Unless you’ve been living under a rock the past few months, you’ve likely heard about ChatGPT or one of its competitors and how AI writing tools are revolutionizing the wild world of blogging. But, is it something you should use for your blog? In this post, we’ll explore how to write a blog post using AI – the right way.

And, before you come at me, I should state I’m a writer that makes a living from creating content every week. I’m not on #TeamAI, but I’m also not exactly on #TeamNoAI either. Hopefully, by the end of this post you’ll understand why I’m writing about blogging with AI at all, and have some ideas of how to use it ethically and correctly for your own content.

What exactly is AI? And what is AI writing software?

TechTarget refers to AI or artificial intelligence as “the simulation of human intelligence processes by machines, especially computer systems.” By extension, AI writing software is supposed to simulate content written by human writers.

With the use of algorithms, suggestions, and a lot of complicated computerized 1s and 0s, AI writing software should theoretically be able to take a prompt a user gives it, and deliver text content back to the user. The reason it’s causing such a stir in the writing world is that it can generate large bits of text in mere seconds.

What was taking content writers hours to complete can be created without breaking a sweat. Of course, that’s not to say what is generated is accurate, and not even necessarily great content. However, as I’ve played with several different AI writing tools at this point, I have to admit it is certainly impressive what the different software can spit out.

What can AI accomplish?

I think that what AI can accomplish depends largely on your goals. The different functions I’ve seen AI writing tools perform include, but aren’t limited to:

• Writing first-draft intros and conclusions for blog posts
• Generating a list of blog topics to write about
• Creating different heading and title options for blog posts
• Summarizing the points of a blog or article, or even just a section of the text for a better understanding
• Generating product descriptions for ecommerce stores
• Writing entire blog posts, articles, essays, poems, and even songs
• Analyzing the tone to determine if a block of text is professional, casual, funny, or depressing
• Creating landing pages for websites
• Writing social media posts to promote content, ideas, and views
• Generating ideas for videos, podcast episodes, and other types of content
• Brainstorm content marketing ideas
• Writing ad copy
• Answer questions (albeit not necessarily factual in its response)
• Breakdown complicated ideas into easier-to-digest ones, or beef up generic content with SAT words (For example, WordHero’s “Explain It To A Child” and “Explain It Like a Professor” functions)

Of course, this is only for the actual writing portion of blogging. I’ve seen so many tutorials and articles expressing various methods of using AI tools for everything from creating complementary YouTube videos for blog posts to generating AI artwork.

Since this article is about how to write a blog post using AI, I’ll do my best to keep my focus on that. So, is it possible for a blogger or content creator to use AI writing tools to create high-quality content? Let’s first take a look at the ethical considerations.

Ethical considerations of writing blog posts with AI

Aside from the ethical considerations related to carbon emissions generated because of the computing power AI tech is causing, some people look at using AI to write blog posts as straight-up plagiarism.

I spoke with SEO and copywriting expert Ryan Brock who is the Chief Solution Officer for DemandJump. He said whether we like it or not, Chat GPT, and all these other AI writing tools are just plagiarism. Period.

In his opinion, it scrapes the internet and then repackages it in a slightly different structure and gives it back to you. He says no matter how you look at it, “It’s plagiarism and that’s just not cool.”

He went on to say by scraping other people’s content, you’re not providing any new value to anyone. That’s not how you build trust factor if you’re trying to establish yourself as a thought leader (or if you’re trying to sell something).

On the flip side of things, Ryan admitted that for answering basic questions that are evergreen and don’t need a lot of fact-checking, it would help someone come up with ideas and break down basic concepts faster. But to actually use that in a blog post he says is doing more harm than good in the long run.

He’s not alone in this sentiment.

Joyce O’Day wrote an article back in July 2022 that basically said if you’re using AI writing tools, the content isn’t yours. She said, “All published content — popular or academic — that utilizes artificial intelligence should be appropriately labeled with the name of the AI software listed as a co-author. Otherwise, authors are taking credit for content that is not their intellectual property, which is plagiarism.”

The Guardian reported, “The use of AI tools to generate writing that can be passed off as one’s own has been dubbed ‘AIgiarism’ by the American venture capitalist Paul Graham, whose wife, Jessica Livingston, is one of the backers of OpenAI.”

