Tutorials

How to Create Quick Shareable Social Media Images [Tutorial]

By Cassie Witt on October 20, 2020 0

Want to maximize the visibility and sharing of your social media posts? Here is one quick tip that is sure to help: use an image.

Yes, it’s as simple as that.

While there are many reasons a social media post performs better than another, a quick way to help it along is to add an image. And the stats back this up.

Social Media Image Stats

“When people hear information, they’re likely to remember only 10% of that information three days later. However, if a relevant image is paired with that same information, people retained 65% of the information three days later.”

-Source: Brain Rules

“Tweets with images receive 150% more retweets than tweets without images.”

-Source: Buffer

“There are more than 1 Billion Instagram users active every day.”

-Source: Instagram Business

“Facebook posts with images see 2.3X more engagement than those without images.”

-Source: Buzz Sumo

The range of platforms covered by these stats proves that this tactic isn’t just a one-trick pony.

When you consider that there are not one but three major social media platforms based on the popularity of sharing images: Instagram, Snapchat, and Pinterest, you have to admit that as a plugged-in society, we are mad about images!

It makes sense, too. Images are easy to glance at and understand. When an image catches our eye, we are able to analyze and deconstruct it faster than words. Our brains are literally wired to process visual things faster. It’s how we evolved. In fact, when we read words, we’re not just recognizing letters and turning those into understandable language. Our minds attribute pictures to specific words or sounds. In that way, we’re able to understand what the word means.

My Personal Take

While writing an in-depth Facebook post or Twitter threads can help you engage and connect on a deeper level with the people who want to learn more, sharing an image with a short caption can help you gain a wider audience, faster. If audience growth is your goal, then this is a tactic you should try.

What Kind of Images?

Before we get too far into the tool I’m going to show you, I need to explain what type of images we’re talking about.

One of the easiest types of images to produce that will resonate with a wide number of people are quote images. These are images with a quote overlaid over some kind of a background. Often, you will see an image in the background, but you can also use solid-colored backgrounds, or gradients, or any design that calls attention to the words, rather than the background elements. Below are three examples. These are all from Instagram, but they work equally as well on the other platforms.

Creating these “quote images” will allow you to broaden your audience more effectively than sharing brand images. Why? Because they resonate with more people. You can use this tactic to show off your philosophy and pull more people in. It’s tantamount to leading with your hobbies or interests at a business mixer, rather than what product you sell.

The Tool: Pablo by Buffer

Pros

No copyright issues (if you use the images provided by Pablo).
Easy to Get Started
Dead simple to use
Can Share Right From the App

Cons

Desktop only (no mobile or app version)
Has only a few features
Cannot skip beginning tutorial (if you haven’t accessed it for a while or if you access it on a new browser)

Copyright Issues

Before we get too far into this tool, I have to discuss the invisible elephant in the room: copyright issues. I’ve written before about being careful you choose an image which isn’t going to land you in hot water over copyright issues. Overlaying words over a photo doesn’t change that.

You still have to make sure you’re using a free-to-use image or paying for the correct type of licensing if it’s a paid stock photo.

Luckily, Pablo, the tool I’m writing about today, provides a way to search through a site of free images, so you don’t need to worry about it.

Introducing Pablo

Choosing Images

Your first step is to choose an image, and choosing the right one is half the battle. You want to choose a photo that portrays your message, or at least doesn’t detract from it.

Here’s what I’ve noticed, though. Many people use a lot of the same or very similar images to express what they want to say.

Have an inspirational quote? Why not layer it over an image of a beautiful mountain peak wreathed in clouds? Unfortunately, many people use this formula, and it only works some of the time.

I am just as guilty of this and it’s easy to do. After all, you’re in a hurry. Do you really have time to sort through a ton of photos to find one that is absolutely perfect?! Maybe not…

However, taking a few extra minutes to choose a photo that not only compliments your message, but is also unique will ensure that your image and message are more likely to stand out from the crowd.

Pablo gives you two ways to choose images. You can choose images from the free stock photos on the left or upload your own image. If you use the free stock photos, Pablo allows you to search by keyword or shuffle them if you just want to see more random images.

