According to Instagram, only half of the business accounts use their story feature at least once a month. So let’s step back, consider this tool, and evaluate its effectiveness for your business.

Stories are a relatively new part of a culture that clearly undervalues their marketing potential.

Here’s what you can do to optimize your story features for any platform, but first…

What are Instagram stories?

The story feature allows users to post photos, videos text, emoticons, and stickers to create long-form or short-form content directly from their mobile phone.

Stories appear at the top of feeds, making it impossible to miss when users sign into their account. Users can also tap on another user’s profile photo to see their story.

When stories are published, they are made available to friends and followers for 24 hours from the time it was published.

The story functionality can be found on:

• Instagram
• Facebook
• Snapchat
• Twitter

Recently Twitter launched its own take on the stories, calling them “Fleets. ”

where did Instagram stories come from?

In 2013, the social media platform, Snapchat, introduced the concept of “stories”. At this point in time, Snapchat had only 10 million users worldwide, so needless to say, this became the new benchmark.

Five years later, during the first quarter of 2018, Snapchat’s ad value increased by 234%. Now businesses were allowed into the social sphere. Just like “The Facebook’s” notorious business change, this is widely considered a “sell-out” period.

Why should I use Instagram stories on my business page?

In 2019, content shared through stories rose to the popularity of the traditional newsfeed. Your temporary content is now just as relevant to the average consumer as your permanent content.

By posting more often you can build a deeper connection with your followers. It will make your business look active, find loyal followers, and add to your creative outlets. When you haven’t posted in a while, your followers will get a notification to let them know that you have posted new content. It is always important to strategize, maybe posting less is your strategy to get that notification. Notifying customers directly is a great way to get traction to your more important announcements!

Create and publish short bite-size stories to show your audience the behind the scenes of your business to help humanize your brand. Your followers will be able to relate the content that you are posting and will get to know you and your business better.

Posting stories also help you re-engage with your audience. If they ever miss a story, it will be at the top of their news feed. You can also track the performance of your stories by seeing who watched or engaged with the content. Once you’ve posted to your story, it will save privately to your account for you to access and republish. Instagram provides great insights, even to private accounts.

Best practices for designing instagram stories

Now that you know everything about stories, it is time to dive into some best practices for creating your own content to engage your audience.

1. Have quality content

For your posts, you’ll want to use high-quality creatives, including vertical orientation images and videos. You will also need to think about text, fonts and placement in your posts.

If you are posting multiple stories break it down by having one idea per post and create colour contrast between the slides. This will engage your audience by enticing them to click to see what you have in store.

2. Keep your brand in mind

Always consider your branding. Create a message that is reflective of your business, so users know who it’s from.

Branding elements you can add in stories are:

• the narrative (message)
• imagery and colour scheme
• your logo
• brand hashtag
• your slogan

3. Choosing the right visual effect

Once you’ve picked your source image, you can decorate it with sticker and text features. Your options are practically endless. This is why you must not spam your stories.

Having too many design effects can overwhelm your posts and distract your users from getting to the core of your message .

When learning to use these effects, make sure that they are relevant to the content and use a maximum of 2 elements.

In sum

There is A LOT to play around with, so go ahead, swipe left in the app, take a photo, and have fun with the editing tools.

The best way to learn what works best for you and your audience you simply have to start. From the data you gather you can pull lessons, test, and try new things to determine what works best for your business.

In today’s day and age social media for any business is a must, but it can sometimes be overlooked.

With these quick tips – which you should you use right now –  you will have the basis covered to have a great social media presence.

Number 3 helps you get ahead.

5 social media advice for small business owners

1. Find your audience

Think about where your audience would expect to find you; or more importantly, would want to find you and with that start researching the various platforms to find your potential audience.

It’s really easy to get caught up in accounts that your business doesn’t really need. For example, Instagram might be soaring in popularity, but are you able to maintain consistent photographic content? Are you reaching the right audience with it? If not, you might want to try other platforms that are not image driven, like Facebook or Twitter.

2. Make sure you’re on the right platform

Users access social media platforms on various devices, either on laptops, phones and even TV. All have different formats, before you dive into a platform, know the purpose and tone of your brand and the different formats the platform can be accessed.

Not only should you be aware of the different platform formats, you should know what social platform your target audience is active on. If your audience is millennial, consider being on Instagram and Snapchat. If you want to reach out to other business owners, consider having a LinkedIn or Facebook page.

3. Get Comfortable

This is something to invest time into. Make sure you know your platform inside and out and know what the content you post should look like. Brand consistency is key on social media.

If you are new to social media, pace yourself and only start out on one platform before getting active on other ones. This will give you the chance to:

• become familiar with how to write for social media,
• how to engage with followers,
• and get comfortable with your visual identity.

Once you have the basics covered, you can then try other platforms that align with your business and your goals.

