How to Use Social Language For Your Content

Social media can be a powerful tool for your brand, but it’s only effective if you approach it the right way. Users want to connect with other people on their social networks, not a faceless company or a logo. How do successful brands engage with their followers and make the most of their social media presence? The answer is simple: They create a consistent persona and voice for their content and social media postings. Let’s look at a few tips to help you develop an engaging brand voice and build a persona that works for your company. Use Analytic Data If you want to nail down the right tone, language and style for your brand’s persona, it’s important to understand your target audience. Your social media platforms offer a wealth of information about your current fan base. Check out Facebook Insights, Twitter Card analytics and Pinterest analytics; you can use these tools to answer many questions about who your audience is and what they want: – What’s the male to female ratio of your audience? –What’s the average age of your followers? –How can you best present your products or services to this audience? Once you’ve identified your key audience, you can choose the social media platforms that are most popular for your targeted demographic. You can also check out successful brand accounts on these platforms and see what form of content works well for them. Do they incorporate a lot of video into their content, or do they rely on text updates and images? Armed with information from your analytics research, you can start planning the characteristics of your brand’s voice. If you’re catering to a younger crowd, you may want to develop a presence on Instagram and Snapchat, and you’ll likely use a hipper, witty tone in your content. DiGiorno Pizza has enjoyed tremendous success in social media, particularly on Twitter. The brand’s casual lack of capitalization in its posts, paired with playful, wry observations, results in a distinct persona that has won legions of followers. A corporate brand with a more serious bent will probably do best using a slightly more formal tone and sticking to platforms such as LinkedIn and Facebook. Hiring a contentwriter that specializes in certain tones or knows a demographic well is a great way to create a believable and engaging social media persona. Give Users a Reason to Follow You No social media user logs into their networks to be sold something. If you want your brand’s message to resonate with your audience, you need to contribute valuable content and solve problems for your followers. One brand who really understands this concept is chocolate maker Cadbury. Their successful social media presence brings together a huge community of chocoholics and foodies. The brand’s regularly-scheduled hangouts are popular among fans, and the company manages to promote their chocolate products while keeping the message interesting and light-hearted. Be Consistent Every company who has succeeded in establishing a strong brand persona shares a common trait: They were consistent with their voice and their message. They know who they are, and they know what kind of content resonates with their audience. Even when they vary their content among different platforms, the brand’s distinct voice rings clear.