I’ve seen many copywriters and content creators state in online forums such as Reddit, as well as within Facebook Groups and on LinkedIn that the act of simply pulling content from AI software is not ethical. To make matters worse, in many cases, depending on the complexity of the subject, it could be generating completely false information.

While every writing solution I’ve come across has stated it’s not responsible for the accuracy of the text that is generated, I’m not sure everyone takes the time to fact-check the content that is given to them. In fact, I personally know of a few people that have turned in shoddy work that needed to be corrected because they relied more on AI software than their own common sense. Needless to say, they lost work as a result.

Some content writers are leaning heavily into AI

While using AI for writing may not be seen as completely ethical, it’s no secret that a lot of freelancers are leaning heavily into it for content creation. One such freelance writer that is getting her fair share of flack for this opinion is “Fiverr Millionaire” and author of the book “Freelance Your Way to Freedom,” Alexandra Fasulo. The self-proclaimed Freelance Fairy believes that AI is the way of the future and she has stated she is glad it’s making waves in the world.

In fact, she recently took to Instagram to discuss Fiverr’s new category for freelancers dedicated to AI where she discussed freelancers charging to edit ChatGPT-generated articles to earn more money in less time.

At the same time, she’s certain that AI will not replace freelancers altogether. For example, one of the gigs she referenced in a TikTok video was to proofread, fact-check, and add hyperlinks to AI text.

Could edited AI text be the ethical way to produce quality content, but get it done faster and for less money? Perhaps.

I guess the real question we all need to ask ourselves is, where do we draw our ethical line in the sand?

Even Google has walked back its initial statements that it would completely downgrade a website’s search rankings if it used AI. In April 2022 Search Engine Journal reported Google’s John Mueller stated that AI-generated content was considered spam. Then, in January 2023, the publication reported Google is now saying AI content is okay as long as it’s high-quality and helpful to the user.  Perhaps this is because Google is working on an AI platform to compete with ChatGPT, or maybe they just don’t want to turn off all the potential advertisers that are using AI to produce content. Who knows for sure?

What about SEO considerations with using AI writing tools?

While we’re talking Google, let’s consider SEO for a moment. Can you write blog content using AI and have that written content rank in search results?

Based on all the research I’ve done for this post, and people I’ve talked to that are much smarter than I am, the basic answer is yes, but with a major caveat.

You have to add a lot more to the post generated with AI before you can ever hope to rank with it!

In other words, if you copy and paste content generated from your favorite AI writing solution into WordPress (or whatever CMS you’re using), no, you probably won’t rank well for it.

But, if you take that base piece and improve upon it – ahem, make it MUCH better – sure, you can rank with it.

Here are the steps you need to take if getting an AI-generated article to rank well is your goal:

1. Research keywords. Don’t generate the text until you have done a thorough keyword research session.

• While researching keywords, consider your ideal customer, and what they will actually be looking for that could ultimately lead them to your page.
• Consider the questions they are asking and the pain points they are looking to solve and how your product or service can solve them.

2. Come up with article ideas. Go to your favorite AI writing solution and add a simple prompt. For example, let’s assume you’re a personal trainer trying to get more clients in the Scottsdale, Arizona area. Next, we’ll assume you’re trying to rank for Best Personal Trainer in Scottsdale. So in this case, the prompt we’ll input is “Give me 10 article ideas for the Best Personal Trainer in Scottsdale.”

3. Generate an outline. Using one of the prompts, let’s generate an outline for the post. In this case, we’ll use the prompt “10 Reasons to Hire a Personal Trainer in Scottsdale: Benefits and Results” Again we’ll go to our AI writing solution and prompt it to create an outline for a blog post on that topic.