4. Aim to Grow

Now that you’ve really got everything under control, your next objective should be to grow your following.

This part is a little more grueling and difficult to define for each business and industry. Make sure that each of your posts have reason to be read, spoken to, and shared every time. Welcome new followers and take the opportunity to make social an enjoyable experience every time someone visits your profile.

5. Check on it!

If you use Hootsuite, or something similar, you follow a routine. You schedule your weekly posts and forget it, but this could cost you.

It’s important to monitor your accounts to see:

• how your followers are engaging with your content,
• what are your top performance posts, and
• what type of comments you are getting.

You need this data to be able to adapt and meet the needs of your followers.

So don’t be afraid to engage with your audience, and get a bit personal with the profile. Respond to live events, keep up with trends and be spontaneous. Monitor what other profiles similar to yours are doing and try new things.

Ready to start your social media presence?

That’s exactly what we’re here for. Sussex takes on social media planning and consultations from anywhere in Canada just hit CONTACT, and we’ll set you up and keep you updated.

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Whether I’m attending a conference on behalf of Sussex or for leisure, live-tweeting is a great way to help raise awareness and to improve engagement.

What is live tweeting?

Live tweeting is when a Twitter user post comments about an event while it is taking place.

9 best practices for live tweeting

Before the event

When the plan is to live tweet during an event, it’s important to prepare your strategy beforehand so you can stay current and post relevant content.

1. Before the event you do your research

• Know the names and proper spelling of the speakers
• Research speaker and attendee Twitter handles
• Research the event hashtag or create your own
• Think about any questions your followers may have and prepare some answers
• Prepare a few tweets in advance for sessions you are hosting or attending

At the event

2. Let your followers know that you will attend the event

Post a tweet to give your followers a heads up that you will be a certain event. This provides them with an opportunity to visit your account for the latest updates.

3. Use the official event hashtag(s) in your posts

You can find the official hashtag(s) on the event website or social media profiles. Don’t use too many hashtags in your posts and use the main one instead.

If you decide to create a hashtag for an event you’re hosting, remember to keep it short, easy to remember, and be sure it’s not already in use.

4. Tag speakers in posts

It’s important to tag the right handle in a post. Use Twitter’s search engine or the event website to find the proper user names.  

5. Capture key messages

You don’t have to post word for word what was said during a session. Only post key points that are valuable to onsite participants as well as your wider following.

6. Tweet quotes from presenters

When you are quoting someone in your tweet, always attribute the quote and make sure you quote the speaker accurately. Try to find and include their Twitter handle, this will give them proper credit, as well as help you start a conversation.

7. Share backstage photos and videos

Content that contains images and video performs better than the ones without. Share high quality images and videos to increase engagement.

8. Engage with others

Engagement is a two-way street. Instead of pushing content:

• Try to respond to tweets from other participants
• Engage in conversation by agreeing or providing your own perspective
• Answer polls
• Retweet/like insightful comments from participants

9. Follow back

By using the event hashtag, your tweets will appear in the live stream and people will start following you. Follow them back so the newly created connections can extend to offline opportunities as well.

Live tweeting might be a short-term goal, but just like any just like your long-term communication objectives, you should have a plan in place.

Sussex can help you identify the right tools to help you plan and stay organize. Contact us to learn how we can help.  

What is a brand hashtag?

A brand hashtag works the same as a regular hashtag. The difference is that they are used on social media to signify that a post is associated with a brand, product or company.

They are unique to a business and they are found in the bio section on the user profile of the company social media account. Followers are invited to engage with the company by using the brand hashtag.

Why is a brand hashtag important?

There are many benefits of using a branding hashtag.

1. Brand hashtags make your brand more searchable on social media platforms

The primary function of a hashtag is to have your content appear in the search results of that hashtag. People will use various hashtags on their posts to reach a broader audience. Other times, hashtags will be created for a specific campaign so that all the posts associated with a topic can appear in the hashtag search.

In the case of branding hashtags, they are used in conjunction with thematic hashtags to not only have your posts appear in multiple searches, but also so that all the posts associated with your brand will appear under the search for that hashtag.

2. Brand hashtags are great for analytics

With a branding hashtag, you can track who is engaging with your brand and track its performance. Therefore, it is important to have a unique hashtag, so that the analytics only reflect content related to your brand and not other topics. It is very important that your audience knows the exact spelling of the hashtag so that it can be accurately tracked.

3. Brand hashtags can also be used across platforms

Many organizations are active on several platforms. When your brand hashtag is used across different channels, it becomes more recognizable to your audience because it’s being seen and marketed everywhere.

Tips to create your own brand hashtag

Your brand hashtag can be your company name, slogan, or tag line. That way you can ensure its uniqueness.

