  • Completeness. You want your caption to convey everything necessary in order for it to make sense and be understood by your followers. It should have a beginning, middle and end that flow together seamlessly. If you’re having trouble finding the right words for your post, try writing down what you think would make this particular post perfect before coming up with some captions—this can help guide your thoughts in the right direction!

  • Conciseness and consistency across all platforms (if applicable). The more concise titles/captions are often more engaging because they don’t require scrolling down past several paragraphs before getting back into reading mode again; this means people will spend less time on each individual page but still feel rewarded by what they read there because there was enough detail provided without being overwhelming or boring at all!

There you have it! A few tips for creating captions that will give your content the boost it needs to stand out in social media. Hopefully, this post has given you some ideas and inspiration for your next post or project.

Curious about what I’m learning every week on my creative journey as it relates to faith, self-care, and entrepreneurship?

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Entrepreneurship/

How to Create a Solid Social Media Strategy

I started marketing using social media back in 2014 for my digital magazine, Virtue & Memoirs. These days, in addition to the magazine, I market my copywriting and brand storytelling business Chayil Media Publishing using social media – and I also create social media strategies for clients that I write social media content for. And lastly, I market my personal brand using social media as well.

So where do you start? Well, let’s dig into everything in this blog post.

Pick your platform.

You need to pick your platform, and this step is pretty simple.

Is this a place that aligns with your brand? You want to be where your followers are—and not somewhere else that may or may not be useful for the same purpose.

Follow people and brands that align with your mission

This is a fairly obvious one, but still worth mentioning: follow people who are relevant to your brand. If you have a service-based business, connect with people who are your ideal clients and people who compliment your brand.

For instance, if you’re a website designer, connect with graphic designers. Since, I’m a copywriter and story strategist, I love connecting with website designers who I can possibly collaborate with or refer people to in the future. Additionally, I love connecting to people who are ideal clients.

Understand your audience.

You should know who you are talking to and understand the needs of your audience. Simply put, the content you produce on social media should speak directly to your ideal client or customer. Now, you’re probably wondering, “Danielle, how do I figure this out?”

Well, you simply need to ask questions. A great way to do this is by jumping into Facebook groups to ask questions about what your ideal client or customer is struggling with – or even finding out what they like best when it comes to a problem you solve.

You can also jump into these groups and use the search bar to find out everything you need to know. Type in a keyword associated with what you do and another word like frustrated or struggle. You’ll see quite a few conversations pulled up from your search.

Conduct surveys with customers or prospects. Ask them for feedback about why they follow or engage with certain accounts on social media, what types of posts inspire them to interact with your brand online, etc.

These surveys can be done on sites like SurveyMonkey or Google Forms.

Create an editorial calendar.

The next step is to create an editorial calendar that includes the days and times you will post, as well as the topics you will cover, and images you will use.

Make sure your editorial calendar is in sync with your marketing goals. This will help ensure that your social media strategy aligns with the rest of your brand’s mission.

Now, while it’s important to need to post regularly and consistently, you also need to make sure that what you’re posting is worth sharing. The key is finding the right balance between quantity and quality.

It’s important to have a good mix of different types of content: video, images, carousel posts, etc. This will help you reach an audience across all platforms while remaining relevant at all times.

Track and analyze your results.

Once you’ve put your social media strategy into action, it’s time to evaluate the results. You’ll need to know if your plans are working.

There are several ways to track and analyze performance:

Use analytics tools such as Facebook Insights, Google Analytics, and Twitter Analytics. These tools help you understand how many people are seeing posts on each platform as well as what content is reaching them (and what isn’t).

I personally, use a scheduling tool called Loomly to track and analyze my results.

When you have a solid social media strategy in place, you’ll be able to build authentic relationships with potential clients or customers – and generate sales.

Curious about what I’m learning every week on my creative journey as it relates to faith, self-care, and entrepreneurship?

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Entrepreneurship/

6 Marketing Tips for New Entrepreneurs

Understanding marketing is essential to your success as a new entrepreneur. Marketing is how your target audience finds you. The first thing I ever marketed was my self-published poetry book in 2011. I learned a lot about marketing on social media and through the book’s website – and Amazon. I used that experience – along with my journalism skills to also market my Christian women’s digital magazine “Virtue and Memoirs.”

And these days, I’m still a content creator at heart – marketing Chayil Media Publishing – my copywriting and brand storytelling business, my digital magazine, and my personal brand. Why? Well simply put, without marketing, you won’t gain the exposure to grow a sustainable brand or business.

Marketing is how you gain the trust of your target audience by showing, telling, and proving that your products, services, or business are there to support them.

Danielle Delaney

The following are six marketing tips every new entrepreneur needs to get started right.

