Are you new to content creation? Or just want to improve your content creation skills? Whether you are a business, Instagram influencer or a personal user, you could benefit from applying these tips on creating effective social media content in 2021.
Effective social media content will help grow and engage your audience, whilst avoiding becoming a stagnant page. Keep in mind there is no formula to creating a perfect social media post and you may need to experiment as to what works best for your chosen application.
We’ve compiled our top tips for each element of a social media post consisting of:
- Captions
- Images and or videos
- Call to action (some scenarios)
- Tags/mentions (some scenarios)
- Hashtags
Captions
A good caption grabs the reader’s attention and engages them. Some effective headlines promise a result, ask a question or spark curiosity. These styles of headlines should be short and engage the reader prompting further reading. Characters and emojis can be added to captions to attract viewers and make your content relatable. Research has proven the positive effect emojis can have on increasing audience engagement, it can also add a human aspect to your post.
Images and or Videos
Visually pleasing content plays a major part in gaining social media content engagement. Research has shown that visually pleasing posts gain more likes, comments and shares when compared with something such as a text-only Facebook post. A combination of an image with text overlay is commonly utilised to gain the practicality of a text post with the aesthetic of a visual post. Posts high in colour, with people and of high quality are common go-to choices for social media posts. Thousands of visual effects are also built into social media platforms or are available through third-party applications to assist users with creating a pleasing aesthetic. It is also preferred to utilise your own visual content where possible as opposed to stock content off freely accessible websites.
Call to Action
Beginning and/or ending a post with a clear call to action is a good way to gain traffic and increase engagement with a post. Calls to action can be as simple as links to web pages or asking the audience to comment on a post.
Tags/Mentions
Mentioning other businesses, pages or influencers in your post is an important aspect of creating an effective social media post. This promotes mutual exposure and allows your audience to understand the people you support. Tagging others can also increase engagement on a post, with algorithms pushing popular posts to the top of users’ feeds.
Hashtags
Hashtags can be utilised to identify brands, themes, content, campaigns and trends. They are searchable on all major social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. They can help make your post and page more discoverable and attach your post to trending topics. Adding hashtags to your posts is essential to increasing your organic reach and boosting your engagement.
Creating effective social media content does not have to be hard. Following these simple guidelines; utilising captions, images/videos, a call to action, mentions and hashtags will have you on your way to becoming an effective content creator in 2021.
If you would like to further discuss effective content creation, don’t hesitate to contact us for further information.
