Creating content and managing social media is very time-consuming, and staying original and creative is one of the hardest social media marketing challenges.
Social media manager tasks seem to go on forever: create, schedule, monitor, reply, and update content across several different platforms. That’s why it’s important to find an easier way to get new content ideas. We’ve put together a list of how you can always stay on top of the trends and be sure to never run out of creative content.
Use Analytics
One of the best ways to find out what works is to look at your analytics. Study your best posts and re-create them. Try to find a pattern among your top posts. Look for common topics among them, as well as a particular content form, such as image, text, or video. Also, look at whether people leave comments on those posts.
Use Research Tools
Buzzsumo is a useful tool that will help you determine what kind of content your audience wants to see. It’s like Google for the most popular content. You can research any keyword, and Buzzsumo will show you the most popular and shared content for that keyword.
Search through the results and see if you can find popular topics around that keyword.
Buzzsumo also breaks down the share count by platforms, so you can see if certain content is more popular on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Pinterest.
Learn From Your Competitors
Look at your top competitors in the industry and see what is working for them. If your target audience is similar, what worked for them will probably work for you as well.
You can go beyond just your competitors, as well. Research other companies that you admire and see what you can learn from them. Maybe they are in a similar space as you, or you can identify with their way of marketing.
However, while it’s great to learn from others, you don’t want to follow them exactly. Your brand should be unique and different from theirs, and you want to be original with what you’re posting. Look for general ideas and patterns, but adapt them for your own voice.
Ask Your Audience
Simply post a poll or a question on your social media profiles about what kinds of topics and other content your audience wants to see more of. If you want open-ended replies, post a question. If you think you already know what your audience might be interested in, create a poll with a few options.
Follow Trends
We all know that the top content format currently is video since video posts have the highest average engagement. Does that mean you should start creating videos?
It would be great to start experimenting with a few video posts, if your resources allow it, to see how they perform. You want to be sure that it’s worth your resources, since creating videos can be very expensive and time-consuming. Nevertheless, you should keep following industry trends and find the ones that work best for you.
If you need any help finding new content ideas, feel free to contact us!