4. Write the post. You have two options at this point and this is where things get tricky.

• Option 1 – You could technically re-prompt your writing software to address each of the points in the outline and create a pretty decent article
• Option 2 – Write the post yourself addressing the outline ideas and add in real examples and testimonials that show off your expertise and authority on the subjects

5. Refine and optimize the post. Edit, and add to the post to make it even better. To do this you can:

• Add an FAQ section to include more of the keywords people are looking for (but don’t keyword stuff the post!)
• Include some images that are optimized with proper Alt Tags and descriptions (Compress the images before loading them into the post to improve page load time!)
• Break up larger paragraphs into easier-to-read shorter paragraphs
• Add more subheads for skimmers
• Include links to authoritative sites where relevant
• Include links to your own blog posts that expand on ideas presented in the post
• Create a solid meta description that tells search engines what the post is about (Don’t forget to use the keyword(s) that you’re trying to rank for in your description!)

6. Publish and promote. It might take some time for your post to start showing up in search engine result pages (SERPs), but you can start sharing it across social media, in your newsletter, and even in forums like Reddit and Quora. Just be careful not to spam!

7. Next, you need to write more posts. One solid blog post doesn’t show off your E-E-A-T! Google released an update in December 2022 that to improve the rating of your quality it’s previous E-A-T guidelines are no longer enough if you hope to win out over your competitors.

• E-A-T “stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness.”
• So what is the extra E? Experience!

DemandJump recommends writing around 16 posts centered on the same subject to rank higher than your competitors. They refer to this as a Pillar Based Marketing campaign. It’s similar to Hubspot’s “topic clusters” way of writing which involves writing long-form content about several subtopics related to one central topic.

So in this case, you could go back to step 2 and take all the blog post ideas generated from your AI writing solution and repeat steps 3-7 for all 10 of the ideas it gave you. Then, interlink all of them so they support one another and shout from the digital rooftops that you are an expert on the subject that has authority, trustworthiness and experience to back up your claims online.

5 AI tools that can help you blog better

What tools can you use to help you write your blog posts? There are several different options available. Rather than get into the specific brands (especially since more are coming online every day, it seems), I’ll just share what you should be considering to make your blog post writing easier on you:

• A keyword research tool
• An AI writing tool – preferably one that does more than write a paragraph. Look for one that can give you ideas for:
  • Headers
  • Meta descriptions
  • Content briefs
  • Email subjects
  • Videos
  • Blog topics
  • Blog post outlines, etc.
• A spelling and grammar checker
• A plagiarism detection tool
• A graphics and/or image generation tool

How to write a blog post using AI

So how do you ethically write a blog post using AI? The most basic answer is: Don’t copy and paste AI-generated text verbatim. So what if you can get 2,000 words written in a matter of seconds? Even with different prompts for different sections of a full post, I wouldn’t recommend slapping it all together and calling it complete.

The better way, and the more ethical way, is to perhaps use it as a means to improve my workflow and break through writer’s block.

That is what I do when the cursor on my Google Doc blinks at me longer than I like. I will throw a random prompt or two in just to get the creative juices flowing.

From there, go and do your own research and craft a message that actually delivers value. I will say that using this method has saved me a lot of time and energy because as someone who pumps out a lot of content, it’s easy for me to hit a wall and simply not know what to say next. So, having writing solutions that can inspire content ideas is helpful.

Then again, if I’m really stumped and don’t know where to go next with a post, I also go to sites like Neil Patel’s Answer the Public, AlsoAsked, and even DemandJump to get insights into what people are actually searching for online about a variety of subjects. In the case of one of my clients, when they get lost for content creation ideas, they go to the users and ask them what they want to know more about and then we create content campaigns around that.

All this to say, I do see AI as a fun tool for busting through writer’s block and inspiring new ideas.

And, it’s great for coming up with blog post ideas if you’re stumped for what to cover next on your website.

Conclusion

We’ve covered a lot in this post, but my biggest hope is that I’ve convinced you not to just blindly use AI writing apps to spit out a bunch of low-quality content. Your readers and customers deserve better than that. Sure, use all the tools you want to speed up the process and eliminate writer’s block. But, don’t rely on it so heavily that you can’t tell where the AI writing assistant ends and your authenticity begins.

There is definitely a place for AI. And, I’m all for using it to improve your content writing process. From here, I would recommend checking out as many tools as you want. Take advantage of every free trial you can find and play and test to your heart’s content. Then, come back, and sit down to draft a real strategy that will actually convert. Happy blogging!