Focus On Building Relationships with Your Target Audience First

Before you sell to your audience right away, learn to build a strong relationship first. In other words, the freer value you provide in the long run, the stronger the relationship becomes — making it easier to market your products at a later time. By the way, if you want to learn more about what your audience needs from you, don’t be afraid to survey them on social media by asking questions or doing polls.

Share Engaging and Valuable Content

No business today, online or off, can survive without content marketing. Without content, your audience will not understand the type of value you provide. This can be done through blog posts, videos, photos or even sharing user-generated content. And if you’re not familiar with user-generated content – It’s content that’s shared on social media by one of your customers or clients promoting your brand. You can easily reshare this content with your followers.

Don’t Skip Email Marketing

Emails offer the highest return on investment compared to all other online marketing strategies. There is a myth that email marketing is dead, but this is far from the truth, with nearly three hundred billion emails being sent around the world today. Email marketing is powerful because you don’t have to battle with the algorithms of the world.

Set Up a Business Blog

A blog on your website is a great way to have sole ownership of what you share and sell to your community. If a specific social media platform disappears, you won’t reach them. However, you know this won’t happen since you control your blog. Making it easy to share information with your customers or target audience whenever you can.

Use Social Media

You can’t avoid social media. Even just one social media account can skyrocket your reach and exposure as a brand. Did you know that nearly four billion people worldwide use some form of social media? This means your potential to reach your target audience is almost limitless. Find out which platforms your audience hangs out on and jump in with a strategy. However, be careful not to overwhelm yourself. I recommend sticking to 2-3 platforms.

Get Help

Marketing helps you reach certain revenue goals and reach your target audience effectively. Without marketing, it is unlikely your customers will find you very easily. If you need help, try to hire someone who can help you. A few roles that come to mind are social media managers, copywriters, website designers, and brand photographers

Marketing doesn’t need to be complicated. As long as you create content that your target audience needs or wants, you will likely be successful. And of course, don’t forget nailing down a strategy first.

Unfortunately, many entrepreneurs make mistakes that can hinder their success by ignoring customers’ needs or not taking the time to share your value.

Curious about what I’m learning every week on my creative journey as it relates to faith, self-care, and entrepreneurship?

Click here subscribe to my weekly newsletter, “Letters for the Virtuous Creative.”

Entrepreneurship/

Video! Does It Matter in Business? Yes!

Have you been ignoring video, hoping it will just go away? Or worse, thinking you can accomplish the same goals without it? 

I’m here to tell you, video is going nowhere.

YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world, and thousands of hours of video are uploaded each and every day. Video clips on social platforms on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn enjoy far more engagement than do plain text or even image-based updates.

 When it comes to training programs, most people prefer video to text—or at least a combination of the two. 

And now with streaming video, this rapidly growing marketing channel has become even more crucial to your marketing strategy. 

  • Live video lets viewers get to know you better and trust you. 
  • Your personality and brand shine through in ways written words or pre-recorded video simply cannot manage
  • A built-in sense of urgency makes it easy to connect with your action takers
  • Repurposing video for other channels is easy and super productive
  • Instagram and other social networks appear to give more weight to video, showing it in more newsfeeds than other post formats

In addition to all of that, video is easy to produce—contrary to what some people may think.

Simply prop up your smartphone, log into your preferred app, and viola! You’re live. And because it’s a live, streaming video, your viewers likely have less expectation of perfection. 

For example, with a scripted webinar, they expect a certain polish. But with streaming video, you can get away with a much more lighthearted, go-with-the-flow style. It’s perfect for Q&A sessions, special announcements, group coaching, or anything else where you simply want to connect with your audience, and there’s no agenda. 

If you’re recording videos for Instagram Reels, Stories, Facebook, or LinkedIn you can simply grab your phone to prop it up on something as well – and also invest in a microphone.  There are a variety of microphones on Amazon. And lastly, when it comes to presentation, make sure your lighting is on point. You can film near a window or invest in a ring light. I also have a couple of these that I got from Amazon.

Don’t Abandon Your Other Marketing Methods. 

We see this happen a lot—a popular trend or strategy comes along, and all of a sudden everyone is on board. 

However, you must not forget to incorporate other methods like photos, carousel posts, or email marketing into your marketing strategy. Recorded video and live video can complement these methods. 

So while Instagram Reels and Live video in general definitely matters when it comes to your overall marketing efforts, it’s not the end-all, be-all tool that will outshine everything else in your marketing strategy. 

Want more insights from Danielle about how to show up boldly in business and everyday life as a Christian woman creative? Subscribe to her official email list where you’ll receive weekly letters in your inbox. 

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