Fonts/Design

Now comes the fun part: adding your quote/words over the image and making sure everything looks right. That’s not fun, you say? Well maybe it’s just fun for me, then… 😉

If you want to overlay a quote over the image, this is the time to do that.

Just slapping some text on the photo isn’t enough, though. You’ll want to spend a few minutes tweaking the settings so that it looks right. Don’t forget to make sure that your text is readable. Below are some tips on that.

Start by clicking on the left and right arrows beside the “Add Quote” words. This will rotate through common quotes.

I’ve chosen a quote by Eleanor Roosevelt, which seems appropriate to not only the image, but something that I want to say today.

Once you have some text on there, you can start to play around with the options. They are not immediately apparent, as you have to click on the text to make them appear.

You can change the font family, size, boldness, alignment and color. You can even put your own text by selecting the text that is there and typing or pasting in the replacement words. In this way, you can customize your text to fit a certain mood, or just make it look more readable. You can also move the text around by clicking and dragging. As you’re moving the text, you will see blue lines appear both horizontally and vertically to indicate whether you have aligned the text perfectly. Below is a screenshot where you can see that I have the text aligned perfectly center and also how different the overall image looks when you play around with these settings just a little bit.

Now that you have your words the way you want them, it is time to tweak your image settings so that it looks really nice. First up, is adding a logo or other graphic, if you want. Many companies use this feature to brand their images so that people seeing them across the internet can identify the image with their business. If you want to do this, start by clicking on the words “Insert Logo or Graphic” and choose your logo or another small branding image from your files. You will likely want to use a logo with a transparent background (either in a .png or .gif format).

Once you add your logo, you can move it around by clicking, dragging, and dropping it in the spot you want.

You can also resize the logo with the slider buttons, but you may need to shift it a little bit, as making the image larger tends to move it around.

The next way you can dial your image in is to use filters. There are only a handful, but they can make a big difference in the way your image looks. You can find them to the right of the preview image with the rest of the settings.

Click on the down arrow beside the current filter that’s selected to see all choices. You can choose from.

None
Light Contrast
Heavy Contrast
Light Blur
Heavy Blur
Grayscale
Blur Grayscale
Blue Tint
Red Tint
Green Tint

I chose the blue tint option and I like the contrast of the blue with the yellow letters. Don’t be afraid to play around with the options until you like what you see.

You can also reposition the photo. This is found at the top of the image preview or canvas area. Click on “Reposition” to bring up the tool and drag the photo around, or zoom in or out until you are satisfied. Press “Done” to save the changes.

Sharing to Social Media

The last thing to do is export it for the different social media platforms. This is where I feel Pablo really shines. With just a couple of clicks you can instantly resize your photo and export the perfect size for the main social media platforms. I have Instagram selected as my first option.

When I click on Twitter and Facebook as an option, you can see my text is slightly running into the logo on the bottom right. I just need to do a few quick tweaks, either by moving the words or logo slightly or making them smaller to make it all fit. Depending on your setup, you may need to do more.

Just remember that when you start moving things around, it will save it. So get the elements where you want them then click the “Share & Download” button on the right. Pablo gives you several options to either share directly to social media platforms, import the image into the Buffer site, or download for later.

I’ve been using Pablo and other tools for a while to create quick shareable social media images. Over the years, I’ve learned some design tips to help make these types of images perform better.

Tips to Make Your Images Look Better

Use light words over a darker background, or vice versa.
Use the blur tool to bring your words into greater focus. Be careful with this, though… you can blur your image so much that it’s unrecognizable.
Choose a readable font. Yes, readable. Readable is always preferable over “cute”. Afterall, you want your users to actually read the text right?
Use your company logo on images to Brand them. You never know where your images will end up, as people share them across the internet.

What You Can Use This For

Instagram posts. Instagram is for pictures, after all. 😉
To flesh out your weekly content.
To promote a promotion, sale, blog post, etc.

Now get out there and create some easy to share images that will delight your followers and get you more engagement!

Continually Grow Your Email List With This System

By Cassie Witt on March 2, 2018 0

The Problem: A Stagnant Email List

Building an email list (and nurturing that list) is by far one of the best things you can do for your business. After a while, though, you’ll notice that people on your list will naturally become less responsive.

