Social Media Leaps

Creating Content

We’ve talked to quite a few small business and chamber bloggers who have suffered from “blogstipation.” A nasty little condition where we desperately want to write something insightful, clever or interesting and just don’t have the ability to get it from brain to keyboard!

You know by now that social media success isn’t just about friending and linking. Social media is, at its core, all about building relationships by sharing content and information with a community of interest to you. The biggest difficulty many participants face, especially as they are trying to build a unique and valuable brand with their social media efforts, is having a stream of information and content of value to share.

Fueling content ideas

Assess and access your current “information streams.”

The starting point for having great content to share is to leverage the information stream you already have or can easily create in areas that you and your target community may find interesting.

Think about the information streams in which you currently participate. Magazines and newsletters you receive. Email distribution lists you are on. Educational events, programs and webinars you attend. Blogs and Tweetfeeds you have (or will have soon). Media clips and staff briefings. The people you meet and interact with everyday.

Chances are, you are already part of a dozen solid streams of information that are bringing you content, ideas and sharable stuff today. If you are extremely “stream poor” at the moment, it will be hard for you to generate content regularly and you’ll need to do some web surfing to find some great resources.

The problem with streams is that they run fast. So you need to keep a notebook, pda, or notes file to jot down ideas, links and content as you come across them. Then, when you sit down to write, you have some ideas in queue to write about.

Cast your net wide.

If you aren’t using a reader like GoogleReader or some other tool, you should learn more about this tool. The benefit is that it brings content to you regularly from sources you designate and puts it into an organized place for your ongoing review. Getting a reader set up is a little bit of a time investment, but it pays off quickly. The best way to learn about a reader is to use one—but just think of it as having an electronic “subscription” to a whole bunch of Web publications that automatically come to you in a nicely organized set of folders.

It’s ok to aggregate.

Fact is, most of us aren’t brilliant. So, its hard to create compelling original content on a daily or even weekly basis. The Web and social media are about sharing, so its ok to forward a link with some of your thoughts – in fact it’s even encouraged. Just make sure you credit where it came from and that you actually are adding to it (in most cases) even if its just to say it resonates with you, you like it, etc. Links, interviews, images, and videos are all interesting ways of getting people to pay attention to your content and leverage the information of value to your target audience on the web.

Ask questions of your audience.

Whether it’s through traditional surveys or asking questions of your community, creating interaction and understanding what your audience is interested in will help you create content that is relevant and engaging.

Write what you know.

Don’t stretch yourself too far by writing content that you’re not really familiar with—you will get called on it. The Internet is the ultimate “transparent” medium. If you’re providing false information or bad information, it will get attention. Try to focus on areas you know well when you go deep on content.

Share your access.

As a chamber executive or a well connected small business owner, you travel in interesting circles. That’s great fodder for good content. Everyone wants to know what small businesses think about an issue or get the inside scoop on something that is going on in town. Just make sure you don’t betray confidences and think carefully about how your network would or could feel about how you are relaying the information or conversations in your web communications.

Some things to remember while writing

It’s about them, not you!

Many people wonder “Why would I tweet? Does anyone really care what I am doing?” While it’s sometimes interesting to know a little about your life, in most cases Twitter and other tools used for business and chambers are being used to communicate information to customers and colleagues. Good writing is always focused on creating value for the reader. As long as you continue to ask yourself, “would they care,” it will advance the reputation you build online.

Sharing a little bit about you is ok.

We all want to know interesting people and want to advance what we know about each other so we can advance the relationship. Making yourself a little more three dimensional is okay. Social media is a human experience and the authenticity and connection that can be created is an important part of the relationship. You should “personalize” your content and your voice enough to be unique and interesting. Be yourself! A guideline a lot of people use is that 80% of their social media content is about other content, information and resources for their friends and followers. The other 20% can be explicitly about you and your business.

Be interesting and valuable.

With all the talk about social media and your brand, some people become initimidated about having an opinion online. Especially as a chamber leader or a local small business owner, there are concerns about “what people might think” or who may disagree. As long as your view and your ideas are consistent with your personal or organizational mission, its ok to have an opinion. Your opinions make you interesting and your point of view makes you valuable. Remember, however, that It’s not ok to berate others for theirs or dismiss the ideas or contributions they have. People like to follow personalities and interesting perspectives.

Use stories.

There is a reason news journalists call their writing “stories.” There are characters, plots and storylines. A beginning, a middle and an end. A point. Stories and examples help the reader get it and they represent experience and reality for the points you want to make. Remember, your readers want to be interested and engaged with your writing.

Style and frequency.

Create a regular schedule for contribution. Especially if you are writing a blog or own a page in a social networking site. Even if you stack up content to release over time, it’s better to write with some frequency than to do a lot and then nothing for a while. You are trying to develop a regular audience and it needs care and feeding regularly. To start, once a week is just fine.

Over time you’ll develop a voice for your contributions. If many different people are writing for your social media efforts, consider sub-authoring the work or have one person edit the work for consistency of voice. And finally, remember to leave links and resources for others. Be a connector and others will see you as a resource and key audience manager.