If you’re wondering how to do social media for your business and think you need a roadmap to navigate the ins and outs of today’s social media landscape, you’re in the right place.

Use this guide to position your venture for success on the social platforms where your customers spend their time. 

Let’s get started.

The discussion about social media for small businesses used to be simpler. It revolved around a few social networks, which had differences that were easy to parse. Instagram equaled pictures; YouTube equaled videos. “Facebook? It’s the one with opposable thumbs.” 

Social media platforms have climbed out of their primitive goop and evolved from simple organisms to complex forms. And, despite the vast landscape of social media, platforms are evolving to look more and more alike.

Live video? Sure — on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, Pinterest and Twitter.

Yet no single map precisely navigates the landscape of more than one platform. It’s worth it to take the time to do it right, though — by being authentic, offering content your audience values, and building relationships with your customers and prospects.

Social media marketing can generate returns like nothing else can.

You won’t go viral with your first post. And you shouldn’t expect to boom on every platform simultaneously. But the payoffs are life-changing for those small business owners who learn how to do social media the right way.

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Simply put, social media marketing is the process of sharing content (photos, videos and text) on different social media channels, where it’s viewed by the public. It’s an extension of your digital marketing efforts.

At the core of social media for small businesses is the opportunity to connect with new and existing customers and build your sphere of influence through those outlets.

Central to your success with social media marketing is your customers’ and prospects’ ability to find value in what you have to offer.

Mindset: You have to earn people’s attention on social media; no one owes it to you, and they won’t pay attention unless something is in it for them.

Your audience’s default is to do nothing.

Their lives were fine before you arrived.

Their lives will be fine after you go away.

Your goal is to help them feel enough excitement about your pitch to overcome that inertia.

— Wes Kao (@wes_kao) December 13, 2022

By learning how to do social media in a way that provides clear value to your customers and prospects, you can::

1. Establish expertise. When you share your knowledge freely and display your expertise on social media, you build more than just a following — you create an audience that remembers you as a thought leader in your industry.
2. Build brand awareness and audience. You already undertake a wide variety of brand awareness tactics routinely. Social media marketing is just the latest evolution of setting up a booth at industry events and sharing your elevator pitch.
3. Drive funnel and website traffic. Sharing a valuable freebie or new product announcement that interests your target audience can generate clicks to drive traffic to your funnel, selling your products and services.
4. Be remembered. Attention is a powerful currency, and attention from social media marketing results in you being remembered as the “it” person for what you offer.
5. See conversions. Ultimately, these activities all lead to the same place: conversions.

While a business’s ultimate goal is sales, social media marketing can also result in other powerful indirect conversions:

• Referrals. Someone who’s never used your services but remembers you as “the X person” will be quick to recommend you.
• Industry elevation. Being included in industry publications and round-ups won’t drive sales directly but are a fantastic way to reach an even larger audience.

Exercise: Look for examples of successful social media marketing from brands that you buy from. Can you identify the purpose behind one of their social posts? Start to pull back the curtain on social media marketing.

Bottom line: Always remember why you’re sharing. Learning how to do social media to reap its benefits rests on sharing with a clear purpose in mind.

Using social media marketing as a funnel

Social media marketing unlocks a spectrum of possibilities for your business — both positive and negative. And no, I’m not talking about negative comments.

This is an important realization: You don’t own your social media channels, either the content published there or your followers. Social media accounts live on borrowed land, and you could always lose access to what you’ve built there. Every single business still needs a website.

Always treat social media as a funnel that leads back to your owned content.

Vine disappeared overnight in 2016 (though it might return). Pinterest and LinkedIn accounts get mistakenly suspended. Instagram and Facebook accounts get hacked and held for a hefty ransom. TikTok has been banned altogether by a (potentially growing) list of countries.

Social media marketing is a way to explode your brand awareness, but small businesses should continue the conversation off of the page.

The benefits of social media marketing are exciting, but if you don’t enter the jungle with clear expectations you’ll quickly get discouraged.

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Setting realistic expectations

On any given social network sit countless abandoned profiles from creators who gave up on their social media marketing strategy, leaving their accumulated audience, followers and invested time to collect dust.