This is totally normal.

People get bored, distracted, or sometimes they just don’t want to hear from you anymore. Don’t take it personally. It happens to everyone. Some of these people will unsubscribe and some won’t. This is what we call “churn”, and it is just something you have to deal with when you build an email list.

Without managing this churn your email list will become stagnant and basically useless. There are two things you can do about this: manage those people who aren’t opening or interacting with your emails anymore and adding new people to your list.

Managing your reluctant unsubscribers is not in the scope of this post. Though, it’s a great idea for a later post. Instead, we’re going to look at solution number two: adding new people to your email list. Specifically, we’ll be focusing on how to put your email list growth on autopilot. what steps you can take to make sure people always have the opportunity to join your email list, and not just when you run a promotion or offer a free eBook.

Grow Your Email List Continually, Even When You’re Not Promoting It

Most email list growth tactics involved a giveaway or a contest of some sort. Those work great for giving your email list growth a huge boost. Those tactics only work for a short amount of time, though. You need a system that will give you a steady stream of people who want to join your email list even when you’re not promoting a free eBook. Enter the Automated Email Opt-In System.

The Automated Email Opt-In System

It takes three main steps to build your automated email sign-up system. Each of these steps can take a little while to implement, but once they’re set up, you’ll have a fully functioning system for continual email list growth.

Add Email Signup to site & blog posts
SEO
Promote

Step 1: Setting Up the Email Opt-In

Most people have an email signup form somewhere on their site. Usually, it’s just in one place, like a pop up or as a welcome mat that shows up when a person first visits the website. There are many other places you can add a form to your website that will help put your email list building on autopilot. One of the best places is at the bottom of all your blog posts.

If you have WordPress, and don’t already have a plugin to add your email opt-in at the bottom of every blog post, I would suggest using Hustle from WPMU Dev. There’s a free version from on the WordPress plugins directory that you can use if you don’t want to pay for their pro version. It supports a lot of different email programs out of the box, including:

AWeber
ActiveCampaign
Campaignmonitor
MailChimp
ConstantContact
ConvertKit
GetResponse
Hubspot
Sendy
Mad Mimi
Mautic
Infusionsoft
SendinBlue

It’s also got a pretty simple wizard for building your popup. Below is a quick tutorial on how to use it.

Setting Up an Email Opt-In to Continually Grow Your List With Hustle

To get started find the “Hustle” menu item in your WordPress Dashboard and click it.

Below is a screenshot of what the first page looks like.

Since we’re going to be creating an opt-in to an email list, click “Create” beside the Opt-Ins option. There is a lot more you can use this plugin for, but for now let’s focus on getting that awesome email opt-in going.

The first bit of information you need to fill out is to give it a name. Only you will see this, so don’t worry about what you name it. Just make sure you can recognize it. Then decide whether you want to run the opt-in in test mode. This is probably a good idea if you don’t know what to expect. If your email provider isn’t in the list (see list above) then click to save your emails to a local list. Once people start signing up, you can set a reminder on your calendar to check this once a week, and export them out to upload them to your email provider. If your email provider is on the list, then don’t worry. Your emails will be added directly to your list once you set it up.

The screenshot below shows a partial list of the email providers that Hustle integrates with. It actually integrates with quite a few. The full list is near the beginning of this section.

In the next section you’ll connect to your email service. Each email service will ask for different information, and I can’t cover them all. When in doubt check the help files of your email service provider to find out where to get the information to connect. Once it’s connected, you’ll be able to choose which email list or form you want a new subscriber to be added to.

Designing Your Opt-In

The next section is where you’ll start designing the way your opt-in looks. There are two schools of thought on this: to make the colors mimic your design and to make the colors stand out from your design. I would try to stick close to your website’s overall design, but don’t be afraid to deviate a little bit in order to get a potential subscriber to notice your opt-in. The next seven screenshots show the formatting options available through the Hustle plugin.

