This is the second in a series about creating useful and engaging social media posts, simply. Written by Marva Lord

Storytelling is key

It’s important to keep in mind that storytelling is a significant cornerstone of digital activity, an extension of the age old art of sharing our experiences and creativity . Online platforms are simply another place for us humans to naturally tell our stories. This is a major reason why online writing, video, animation and photography workshops are on the rise. This post outlines a few things to keep in mind. Remember that when using text, vary the length of post content. Alternate use of visuals including photos and short videos for the various platforms.

Where to start?

1. List Themes for Social Media posts

Making time to create a list of different types of organic social media posts helps to ease the planning process. Your list can be reviewed and adjusted, every so often, to ensure a cohesive social media strategy.
Posts can be spontaneous, pre-scheduled, evergreen (previously used posts that you haven’t used in a while, but still be relevant)

2. Sample List of a Few Types of Posts

Here are just a few ideas as a starting point.

News

Instructional

Personal Spotlight

Cheat Sheet

Media Post – audio, video, images

Share Other Peoples Content – stories that resonate for you, with attribution

Your Original Content Eg. blog posts, excerpts from your books, trailer of films, excerpt from conferences etc that you participate in or recommend

Thought provoking or Funny Comment – your own or someone else’s with attribution

Photos owned by you or in public domain, can go along with a quote or a simple title

Tips and Advice

Inspiration 

Questions

Promotional Updates

3. Set a Daily Theme to Manage Process More Simply

Drawing from your general list of theme ideas, set a different one for each day of the week. Where possible include a photo or short vid.

Exampes of Daily Themes

Mondays – Weekly Quote with image

Tuesdays – Visual Commentary or Poem – as images or as words

Wednesdays – Question or Statement of the week – choose an interesting or engaging question/statement to discuss with your followers 

Thursdays – Throwback Thursday – posts relevant to your interests

Fridays – Featured Product – you are selling or giving way

Sats or Suns – Inspiration 

 4. Post Creation Tools

There are many different types of free and paid post creation tools. You can use apps on your phone, desktop or pad like Photoshop’s Spark and Lightroom. Two of my faves are Pablo and Ripl. Pablo I use mostly on desktop

Pablo – created by Buffer – excellent for combining quotes and images for various Twitter, Instagram, FB or Pinterest

Ripl – short vid or image creation posts for Twitter, Instagram,  Linkedin, Facebook – free or pro version

 Hashtags –   https://displaypurposes.com recommended by Beth Kirby. Mostly because it’s so simple to use. But again, there are others that you may prefer. 

I hope this post is useful. If you’d like my personal help with developing a social media strategy, send a message to hello@griotsarts.com or call +44 1497700255.

– Marva

Marva Lord is a digital media consultant for websites and online marketing projects. Clients include poets, musicians, filmmakers, creative businesses, authors, charitable and community organisations, among others.