Holy frank

Just Another Day in Social Media. 😂

As a social media manager, I can honestly say I am just not brave — or funny — enough to turn sexts between (married) Maroon 5 frontman Adam Levine and his conquests into an opportunity for a brand post. But there are many other brand managers who did. That's right — food brands like Velveeta, Oscar Mayer (of course), KFC and a number of others went all in on this trend. Gizmodo has a slideshow. Holy frank, indeed! 😳

Here are today's top stories: 

• You Don't Work For Social Media (Why a Strategy Has Never Been More Important)

• Instagram Stories, Uninterrupted

• LinkedIn Conducts a Social Experiment on (Unknowing) Users

• And GPS Art That Almost Makes Me Want to Go For a Run

 You Don't Work For Social Media 

Reels, Stories, videos, tweets, articles, photos — there have never been so many ways to post social media content. And let’s be honest, it’s not always because social media companies are trying to help us. The reality is that they are continually fighting to stay on top, which means the platforms can sometimes suffer from “featuritis,” with one new update after another rolling out, and all of us scrambling to catch up. That's why it's never been more important to have a social media strategy. Here are a few questions to consider...

 Why Are You Posting?  
At the heart of this question is: Goals. We all understand the power of social media, and that for many organizations, it’s impossible to live without. But what do you want social media to do for your organization? For example, perhaps you want to generate leads, increase event attendance, or be a brand leader. 
 
Whatever social media goals you choose, they should support the overall goals of your organization. Social media is a tool (one of many marketing tools) and the first step in getting it to work for you is to be clear on what you want it to do.

 Who Are You Trying to Reach?  
This is all about identifying your target (and secondary) markets. Who do you want to reach?  Get as detailed as you can. If you already have social media channels, you can check the analytics to mine for information about your current followers. Overall, consider these four categories:
 
Demographic — Age, gender, income, education
Geographic — Where they live
Psychographic — Interests, values, personality traits
Behavioural — How they behave online, such as keyword usage
 
Being as specific as possible will help you create posts that speak specifically to your audience. It also helps with ad targeting. And may also help identify where your target markets live on social outside your channels, such as related Facebook or LinkedIn Groups, providing potential opportunities to engage with them there.

 What Resources and Content Do You Have? 
Different platforms require different levels of resources. For example, videos take much longer to produce than firing off a quick tweet. So, be honest about how much time you have to dedicate to posting social media content. And for content, consider: What types of content can you consistently and regularly create? For example, is someone in the organization able to grab photos and create videos? Or do you need to rely more on graphics and text?

How you answer these questions — along with your audience — will determine which platforms you use, and how you use it. 

 Next Steps 
Take this information and create a platform strategy. This strategy should be a quick one pager that outlines: 

1. Platforms that fit your audience, resources and content

2. The goal(s) of using those platforms

3. The type of content you want to post there (or full storyboards for TikTok)

4. And frequency of posts

*Note: Passion for a certain platform goes a long way! If you love posting to a certain platform, it won’t feel like work and will always be successful.

SOCIAL SNACKS

📱 Instagram Stories, Uninterrupted📱

Coming soon: When posting an Instagram Story that is under 60 seconds in length, it will no longer be chopped up into shorter 15-second clips, according to a report by TechCrunch. As the article points out, this might be a welcome change for anyone who is posting the video and doesn't want to edit each individual clip. Also, viewers won't have to continually tap through each clip to get through the Story. But I'm curious how this will affect the metrics, because I feel like I may sit through one or two shorter clips, but may exit out even earlier if I know it's going to be a longer story. Time will tell, I guess...

🧪 LinkedIn Conducts Social Experiment on (Unknowing) Users 🧪

LinkedIn may have a few questions to answer this week, after the NY Times reported that the Microsoft-owned company conducted a 5-year social experiment on 20 million users without their knowledge. It was all part of a plan to test a theory in sociology called "the strength of weak ties" that suggests weak ties (acquaintances) are better for job prospecting and other opportunities than strong ties. To test this, between 2015 and 2019, LinkedIn randomized whether the contacts shown in the "People You May Know" section were acquaintances or those with strong ties to the user. They found that relatively weak social ties on LinkedIn proved twice as effective in securing employment as stronger social ties. The results were published in the journal Science.

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 ICYMI 

🔴 Instagram creates three how-to guides for businesses [Instagram Blog]

🔴 TikTok is rolling out a dislike button for comments [Mashable]

🔴 Twitter is making images more accessible [Twitter Blog]

🔴 Facebook is experimenting with letting users help write speech rules [The Verge]

 CREATOR UPDATE 

YouTube recently announced a new monetization program for Shorts creators (Shorts are YouTube's answer to TikTok). Among those updates is a feature called Super Thanks. YouTube is planning to test the ability to purchase Super Thanks messages in Shorts clips posted by creators who have this feature enabled. Learn more.
 

 THAT TRACKS 

GPS Art... That Is

Back when I used to run, I was just happy when I was able to finish my route. But perhaps all I needed was a bit of inspiration? Because it turns out that many runners and cyclists are now creating GPS routes that turn their efforts into works of art. According to a recent article in the NY Times, GPS Art is "a practice that uses the Global Positioning System mapping capabilities of modern phone apps like Strava to create digital drawings using an athlete’s route across the landscape." Want to see some examples? Check out Lenny Maughan and Strava.Artist on Instagram.

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