8 Tips to Enhance Your Social Media Profiles

Here are some ways to create the best social media profiles:

1. Be Yourself

First things first: Be consistent. You may have accounts on multiple social media channels, but your profile should be congruent with your brand on each one. Be consistent in your brand voice, message and visual style.

Platforms differ wildly in character count allowance (Twitter is 160 characters, LinkedIn is 2,000!) but your basic information should always be the same and should include:

• • Your name (or company name)
  • Your headshot (if you’re a personal brand)
  • Your logo
  • Your elevator pitch
  • Your URL

You’ll only have a sentence or two to do this on most platforms. Make the most of it by being clear (instead of clever) about who you are and what you do.

2. Use Keywords

Keywords are often common sense. And be specific. If you are clear in your keywords, your social media profile will appear in search engine results pages for the keywords you are targeting. For example, if you are a speaker you would want to use  “keynote speaker” or “motivational keynote speaker” so your website doesn’t show up when people are searching for music speakers.

Accounts with the keywords in their names appear higher in rankings than those without. So keep that in mind. It is better to use your company name on a social account than a campaign tagline, for example.

3. Use Hashtags

The keywords help optimize you for search engine results. Hashtags will optimize you on the various platforms, as users explore topics that way. Include hashtags in your profile bio or elevator pitch. They’ll go a long way in getting you in front of the right people at the right time.

4. Look Good

If you’re a personal brand, like a business consultant, use a professional headshot as your profile pic. Keep it up to date, refreshing every few years as you age. And use the same one across all of your channels.

If you’re a company, use your logo as the profile pic.

5. Brand your cover images

The top of your page is like a billboard. Make the best use of that space with an image that tells your brand story. It is better to use a real photo here – yourself or your team or your happy customers – than a stock photo.

By adding text over the photo, you can make your cover image an advertisement that can help:

• • Promote a new product or service
  • Inspire action
  • Tell your story

Here is an effective promotional cover image from Salesforce, for example.

6. Post often

Share your content on social channels. Often. That will help raise your search ranking. An effective way to build a consistent distribution plan is to create a social media calendar. Plan ahead and then follow through with quality content that is topical, timely and relevant to your audience.

7. Post with Intent and Context

It’s good to post often. It’s better to have a reason, a strategy, behind every post. Put some thought into what you are communicating. If you are just sharing a photo of your team at lunch, for example, you are missing a marketing opportunity if you do not include some context that frames that lunch around a relevant business win.

Example: “Our team celebrates a successful digital campaign. We helped our clients hit the target. Then we hit the taco bar. That’s a good day.”

8. Link Well

You’ll want people to visit your website. That’s why you included a link. Consider making that link to a specific, relevant page of your site, such as the about page. Or the blog.

Think of your social media profile as a landing page, introducing your brand and inviting customers. You can even close out your bio with a short call to action that links to a lead capture form on your website.

Need help with your social media strategy? Prime Concepts Inc. can help.