Step 1:

Step 2:

Step 3:

Step 4:

Step 5:

Step 6:

Step 7:

Step 8:

Previewing Your Opt-In

When you are ready, click on the eyeball icon to preview your opt-in. The next three screenshots shows the different display options for your email signup: Slide-In, After Content, and Pop Up. Since we’re talking about an opt-in that’s different from a normal pop-up or welcome mat, I would stick with either the slide-in or after content options. These options work really well when you add them to every blog post, because they’ll seem more like a natural extension of a blog post rather than an advertisement.

Choose one display option to work on and use the formatting options in the previous section to make sure that your opt-in looks the way you want it to. You may need to do go back and forth multiple times between the formatting options and the preview before you are satisfied with the way it looks.

Slide In Preview:

After Content Preview:

Pop-Up Preview:

Turning On Your Email Opt-In

When you are ready to finish setting it up, Click the “Next Step” button at the end of the formatting options. Now you are ready to display the opt-in somewhere on your website. To get the most out of these tips, I would suggest turning on the “Enable after content opt-in” or “Enable slide-in opt-in” methods. If you know what you are doing, you can also use the shortcode to embed the form anywhere on your website.

Test, Test, Test

The last thing to do is to test it out and make sure that it works like you want it to. When I set mine up, I discovered that the color of some of the text was a dark color against a dark background, so it was virtually unreadable. It took just a moment to tweak it with css, but it’s always a good idea to test things out and make sure they are working right.

If you don’t want to mess with setting this up yourself, drop me a line. I’ve set up lots of email opt-ins for client’s websites and my rates are very reasonable.

Why Does this Work?

Usually when people see a popup if they don’t want to sign up for your email list, they will just dismiss it and forget about it. Even if the popup comes up again on another page, they may still dismiss it. As effective as pop ups are, they can become a tad annoying after a while. So, the form at the bottom of your blog post gives them another opportunity to join your email list, and it comes after you’ve already provided value to them through a tutorial, lesson, or however your blog post helped them. Once you help someone they are more inclined to listen to you again. Hitting them with an email signup at this point is a great way to capitalize on those feelings of goodwill.

Step 2: SEO the Shit Out of that Content

Now that you’ve gotten your form added to the bottom of all your blog posts. The next step is to get more people to read your blog posts. There are two ways you can do this: work on your search engine optimization (SEO), and promote your content. First, let’s talk about SEO. Search engine optimization is simply making sure your content is formatted so that Google will index and rank it for the keywords you think people will use to find your content.

The easiest way to do this on WordPress is to install and use the Yoast SEO plugin to optimize each blog post.

Choose Your Focus Keyword

Once the plugin is installed, navigate to a post you want to optimize for search engines and edit it. Once in the editing screen, scroll down until you see a section similar to the screenshot below. In the focus keyword box type in your focus keyword phrase. By focusing on one phrase, instead of many for a blog post, you can make sure that your keyword use is more effective.

If you’re having trouble figuring out what your keyword should be, think about what problem your post is trying to solve or what subject it’s talking about. Try to put yourself into the mind of your reader and think about how they would search. Then test out those keywords by searching Google yourself. By clicking on the different posts, you should be able to see how other websites have optimized their posts and get ideas for alternative keyword phrases. You may have to do quite a bit of research before you figure out a good keyword phrase to go for.

NOTE: Notice that Yoast allows multiple keywords, but each keyword has its own optimization box? That’s by design. When you optimize your post for one keyword at a time you will get more bang for your buck out of that keyword.

Optimizing Your Blog Post

Now that you have chosen a focus keyword phrase, the real work begins. To begin, review the snippets (what Google shows to searchers) to make sure your keyword phrase appears in your title, your url, and the excerpt. You can see where the snippet preview appears in the screenshot above. When you’re ready to change it, click the “Edit snippet” button.

The screenshot below shows where the SEO title, slug (url or address to post), and meta description are in the snippet. Edit the boxes to make sure your keyword phrase appears in each one. Make sure, however, that the keyword phrase sounds natural, and not forced. When you’re done click “Close snippet editor”.

Your SEO Checklist for Success

The screenshot below shows a convenient checklist that Yoast provides to help you optimize your blog post. Use it to identify areas to improve on your blog post. Improving these areas will help improve your ranking.

Why Does this Work to Continually Grow Your Email List?