The most common mistake? Not accounting for the buy-in period of sweat equity that social media marketing requires. 

As a Pinterest marketer, I’ve seen countless creators loftily declare “flags at half-mast — Pinterest is dead!” They abandon their strategy, making a dire miscalculation: it takes months for Pinterest to even index your pins for search results.

Exercise: Research how long growth takes on the social channels you’re pursuing.

@cherylporterdiva It’s #vocalwarmup time! #vocalexercise #fyp #cherylportervocalcoach #vocalcoach ♬ original sound – Cheryl Porter | Vocal Coach

Give your social media strategy time

There’s no hard figure for how long it takes to build an audience on social media, but as a rule of thumb:

Don’t start executing a social media strategy on any platform if you’re not committed to at least a year of work.

Give yourself time to:

• Learn the ins and outs of making quality content.
• Nurture a real, genuine relationship with viewers and earn quality followers.
• Upskill your graphic design, video editing or whatever skills the platform demands.

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Should you spend money on social media marketing?

Part of the allure of social media has long been the price tag: free. Minus your time and the resources used to develop quality content, of course. Those resources are especially hefty, though, to an entrepreneur juggling all their daily responsibilities while exploring how to do social media for the first time.

Small businesses can make three main forms of financial investment in social media marketing:

• Paid ads
• Social media management
• Software

Social media ads

Ads can seem like a social media marketing hack: spend some money and see your reach skyrocket. But they aren’t the solution for every product, service or small business.

“Paid ads aren’t a magic solution where you spend money and immediately get sales,” warns marketer Ravi Davda. “It must be done properly, but it’s a way to be seen and drive traffic rapidly, rather than counting solely on organic methods.”

So, how do you know if you’re ready for social media ads?

Social media ads specialist Joe Brady shared this advice:

“When you have a proven offer with positive reviews, that’s when you’re ready to pursue paid ads. You don’t want to run ads for something that’s not been proven. Otherwise, you won’t know if it’s the ads that are the problem or what you’re selling is not in demand.”

Social media management

You can hire social media managers, sometimes also referred to as ghostwriters or freelance content creators, to create and publish content on your behalf.

You can hire help that’s:

• Platform-specific, such as a Twitter manager.
• Content-specific, such as hiring a short-form video content creator.

Note: This is not to be confused with an influencer, who would create content for your account and post it on their own social media profiles.

LinkedIn ghostwriter Renate Linnenkoper shared this insight:

“It’s easy to end up spending hours producing social media content instead of actually having the time to find new clients. Outsourcing your social media content creation is a great way to attract dream clients to your profile through storytelling content without having to rely on paid ads.”

Both of these financial investments save time, but there’s also another option that fits every budget.

Editor’s note: The experts at GoDaddy’s Digital Marketing Services can help you attract and manage your customers with targeted social ad and email campaigns — and measure your success.

Free social media management tools

Behind every social media marketing strategy is a host of systems and tools that save time.

Building a social media presence takes consistency, and that’s best achieved using a content calendar and scheduling tools.

A few popular social media management tools include:

• Sprout Social for scheduling, analytics, engagement and account management.
• Free native schedulers within the different social channels.
• Collaborative software such as Airtable, Notion or Trello to help visualize your social media content calendar and plan out social media campaigns.

Don’t worry about picking specific tools from the get-go; instead, reference this list once you’ve picked which social media channels you’ll focus on.

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Despite their overlaps, each social media channel has unique strengths.

An effective social media strategy weighs the strengths of each social network and looks at what type of content thrives there.

Ask yourself these questions as you evaluate the best social media channel(s) for your business:

• Who is my target customer, and where do they spend their time?
• Do I prefer to write instead of sharing visuals?
• What content will I routinely share?

Let’s see which platform is your smartest starting point.

LinkedIn

Post content on LinkedIn providing value and showing that you’re a reliable source of information on your given subject, and the recommendations will start to come in.

Sound too easy?

As personal branding specialist Jessie van Breugel puts it, “Treat LinkedIn as your job for six months and you’ll never be out of work again.” Jessie has used his account to grow his email list and position himself as a go-to source on personal branding.

Important: That translates to building your own personal account, not your company’s LinkedIn page.

