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What are good ways to engage in social media without producing content?

  • I'm currently working for an agency managing social media accounts for some companies and feeling a bit frustrated. These companies are on different industries but both have the same lazy approach. They have their own websites but besides information about their products/services they don't have blogs or produce any other content. But then they want us to come up with social media strategies that bring them lots of followers and site visitors increasing sales. And the worst part is that my agency's director says yes to all of them and don't advise them on best practices. I don't even contact these companies directly since I'm a freelancer and cannot do that either. It's also not my job to produce content for them it is only my job to create posts, network and engage in conversation highjacker with people which I hate to do. So of course is very difficult to gain new followers or engage people. Previously I worked client-side managing the company's social media presence and I used to develop/create content pieces like blog posts, videos, tutorials, photos, etc, that were spot on creating value to the audience and made their social media presence shine. I believe this is the right way to work in social media and not working with these lazy companies that don't want to do much and then want an agency to do miracles for them. I believe I'm not really cut out to work agency-side since this doesn't make much sense to me. Venting aside, I would like to hear from social media professionals their 2 cents on this. How the hell do you engage in social media without producing your own content?

  • Answer:

    This quote may help you: "Do what you do best - and link to the rest." If they're not making stuff, they'll have to borrow it. Not other companies' stuff (because of legal issues), but you can link to quality stuff. Spread that around like peanut butter. People love peanut butter.

Ef Rodriguez at Quora Visit the source

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I always quote this saying on conferences: "Show your best, link to the rest". You don't have to produce all the content that you share, people don't expect you to either. Here you can see how we do 'Content Curation' at our company: http://realinboundmarketing.com/2012/09/23/content-curation-the-tale-of-the-76-twitter-accounts/

Edwin Vlems

Given your particular circumstances, firstly, I am sorry about the situation you are in! But, as some others have rightly pointed out, I agree with Content Curation too. Its the best and safest approach. Curation as the name might suggest, essentially involves you, aggregating and putting together pre-existing content and media, which are already available in the public domain, and which are most closely aligned with your client's message. You can then go ahead and share this content, through the platforms of your choice. But do try and explain to your agency director, maybe through a respected source in the industry or an educational video/ppt etc how social media works so that he can be more realistic about results. Hope this helps you, all the best!

Arjun Burgula

Share interesting content from related or complementary sources, just be careful to go thru the content so it does not conflict those companies views.

Daniel Berger

While it's not ideal to just post about a company's products and services, it is possible to create engaging posts around them, when you have no content to promote. My colleague Krista recently analyzed the world's most popular brand pages to discover the best types of posts to promote (and sell) your products. Here are three to try: Facebook Post Formula #1: Product Preference A product preference question asks your Fans to choose which of your products they like the best. In this example, http://www.facebook.com/walmart uses “product preference questions” to entice comments. They show images of two choices of products, and ask Fans to comment on which they prefer. This is pretty easy to do, and if you can show your products in a fun way that relates to your consumer you can have a lot of successes with these types of questions. Here’s another product preference question from http://www.facebook.com/xbox . This update shows four of their games, and asks their Fans which one they’ll be playing this weekend. This is a not-so-subtle way to get their enthusiastic fans thinking about their product, and sharing these images with their friends. Gamers can be pretty passionate about their favourite, so sparring them off can generate a lot of likes, shares and comments. Facebook Post Formula #2: Fill in the Blank A fill in the blank post is another question posts that’s effective at getting your Fans to take part in your Facebook Page, and talking about your products. These types of posts are generally one sentence, with a blank line for your Fans to complete. Here’s a “fill in the blank” example from http://www.facebook.com/cocacola, using a branded image of a coke truck. They used an http://blog.wishpond.com/post/53926393458/21-ways-to-create-amazing-facebook-posts-to-promote filter to give it a hot summer feeling. Another example of a product post using “fill in the blank” comes from http://www.facebook.com/Disney. In this update, they are marketing their pins, in a way that resonates with their consumers of this particular product. Disney http://blog.wishpond.com/post/53926393458/21-ways-to-create-amazing-facebook-posts-to-promote traders are clearly very passionate about their wares: this one fill in the blank post had gotten nearly 22,000 likes and close to 2,400 comments in one day. Facebook Post Formula #3: Like vs. Share A “like vs. share” post is a fairly straightforward way to engage your consumer, and get a lot of likes and shares. Create an image of two of your products, and make a “like vs. share” icon. Ask your Fans to choose their favorite product by either liking or sharing your post. Here’s an example from http://www.facebook.com/walmart. They are promoting their NBA t-shirts during the NBA finals, by asking their Fans which of the two teams they support. Fans ‘like’ one choice, and ‘share’ the other. In just 18 hours, this post had over 21,000 interactions with their Fans. Check out all 21 Formulas to http://blog.wishpond.com/post/53926393458/21-ways-to-create-amazing-facebook-posts-to-promote

Nick Steeves

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