When you optimize your post for SEO you’re helping Google and other search engines understand what type of content you’re delivering. This leads to more people seeing and (hopefully) clicking on your posts in search. Even though this is a small part of the automated email opt-in system, it’s important, because it’s building traffic to your email opt-in. Click to Tweet this.

Step 3: Promote, Promote, Promote

The next step after you SEO your blog posts is to start promoting them. This is why having social media accounts is important.

Did you know that you can promote your old blog posts over and over again and not just right after you publish?

In fact, if you setup your blog post promotion on a recurring schedule, you’ll increase the views on those blog posts and your website in general a lot more than if you didn’t.

For scheduling posts to social media over and over again, I prefer to use Buffer. I know that some people also use Meet Edgar, but I haven’t tried it out yet. Below is a tutorial on how promote your blog posts on a recurring schedule using Buffer.

First, Sign Up for Buffer

If you don’t already have buffer, I would suggest signing up for it. If you are really just trying it out, they have a free plan which allows you to hook up 1 social media account/platform: 1 Facebook Page or account, 1 Twitter account, 1 LinkedIn account, etc. It only allows you to schedule 10 posts per social account at a time, but that should be enough for you to test it out.

I’ve used Buffer for years to auto-schedule my social media posts. Buffer is a type of “social media scheduling tool” which you can use like others by “scheduling” your posts for a specific date and time or you can add your posts to your “queue”. The “queue” is basically a set of times your social media posts will go out. It could be only 1 time per day, or multiple. Buffer helps you not only plan out your social media posts and share them ahead of time, but also helps you share your posts at more “optimal” times.

Once you’ve signed up, you’ll want to hook up some social media accounts so you can auto-schedule some posts.

Add the Buffer Button to Your Browser

The next thing to do is add the Buffer button to your browser. This will allow you to start setting up your blog post promotion schedule with just one click.

Setting Up Your Blog Post Promotion Schedule With the “Power” Scheduler

The power scheduler is the best way to share that blog post to your social media accounts over and over again, so you can get the most of your new automated email opt-in system.

Launch Buffer

First, go to the post you want to share. Then click the Buffer button in your browser. It looks like the button in the screenshot below.

The buffer window will popup showing all of the accounts you can share to, along with some pre-set text for your post. This will only allow you to share your post once, though. We want to automate sharing the post over and over again. To do that, click on “Power Scheduler” in the top left.

Power Scheduling to Continually Grow Your Email List

A new window will open with the Power Scheduler in it. Your window will look similar to mine (with your own blog post and social media accounts, of course). There are several options, but once you know what they are, they are pretty easy to understand.

Across the top of the grid with pluses are your social media accounts. Click on any of them to remove that account, so you don’t share to it.

Pro Tip! Instagram is a pretty terrible place to share links to old blog posts, because the links aren’t clickable. If you’re going to post your blog post to Instagram, make sure it is the latest one and that you only use the top slot to schedule to Instagram. Then make sure there’s a link in your Instagram bio that goes to your blog (sometimes called an archive page). Instead of sharing the link in your Instagram post, just put “link in bio”.

On the left is the “schedule” for your posts. You can change any of the numbers, except for the top, “Next Available”. The “Next Available” slot will schedule it in your buffer for the next available slot in your queue. IYou don’t have to use this slot, if you don’t want to. Just don’t click on any of the “+” symbols in that row. You can also add more time slots. I usually leave the times for the 2nd and 3rd slot the same: 2 days and 7 days. After that, I add 14 days, then 30 days, and so on. That way my post gets shared over and over again, driving traffic back to my blog, which means more pop-ups and more chances for people to opt-in to my list.

Once you have your times, figured out, start clicking on those “+” symbols to begin crafting your messages. Here’s is where it gets a little tedious. You will need to craft a message for each account, and for each time slot. However, Buffer makes this simpler by copying the last message used. So, if you want to share the same message across multiple social media accounts you can. The only social media account it will not copy for is Facebook. That’s because Facebook wants you to post something unique to their platform, and they ask their 3rd Party providers to uphold this.

Try to mix up the type of message that you share. Use different words, ask questions instead of making statements, use an image, etc. There are many, many options for the types of posts that you can craft. The point here is to get people interested enough to click. Avoid using “click-bait” tactics, and try to think about what interests your customer or potential customer. Knowing your audience is at least half the battle here.