LinkedIn roll-call:

• Content type: Text-based content with optional photos or videos; plus live video.
• Content style: Can be polished, relating to your small business, or can be personal and casual, relating to your lifestyle.
• Unique opportunity: Instead of just creating fresh content for yourself every day, you can grow your network by simply engaging with content from others (like this). 

Pinterest

Plot twist: Pinterest’s actually not a social network.

Pinterest is a search engine where users look for answers to their queries. When a user enters a term in the search bar, they’re directed to images or videos (called pins) that link back to the websites of bloggers, brands and small businesses.

As a Pinterest specialist, my Pinterest account reaches millions of people per month, which has driven website traffic, brought in new clients, and grown my email list.

The opportunities are enormous, but Pinterest isn’t the ideal platform for every small business owner. Businesses with a lot of quality links on their website (products, blog posts, etc.) are going to see the most success.

Pinterest roll-call:

• Content type: Visual content, either static or video; plus live video on Pinterest.
• Content style: Seasonal, informational and lifestyle.
• Unique opportunity: Longevity. Content on Pinterest lasts for years, not days.

Related: The entrepreneur’s guide to Pinterest marketing

TikTok

TikTok is the adolescent of the social media family, but there’s an audience there for all demographics. In 2021, it became the most visited website in the world, but do you have the type of content to grow your business on TikTok?

In order to answer yes, you must be prepared to produce a lot of content focused on the same topic. 

SEO specialist Kate Smoothy, who has amassed some 19,000 TikTok followers and uses the platform to grow her email list and client base, shared this advice:

“You don’t have to be focussed on one type of content on TikTok, but you do need to be focused on your niche. I would actually encourage creators to try lots of different types of content to find what their audience likes best! But stay in your lane.”

@webhivedigital You can pay a lot of money for SEO tools but you don’t need to. Some of the best SEO tools are free! #seo #searchengineoptimisation #digitalmarketing #marketingtips #seotipsandtricks ♬ original sound – Kate Smoothy | Websites & SEO

TikTok roll-call:

• Content type: Short-form video, or static content with a video or audio element, accompanied by text; plus live video.
• Content style: Trending, informational, lifestyle or entertainment.
• Unique opportunity: Virality and quick growth potential.

Instagram

Open Instagram today and you’ll notice a very different type of content than you used to see pre-2020. Once a social network for hyper-curated photos, Instagram is “no longer just a square photo-sharing app.”

Small business owners can now reach new customers and clients through photos (posts), permanent videos (reels), disappearing videos, text or images (stories) and direct messages.

Most platforms have a direct messaging feature, but Instagram is one of the social media platforms where this feature really shines.

Charlotte Brand uses Instagram to find new clients for her content marketing business, and shared this advice for new small businesses joining the platform:

“Instagram is FULL of marketing potential for all types of small businesses, but when it comes to growing your account, you have to focus on the right metrics. Don’t worry about likes and followers too much; instead, focus on building a community and providing valuable content for your audience.”

Charlotte noted that sharing on Instagram stories provides personal, human connection like no other social network. Users watch stories as much or even more than they scroll the home feed, which means that casual and uncurated access to connect with your audience is uncapped.

Instagram roll-call:

• Content type: Photos, short-form videos and disappearing content; plus live video.
• Content style: Informative, lifestyle or entertainment.
• Unique opportunity: Business-to-consumer (B2C) marketing, specifically in stories.

Related: How to sell on Instagram

YouTube

Like Pinterest, YouTube is actually a search engine, and the content you share there has an incredible shelf life: videos sit in search results for years.

Video marketing specialist Doug Dibert, Jr., has been using video marketing since 2005 and says that YouTube’s big opportunity lies in the fact that there’s more demand than supply.

“Imagine you discovered Google My Business before anyone else did. You’re getting all the benefits and your competition is baffled as to why you’re winning,” he says. “That’s what YouTube is right now for businesses.”

Google owns YouTube, which means that videos also get prime placement across Google search results.

The platform also offers a special direct monetization opportunity, where accounts (called channels) that meet certain engagement thresholds are eligible to directly monetize their content.

