Page 6 - Dallas Vol 5 No 4

Social Media Changes Its
Rules – Again!
BY TERRIE S. WHEELER, MBC
Using social media used to be simple. Write a blog for your website, add it to your HootSuite calendar with a few words of explanation, include a link to the website and it was done. On the appointed day, your content appeared everywhere.
NOT ANYMORE.
All the major platforms have tweaked their algorithms, changing what kind of content gets promoted to connections, followers, and friends. is means you must change the way you use social media to build recog- nition, increase credibility, and rein- force your personal and rm brand.
To meet these changes, we have altered our strategy for social media marketing for both our clients and for our company. To make an impact on social media today, you must:
1.Consistently produce unique, high-quality content.
2. Engage with your connections and followers by liking, commenting and sharing their posts.
3. Establish your rm as a thought leader; it is more important than sharing random links of interest.
4. Increase your personal engage- ment with others who like, share or comment on your content.
5. Consider adding video to the mix. You can use video on your website and upload it directly to LinkedIn and Facebook.
6. Post something to your social me- dia sites three times a week.
7. Use graphics, illustrations or pho- tos to gain “traction” and pull
readers into your content.
Here’s how to leverage social media to your advantage and work with the new rules rather than against them to
enhance your voice and brand.
LINKEDIN
LinkedIn made major changes to determine which items in the feed get promoted and “pushed” into other people’s feeds. It’s all based on engage- ment.
For starters, its algorithm assigns points to what you post and how much engagement it generates.
Posts put in the newsfeed with video and roughly a 200-word de- scription get the most points. But the video must rst be downloaded from YouTube or Vimeo to your hard drive, then “natively” uploaded to LinkedIn. Plus, LinkedIn adds points for each comment, like and share you receive. And by the way, your reply to a com- ment counts, too; the algorithm also gives points to comments, not who posted them or even how long the comments are.
To maximize engagement, your content must be timely and relevant, and highly readable: LinkedIn is us- ing AI to anticipate if your post will generate engagement based largely on
how readable it is. End each post with a question to encourage engagement and conversation.
But what the algorithm gives, it also takes away.
You’ll have points deducted if you include a link back to your website because LinkedIn doesn’t want users leaving its platform. e workaround is to add the link as a comment a er you publish a 200-word summary of your blog post. Please note that ma- terial on your company page will not get any promotion unless someone goes to your website and clicks on the LinkedIn icon to see your recent posts. So, as a best practice, only add posts to your personal pro le.
Anything originating at an aggrega- tor like HootSuite will be ignored, as well.
FACEBOOK: MARK CHANGES IT UP
Like LinkedIn, Facebook limits distribution of posts that take users away from its platform.
Links going to your website may not even be seen by your friends and followers. Now, Facebook wants businesses to pay to boost their posts and to buy ads. Consequently,
ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE · DALLAS· VOL. 5 NO. 4 6