Happy Kids, Inc: Facebook

By Meg Hodson

I love social media. It's a community I love being a part of. I have learned a lot in the 4 years I have been active on social media. I am still learning, too, I've gathered a few of my favorite tips that I believe are key to having a good social media presence, hopefully guaranteeing you won't be a social media fail!

1. Don't Buy Followers. Followers and likes are the easiest thing for people to relate to when they view a profile or page. Easy enough, right? If you have more followers, then you are reaching more people? It would make sense, then, to consider buying followers. Well, unfortunately, if it's too good to be true, it probably is. Most of those supposed followers or likes you purchase aren't even real people or accounts. Is that high number of likes or followers really going to make a difference in the long run?

Let's say you have 100,000 followers on Twitter. Only 500 of those followers are active and engaged with your message. What I mean by this is that they are REAL followers, real people reading what you have to say. The percentage you have of engaged followers is .5%. So, not many of your "followers" are hearing what you have to say. If no one is listening, your message is essentially falling on dead ears.

But let's say you have 5,000 Twitter followers and 4,000 of them are engaged, real people who are actively following you. Your percentage of engaged listeners is a whopping 80%.

Ultimately, you are putting your message out there on social media because you want people to listen, you want to gain new customers, or maybe you want to meet people yourself. Fake likes and followers get you nowhere. It is not organic and will ultimately lead to failure and a lackluster presence on social media.

2. Be Truthful. We have all been there. We are standing in line at the checkout lane at the grocery store and all we see are the headlines on magazines of celebrity gossip. Most of it is sensationalized and not true. But we are still drawn to it. Do you buy the issue? I would guess most of you would not.....and if you do, deep down you know it is not altogether truthful information.

Remember this when you are sharing on social media. Tell the truth. Do not over sensationalize topics. Speak from the heart. Use humor. You can certainly make your "headlines" swoonworthy, as long as you speak of something that actually happened.

3. Engage Personally. A colleague of mine gave me some sage advice that I will never forget: "Schedule content, create conversation." In this busy world of social media, it is imperative and useful to be able to schedule posts and tweets. That is a given. But don't expect magic to happen if that is all you are doing. Be ready to check your stream, engage with those that are sharing your content, get to know your fans. It adds authenticity to your presence.

4. Look At Your Stats. For free, you have access to a wealth of information regarding your activity on social media. Twitter can send you weekly updates via email, including your most popular tweets and links that are most clicked on. Facebook has similar analytic data available. Google Analytics is also helpful with website stats, as well as specific URL statisitcs (yes, you can enter social media URL's on Google Analytics!) In addition, there are some beneficial and useful sites that for free (or a very minimal cost), give you amazing insight into your presence and behavior on social media. One of my favorites is SumAll. Check in often to see what is working the best on your social media channels.

5. Use It or Lose It. As much as we might want to only occasionally put our social media accounts to work, it doesn't work so well. Social media posts have a very short shelf life. What was news this morning may very well be irrelevant within hours, even minutes You must keep your content fresh and constant. That is no easy task. While scheduling programs do help this process, it is still a commitment. If your goal is to gain a solid presence on social media, it is a commitment you must make. While you may have your days or little or no interaction, keep active on your accounts on some level as much as you can.

Good luck!

It's been awhile since I've brought you one of my must have blog resource articles. Well, this one will definitely come in handy!

As a blogger, you are often asked to provide direct URL links to things you have shared on social media. It's fairly straightforward how to obtain a URL for a tweet or an Instagram photo. But how many times have you been frustrated in trying to find an actual direct URL for an individual status update on Facebook?

No worries, the solution is VERY easy. There are two methods I use: obtaining it directly from your Facebook post OR through Hoot Suite.

If you are in Facebook, go to your page or the status update you want to obtain a URL for. Each status update has a title that consists of the individual or page title and the date of the post. Look at the status update and across the top of it, look for this title. Below the page title or person's name, in light gray font, is the date of the post (see the photo below). Hover over this; it's a clickable link and once clicked, should open up that status update alone on the screen. Copy and paste the URL that is now in your web browser.

If you are working within Hoot Suite, you will need to go to your "Streams" window (see photo below) and click on the tab of your Facebook profile or page. Within that will usually appear three columns (status updates, events, and messages.....this may be different if you have customized this stream). Find the status update you want in the "updates" column and click on the date/time below the page name (see second photo below). This will open into a new window. Copy the URL address from your browser.