YouTube roll-call:

• Content type: Video, traditionally longer-form but also short-form (YouTube Shorts); plus live video.
• Content style: Informative, lifestyle or entertainment.
• Unique opportunity: Visibility across both YouTube and Google, and high demand for content.

Related: How to get more customers with YouTube

Facebook

Facebook might be an old social media platform, but it still has an enormous and diverse audience, across all demographics.

Not only does this present small business owners with many potential leads, but users are also actively turning to businesses’ Facebook pages for information like reviews, business hours and direct communication through Facebook messenger.

Arthur Freydin is an entrepreneur with 10 years of Facebook marketing experience and these insights into the power of the platform:

“The platform allows business owners to communicate updates, new products, discounts, opening hours, customer testimonials, and much more on a platform with a very wide audience.”

Business owners can market their business through a Facebook business page or in Facebook groups using their personal account. It also has an incredibly robust ad system.

Facebook roll-call:

• Content type: Text, images or video; plus live video.
• Content style: Photos, videos and short-form video content as well as business page features consisting of reviews, business hours and direct messaging.
• Unique opportunity: The ability to reach your target market through paid ads (called “boosting”). 

Related: How to use Facebook Messenger for business

Twitter

Twitter is the fastest-moving social media platform, where a post (called a tweet) has the shortest lifespan when compared to the other platforms we’ve looked at .. a mere 23 minutes.

But a post on Twitter also requires the least amount of work. Currently, a tweet has a limit of 280 characters. That might change, but the concept won’t: tweets aren’t meant to be profound works of art.

The nature of the platform rewards short, spicy and conversation-provoking content, which makes it ideal for the big-picture part of your brand messaging.

Samson and Cecilia Hollmerus, who together run a small business offering travel coaching and community, use Twitter to build brand awareness:

“We use Twitter for our top-of-funnel content, and our aim is to create brand awareness for our travel community and courses.”

9 Insider travel tips from experienced globetrotters:

That will save you:

• Time
• Money
• Energy

Without compromising quality for your upcoming trip pic.twitter.com/vcbZDgixS3

— Samson | Spontaneous Backpackers (@spontaneousbkpk) December 25, 2022

Twitter roll-call:

• Content type: Short-form text, can include images and videos; plus live video.
• Content style: Short, timely and topical.
• Unique opportunity: The size of the stage. Tweet about a trending topic using a hashtag and your words can be seen by tens of thousands of viewers, no matter how many followers you have.

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You’ll find no shortage of tips online about how to use social media — a single TikTok video might flash 15 tips in a matter of seconds.

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed. Follow these five basic steps and you’ll be ready to start creating the kind of social media content that converts.

1. Do your homework

The first step in any successful social media marketing strategy is listening.

See what kinds of accounts are popular in your industry and research:

• Who’s being followed?
• What topics are popular?
• What content is resonating?

Listening might sound passive, but small business influencer Ivana Taylor shared this exercise:

“Make a list of frequently asked questions and answer them. Or, share your secrets, shortcuts and hacks that will help your customers or audience get better at what you do.”

Actively engage in the listening process by:

• Writing down frequently asked questions (FAQ).
• Saving good posts that you see.
• Creating an ongoing idea document.

As you listen and gather content ideas, it’s time to define your social media marketing strategy.

2. Define your strategy

Start defining your social media strategy by answering these questions:

1. Which social media platform will you start with?
2. How many months will you commit to creating content, regardless of results?
3. How often will you post?

Bear in mind your target outcomes.

Target outcomes

What is the goal of each social media post? These goals can cover:

• Sales
• Education
• Authenticity
• Follower growth
• Lead generation
• Brand awareness
• Email list sign-ups
• Display of expertise
• Community engagement
• Data collection 

A well-rounded social media strategy would encompass all of these outcomes, even the ones that might seem less valuable, like authenticity.

Branding studio CEO Shana Sanders shared this insight into how authenticity generates more aligned leads:

“Be authentic with your social media marketing. Authenticity helps the audience see themselves being in the environment of working with you.”

Focus on creating content that covers all of these target outcomes in turn. Keep them front of mind as you’re creating social media content.