Pro Tip! I know this part is tedious, but don’t share the same message for your blog post week after week. Not only is it against some social media platforms terms of service (see Twitter’s Rules), but it can also get boring and repetitive for your followers. Instead, change up what you say, or even the type of post. Also, be careful sharing the same message across different social media accounts. Especially for Twitter. You do have more characters now, 280 to be exact, but you can still go over if you’re using the same words you would post to Facebook, LinkedIn or Google+. When in doubt, try to keep your post short and sweet. It’ll be faster for your followers to read, and will entice them to click faster.

Why Does this Work?

By promoting your blog posts on social media on a recurring schedule, you’ll ensure that your audience is getting multiple chances to see them. Also, being more consistent with your social media posts can grow your audience on those platforms. This also works for any page on your website and not just blog posts. So, start thinking about pages you can promote.

Continually Grow Your Email List

To be clear this isn’t a tactic for building your email list really fast, but a way to make sure that your email list is always growing. Click to Tweet this. It’s slower than giving away a free ebook in exchange for an email sign up, but no less sure. In fact, I would hazard to say that it is more effective in the long run. After a while, a promotion like a free ebook will be less effective because most of your audience has already seen it. If you’re promoting your existing and new content your audience has more opportunities to sign up. Even if you’re not producing new content, implementing these steps will set your email list growth on autopilot.

Which Platforms Work Best for Facebook Contest Marketing?

By Cassie Witt on September 28, 2017

So you want to run a Facebook Contest… That’s great! Facebook Contests are one of the best ways to build engagement on your Facebook Page and grow your email list. One of the toughest things about running a Facebook Contest, though, is knowing where, when, and how to market it.

I’ve been building, managing, and consulting on Facebook Contests since 2009. At first, I didn’t know the answer to these questions either. It took a lot of trial and error, but eventually I learned a system for maximizing my contest results every single time. In fact, I created a worksheet that will help you figure out which marketing platforms will work best for you.

Download the Free Facebook Contest Marketing Worksheet

How do I Know Where to Market my Facebook Contest?

It starts with listing out all of your current marketing platforms or opportunities. This list may be long, but don’t worry. We’re going to pare it down together.

Below is a screenshot from the first page of the worksheet where I listed all my marketing platforms. It’s important to make sure that you include everything in this list. You don’t want to miss out on a marketing opportunity you may have overlooked.

[feature_box style=”31″ title=”Note” alignment=”center”]Marketing platforms refer to the places and ways you can market. For instance “print advertising” is not a place, but it is a way that you can promote your contest. So, think about all the ways or places where you could market your contest and add them to your worksheet.

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Which Marketing Platforms are the Best for You?

The last step on the first page of this document is to figure out which marketing platforms will work the best for you. This will mostly depend on audience size, but there are a few other factors to consider here.

Be a Ninja!

I remember reading something years ago about editing. The advice was this: when you edit a story or a blog post, you must take on the mindset of a ninja and slash anything that doesn’t belong. The same is true in this case. Cross out any platforms you don’t think will work to market this contest. Here’s a few examples of things you might cross out:

[feature_box style=”31″ title=”Note” alignment=”center”]The list below shows a lot of marketing platforms I didn’t include on my list. That’s because I don’t usually use these forms of advertisement. You, however might. These are really just “hypothetical” platforms you might initially include and then cross off of your own list.

[/feature_box]

TV
Radio
Print Advertising
Banner ads on other websites
Instagram
Tumblr
Employee Message Board

The first three you might cross out because they will take too long to get ready or they are too expensive.

Banner ads on websites might not be practical, because their audience may not be interested in what you’re giving away.

I included Instagram because you can’t share clickable links directly with an image. This makes it hard to get people from Instagram to your Facebook Contest, which is the point.

Tumblr is one of those social media platforms that tend to have unique audiences. If you maintain a Tumblr and your audience regularly engages with content that is similar to what you’re giving away in your contest, then it’s okay to keep on the list. Otherwise, chop it.