If your business name or the hashtag you want to use is common:

1. Conduct a search on all social media platforms to make that it’s not being used.
2. Keep it short to a maximum of three words, that way it’s easy to remember.
3. Avoid complex and long words to ensure correct spelling.  
4. Test it to eliminate any risks or problems. Write it out, say it out loud, ask your team members and a small group of your followers to review it before implementation.
5. When you are satisfied, promote the hashtag on all your social media accounts.   

Simple. An image conveys a thousand words and emotions, and people have an attention span of less than nine seconds.

When it comes to choosing images for your social media platform, you must understand the platform itself, and who your audience is.

Consumers will make a decision based on the aesthetics of a product. Therefore, you must be able to appeal to their interests and needs. You can achieve this with the images you select for your campaigns.

In this post, we’ve got five tips to help you choose the best images for your social media platforms.

1. Different platforms, different image sizes

As mentioned above, you must understand the platform you want to use. This means knowing where images will display and know the different image sizes that will fit these different real estates on the platform.

Cropping or resizing your images to fit the different placements on various platforms, will inform you on the image to use. When you crop an image, some elements can be lost, and you don’t want to use an image that will distort the “story” the image conveys. When images don’t render properly, the emotion evoked by your followers might be that you don’t care about the presentation of your brand.

What are the different image sizes for social media platforms? Read this guide for the different sizes.

2. Use high-quality images

Quality image means selecting high resolution photos. The more pixels an image contains, the more vivid, clear, and detailed the image is. The fewer pixels an image has, the more it looks pixelated, making the image blurry.

When cropping or resizing images, always choose the largest file size possible so you don’t lose resolution and details in the image, and risk having a blurry picture on your social media feed.

3. Select attention grabbing photos

We’re all fighting for attention on social media. That’s why it’s essential to understand the platforms and know your audience. When these two practices are understood, you can now differentiate your brand from the rest, and create content your followers can’t ignore.

Share photos that are of interest of your following and social media posts that contain images perform better and receives more engagements than posts without.

4. Diversify your images

Now that you have attention-grabbing photos, you will need to diversify your images to keep interest and to keep your audience wanting more.

Mix your feed with a variety of stock photos, infographics, memes, and videos/gifs.

When you change the visual information on your feed, you avoid user fatigue, keep your followers engaged, and interest in your content.

5. Have a consistent visual identity

Brands now have multiple social media accounts, it’s crucial to keep your visual identity consistent so your followers recognize your brand.

Your visual identity is as vital as your written message. It’s important to connect your images to your message every chance you get. Using a consistent visual identity tied with your message, will create a stronger brand recognition, whether your followers are on Instagram or on Twitter.

Different platforms provide different experience. The visual content you select to tell your stories will impact user experience and engagement.

Social media image dimensions and its placement vary from platform to platform. When images don’t render properly, chances are your visitor will not engage with your content.

We’ve curated for you the different social media image dimensions by platform for you to use when posting your content.

Social media image dimensions

All the social media image dimensions presented below are in pixels, width x height.

Use this menu to navigate to your preferred platform.

• Facebook image dimensions
• Instagram image dimensions
• Twitter image dimensions
• LinkedIn image dimensions
• Pinterest image dimensions
• YouTube image dimensions
• Snapchat image dimensions

Facebook image dimensions

• Profile image: 180 x 180
• Cover image: 820 x 312
• Post image: 1200 x 630
• Link preview image: 1200 x 628
• Event image: 1920 x 1080

Instagram image dimensions

• Profile image: 110 x 110
• Instagram Stories: 1080 x 1920
• Post photos: 1080 x 1080
• Videos post: 1080 pixels wide
• Image thumbnail: 161 x 161

Twitter image dimensions

• Header image: 1500 x 500 (maximum file size 5 MB)
• Profile image: 400 x 400 (maximum file size 2 MB)
• In-stream image: 440 x 220
• Link preview image: 800 x 418

LinkedIn image dimensions

• Profile image: 400 x 400 (maximum file size 10 MB)
• Background image: 1584 x 396 (maximum file size 4 MB)
• Company cover image: 1536 x 768 (maximum file size 4 MB)
• Company logo image: 300 x 300 (maximum file size 4 MB)
• Company page banner image: 646 x 220 (maximum file size 2 MB)
• Post image: 350 pixels wide
• Link preview: 1200 x 628
• Company logo in searches: 60 x 60 (maximum file size 2 MB)

Pinterest image dimensions

• Profile image: 165 x 165 (maximum file size 10 MB)
• Board cover image: 222 x 150
• Pinned image preview: 236px wide

YouTube image dimensions

• Channel cover images: 2560 x 1440 (maximum file size 4 MB)
• Channel icon: 800 x 800
• Video thumbnail: 1280 x 720

Snapchat image dimensions

• Geofilters, lenses, and ads: 1080 x 1920

We didn’t include your platform? Leave us a comment.

