With all the noise that exists in the social space these days, your content will easily get lost if it isn’t the highest quality. Some people have even made it a point to create 10x content to stand out. Regardless of where you are posting, you should always ask yourself the following before putting your content on the web.
- What is the goal of releasing my content? – Are you adding to an existing conversation, educating on a topic, looking to gain followers, trying to reach an audience? A quality motive is essential in not only releasing good content, but crucial to making sure it reaches the right people.
- Who am I trying to reach? – Releasing content without a clear target audience is asking for trouble. Make sure you have a good understanding of who you want to reach and then monitor your results to make sure you are hitting your goals.
- Does my content provide value to my targeted reader? – If your content is not providing clear benefit to the people reading it, it is not worth posting. Value is key to acquiring viewers and encouraging them to share your content.
- Is my content exciting and engaging? – An easy way to answer this question is to have a friend or coworker read your content and ask them their honest opinion. If you are honest with yourself you could also ask, would you read the entire piece of content if you didn’t have to?
- Relevant to your business? – While every piece of content will not relate back to your business most of it should. Especially when you are posting on trending issues. Relating back does not mean pushing your company or being overly sales oriented. Instead it means that your content gracefully connects your business to the topic.
- Is this a good time? – Timing is everything and it could be the difference between a handful of viewers or your content going viral. Use insights from your specific platform and general knowledge to determine the best time to release your content.
- Does my post fit the platform? – There are a ton of social platforms in which to release content, and their styles are all unique. Make sure your content matches the stylings of whatever social network you are posting to. This may mean you need to make several different types of posts for the same content.
- Is the post consistent with the brand I’m representing? – When posting for a business it’s crucial to keep the brand in mind. Don’t post content that does not fit within the business’ model and common practices.
- Is my post quality? – Have you used the right size image? Included the right hashtags? Linked to the correct page/article? Written a tagline that is going to be attractive and accomplish your goal?
- Am I ready to react and participate? – A well written post with great content will receive engagement. You need to be ready to respond to questions, comments, concerns, leads, etc. related to your post.
Image by Flickr user SEOPlanter