@megemikoart (shop link in my bio) #trans #elliotpage #transgender #nonbinary #lgbtqia #pridemonth #protecttranskids #lgbtsmallbusiness #fyp #comingout ♬ A Moment Apart – Hannah Stater

Add value

Anyone can post on social media, but not everyone turns their social media posts into conversions.

The biggest culprit? Failing to add value. Repurposing other small business marketing content, like sharing a link to a press release, is a losing approach.

Create content that’s:

• Funny
• Unique
• Helpful
• Engaging
• Entertaining
• Inspirational
• Conversational
• Thought-provoking
• Community-oriented

You already have the ideas for your value-driven social media marketing; you just need to identify them.

Business and marketing strategist Annelise Worn shared this advice:

“Ask yourself: ‘what does my ideal client need to know, think and believe about me and my offer in order to say yes?’ Write them all down. Categorize them into three buckets. That’s your content.”

Exercise: Hold a 15-minute brainstorming session where you write down every single answer to this question.

Identify your target market

Before you can create content that speaks to your audience, you have to know who your audience is.

Consider both demographics and psychographics, including:

• Age
• Gender
• Interests
• Struggles
• Education level
• Income or budget

Getting into the demographic information can start to feel overly technical, but copywriting specialist and professor Jasmin Alić, who’s written for Fortune 500 companies, shares this advice:

“Every time you post on social media as your brand, remember you’re speaking to humans. Not businesses and robots — you’d be surprised how many business owners don’t understand this concept.”

Exercise: Just like an actor breaking the fourth wall, look the camera dead in the eyes and speak directly to the viewer. Use “you,” not “you guys.” Likewise, say “I,” not an anonymous “we.”

When your social media marketing converts and a viewer is ready to become a follower or purchase your products or services, it’ll be the act of a single human. Speak to them.

Related: How to update your business for changing demographics

3. Create shareable content

After you’ve defined your social media marketing goals and understand your audience, you must reach viewers with content that engages them.

Digital marketer Yogesh Kumar simplifies the type of content that gets shared online to just two words: “People share creative and relevant content with their followers.”

Exercise: Think about your own behavior as a social media user. What type of content do you deem share-worthy?

I’ve edited 3+ million words.

Here are 8 common content writing mistakes,

and how to fix them:

— Erica Schneider (@ericasmyname) May 23, 2022

Related: How to create content calendars

4. Engage with your audience

Here’s one of the golden rules of social media marketing:

It’s not about you; it’s about them.

A relationship between two entities cannot be built if one party speaks about themselves into a megaphone. Your followers must be the focus of all of your social media marketing efforts, and engaging with them is an important part of this rule.

• Ask questions.
• Answer questions.
• Respond to every comment.
• Thank viewers for sharing their thoughts.
• Engage one-on-one in direct messages (DM) with viewers when appropriate.

Lyssa Jackson, instructor and program manager at LinkedIn, shared this insight:

“Direct messaging is for starting conversations and for building our like, know and trust factor. Even if you don’t make a sale or book a call right away, approaching DMs with a relationship-first mindset will open your network if you’re clear about the problem you solve.”

Exercise: Make time to send followers or peers in your audience thoughtful messages (if it’s appropriate on the platform).

5. Measure success

What does success look like on social media?

Consider these key metrics:

• Followers and views. These numbers give a sense of reach.
• Engagement. Are people commenting on your content?
• Shares. What content is motivating your followers to share it?
• Clicks. Which posts are driving traffic to your website?
• Action. Once they’re on your turf, are they converting?

For tangible measurements, look at platform analytics to access data from within each platform.

For intangibles, look at the quality of community you’re building and how qualified your inbound leads are.

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Conclusion and next steps

You’re making a wise investment by learning how to use social media marketing to grow your small business.

Instead of opening a brick-and-mortar establishment and waiting for potential leads to walk in, you’re going out into the world and finding them.

• Start small.
• Experiment.
• Test your content.
• Try out different platforms.
• Play with the timing of your posts.
• Treat every social media post as an opportunity to improve.

Watch your content evolve. You have no idea how your business might evolve with it.

Develop a quality, successful social media marketing strategy that’s an agent of your overall marketing goals, and your business will never be the same.