Contact us to explore the solutions we have for you!  

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This social platform is for those who are interested in growing their professional network by connecting with other members.

LinkedIn offers specialized options catering to professionals that are not found on other social media platforms.

If you are new to the platform and need a little help to start, this page contains the top ten tips to optimize your LinkedIn profile.

1. Have a professional headshot

First impressions matter. Having a professional picture on your profile gives a great first impression. Profiles with a professional photo receive more profile views than those without.

2. Customize your headline

Your headline is the first thing members see when you appear in their search results.You have a 120-character space to describe what you do. Use brief and industry-specific keywords so the right professionals can find you on LinkedIn.

3. Complete the “Summary” section

You have a 2,000 character space limit in this section. Have a well-written summary of who you are and your accomplishments, using industry-specific keywords so it’s easier for other professionals to search and find your profile.  Also include your strengths, interests, areas of expertise, volunteer work, and awards.

4. Add your work experience

List your current position and at least two past positions. Describe your role in each position and include the company name and key achievements to demonstrate the depth of your experience and knowledge.

5. Add your education

Including information about your degrees and schools attended presents the opportunity to make connections with other alumni.

6. Use the media section

Adding publications you have written lends credibility to your profile and stated expertise.

7. Join groups

Joining groups is a great opportunity to strengthen connections with members in an exclusive forum and you can also send members of the group direct messages. By default, you cannot send messages to members you don’t know.

8. Add featured skills and member endorsements

Add skills that define your professional role and experiences to showcase your talents and abilities. Members in your network can validate your skills and make recommendations based on your skill set.

9. Customize background photo

The background image of the LinkedIn profile gets overlooked by many members.Adding a cover photo will make you stand out. Your cover should reflect who you are, what you do and your brand. LinkedIn recommends that your background image be 1,584 x 391px.

10. Customize your LinkedIn URL

Customizing your LinkedIn URL makes it easy for people to find and to share your profile,and it will optimize your profile to ensure it appears in search engines.

How do you stand out in sea where users are flooded with content? How do you grab their attention to increase engagement with your content instead of the competition?

You stand out by using these best practices for writing tweets.

Whether you are new or an expert on Twitter, you can’t write tweets without the following elements. In this blog posts, we will explore 10 best practices for writing tweets. 

10 best practices for writing tweets

1. Don’t hashtag overload

Use one to two relevant hashtags per post. Tweets with more than two hashtags get 32% LESS engagement.

If you don’t know which hashtag to use, there are tools like hashtagify.me that provides information on the performance of hashtags. This will help you narrow down which one to include in your post.

2. Use pictures

Tweets with images have twice the engagement than tweets without. Use vibrant and high quality images.

If you are using infographics, make sure that the information is broken down into bite size data that can be easily understood.One infographic should contain one message.  

3. Tweet longer

Twitter changed the character limit from 140 to 280. Now that you have more space, it’s OK to elaborate a tad more in your posts.

Brand tweets that use more characters perform best. Also add white space between your content/elements to make it easier to read.

4. Take advantage of image tagging

Now that there’s more character space, you might want to mention someone directly in your posts.

Just like the hashtag, keep mentions to two per post. If you have more than two, use the image tagging functionality.

You can tag up to 10 users in an image and it’s a great way to save on character space.

5. Include call to actions

Every piece of content that you post has a purpose. To increase engagement, include calls to action in your post. Either to visit your website, download an eBook, follow, or reply to your post.

6. Post at peak times

This will vary depending on your audience. The only way to get that information is by monitoring and analyzing the data from your accounts.

If you’re just getting started, the general rule is to post between the hours of:

• 7-9am,
• 12-1pm, and
• 4-6pm.

Why? That is when people are commuting to and from work, or are on their lunch break.

7. Join the conversation

Communications is a two way street, be sure to engage with your follows.

Reply, like, and share content that you are mentioned in. This encourages users to mention you and engage more with your content. This further amplify your content and presence.

8. Maintain frequency

Top performing users average 1-5 tweets per day. The more you post, the more engagement you receive, and the more your audience grows.

Create a content calendar that will help you organize your content and when you want to publish them.

9. Diversify your network

Follow accounts from different industries and engage with your employees and peers. Diversifying your content and network will engage users and will broaden your reach.

10. Segment your audience by using lists

Twitter can be overwhelming with the number of tweets that are published on your feed. The list functionality allows you to create different lists of influencers, customers, and interest. When you create lists, it organizes the content into smaller streams where the latest tweets from the users you have included in each list are displayed and not from your entire following.

These lists can help you organize what content you should write next for your following or even noticing trends in the industry to keep you up to date.

Follow these tips and you will stand out in the Twitterverse.

Leave a comment or tweet at us to share your best practices for writing tweets. 

Contact us to explore the solutions we have for you!