I included employee message board as a place that you might post information about your contest because I’ve actually used this before. However, it is not appropriate for all types of contest, or even for every prize you giveaway. Unless you’re sure that your employees will want to help you promote it, I wouldn’t even bother with this one.

Here’s what I crossed out on my list:

Superstars!

The next step is to identify your superstars, or those marketing platforms which you think will help you the most in your promotion.

[feature_box style=”31″ title=”Note” alignment=”center”]I say “think” or “might” a lot for two reasons.

I don’t know your audience.
All marketing is an experiment until you know something works.

[/feature_box]

In the screenshot below, I’ve marked which platforms I want to use to promote my contest with a star. I’m going to walk through why I decided to mark each of these with a star so you understand why I chose them. You may choose your own platforms for different reasons.

The Obvious

Facebook Page
Facebook Personal Account

I marked my Facebook Page and personal account with stars because we are talking about promoting a Facebook Contest. I wouldn’t want to miss out on the obvious places to market them.

Biggest/Best Audiences

Website
Twitter
Email List
Linked In

Other Platforms Which I Think Will Work

Instagram (I regularly share social media stuff on that channel and I know how to utilize the link in the bio to get people to my contest page).
Friends (I have a few friends who might be interested in helping me promote it)

Do the same on your worksheet.

Want to Know More?

Figuring out which marketing platforms will work best for your contest is just the tip the iceberg to running a successful Facebook Contest. There’s also:

Planning out your contest details
Deciding what type of contest to run
Writing your contest rules
Building your contest page
Working out the details of your marketing
How to build your marketing calendar
Choosing the right prize
What to do when something goes wrong
And so much more!

I cover all of these topics in my course: Build Email Lists Fast with Facebook Contests. It’s a course designed for those who are just getting their feet wet, or who want to get more out of their next Facebook Contest. The course specifically focuses on the “Giveaway” contest type, which is the easiest to manage and the most effective type for building an email list. However, almost everything in the course can be applied to other types of contests including photo submission contests.

If you want to know more, here’s a link to the course detail page. It is currently only $23, since I’m in the middle of a major overhaul, though. The price will go soon, so hurry and get the course at the lower price! If you download this worksheet, you are in my email list and will get a notice when the new course material has been loaded.

Get the Course at the Discounted Price

Don’t Miss the free Facebook Contest Marketing Sheet (download it below)

Download the Free Facebook Contest Marketing Worksheet

Get More Likes On Facebook by Adding your Facebook Page Username to your Business Card

By Cassie Witt on August 16, 2016 1

This post is a part of the “Get More Facebook Likes” series. Each one of these articles will detail a single tactic for growing your Facebook Likes. Not all tactics are created equal, but each will contribute to your success. Find more ways of growing your Facebook Likes by viewing all the posts in the series here.

Why your business card?

There are many ways to get more Facebook Likes, but most of them aren’t quite as simple as putting your Facebook Page username (or Page link) on your business card. It’s a super low-level way to generate more likes (especially if you do a lot of networking). It’s also a tactic that’s often overlooked.

So, why is it effective?

When someone takes your business card at a networking event or even picks one up from a visit to your office, it makes them curious. They want to know more about your business and more about you. Often times they will visit your website. This is also a great opportunity to point them towards your social media accounts.

Someone who wants to know more about you will also check you out on social media, because this is the place where most businesses “let loose” and show their personality. Seeing what a business posts on social media is often a deciding factor in whether or not they want to do business with you.

So, how do you get your Facebook Page username on your business card, so people will follow you? Can’t you just slap the link on the next print run of your business cards? Sure you could, but there are a few things you want to keep in mind before you do.

How to Setup Your Facebook Username, Vanity URL, etc.

First, you want to make sure that your Facebook Page username is setup correctly. In this past, this was called a “vanity url”. Some people (myself included) also refer to it as a Facebook Page link, because that’s ultimately what it accomplishes. Just for clarification, though, your Facebook username is the text that appears at the end of the link (once you setup your username). That’s the “YourBusinessName” part of this link: Facebook.com/YourBusinessName. Your Facebook Page username is also the part after the “@” symbol that someone can use to tag your business when they post something. Your Facebook Page link is the entire link that someone would need to type into a search engine to find your Page.

First, let’s take a look at what a Facebook Page link looks like before you claim your Facebook username. You can see an example below.

http://facebook.com/Your-Business-Name/1234567

Just between you and me, this is an ugly link! Could you imagine trying to tell someone to type this in? They would probably quit right away.

Now I know that most people would just go to Facebook and use the search bar to find your business. And that can work. The problem comes in when there are multiple businesses with the same name. How will someone know which Page to actually like? Better yet, why would you give them the opportunity to Like the wrong page.

The simple answer to this problem is to go claim your Facebook Page username and start advertising it, so this doesn’t happen. Also, if you claim your Facebook username, people will now be able to tag your business in photos or any other posts. This can give your business a larger reach on Facebook than it had before.

So, back to that ugly link…

http://facebook.com/Your-Business-Name/1234567

Not only is this link not as good for search engine optimization (seo). It’s also not very readable on a business card. Below is an example of a good Facebook Page link.

http://www.facebook.com/Team3Media/

The name is easy to read and wouldn’t be too hard for someone to type in.

Now that you know what a good Facebook Page link looks like, it’s time to go claim your Facebook Page username, so you can have a nice one, too. 🙂

But first, let’s go over some helpful tips and guidelines so you can choose the best username possible.

Use Capitalization to make it more readable.

The capital letters aren’t actually necessary. If someone were to type in the link without them, it would still work. However, it makes it infinitely more readable on a business card or any other print material.

Choose the shortest version of your business name or brand possible.

You don’t want people to be typing for-eh-ver in order to get to your Facebook Page. So, make it easy for them. Use a number instead of spelling it out. And use the shortened version of a word where possible, as long as it’s not confusing. The name you choose may be in direct conflict with the name used for SEO. In this case, you may want to use the original version. However, it’s up to you.

Follow the Facebook Page Username guidelines.

Below is an excerpt from their help article on creating custom usernames.

Here are a few things to keep in mind when you create a custom username:

You can’t claim a username someone else is already using.
Usernames can only contain alphanumeric characters (A-Z, 0-9) or a period (“.”).
Periods (“.”) and capitalization don’t count as a part of a username. For example, johnsmith55, John.Smith55 and john.smith.55 are all considered the same username.
Usernames must be at least 5 characters long and can’t contain generic terms or extensions (ex: .com, .net).
You must be an admin to create or change the username for a Page.
Your username must adhere to the Facebook Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.

Check this link for an always updated version of this help article.

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NOTE: One last thing. You used to be able to only change your Facebook Page username twice before you had to get Facebook involved in the process. There is not anything in their guidelines to suggest that this is the case anymore. However, I would still caution against changing it too many times. Remember, your username is tied to your Facebook Page link, so if you change it (after it’s already been set) then any old links to your Page will no longer work!

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Now, Go Claim Your Facebook Page Username!

Claiming your username is actually a fairly easy process. In fact, it’s much easier to create than it used to be. Before you had to go through a handful of screens to get to the place where you could actually change your Facebook Page username. Now, a couple of clicks and you’re there.

Step 1: Go To Your Page

The first step is to go to your Facebok Page and make sure that you are logged in to the account which is an admin of the page.

Step 2: Edit Page Info

Now just put your cursor over the “More” button and click on “Edit Page Info” from the dropdown.

Step 3: Add or Change Your Username

In the “Username” field, either add or edit your Facebook Page username. Then click “save changes” when you’re done.

You may have to try a couple of times before you find a username that Facebook will accept. Once you’re done, now it’s time to move on to the big finish.

How to Add Your Facebook Page Link to Your Business Card

Now that you have a nice readable Faceook Page link or username, you can add it to your business card. If you design your own business cards, check out these tips to keep your design clean and make it more likely that someone visits your Facebook Page.

Avoid “busyness” or “clutter”

Try to keep your business card from being cluttered by only providing the information that someone need to either contact you and find out more about you. You don’t have to add every point of contact. Just make sure your business card has the most important information on it. Also, you want to make sure that adding the Facebook Page link to your card doesn’t make it appear more cluttered. You may need to move things around, take something off, or reduce the fonts in places.

Keep it legible

Another good piece of advice is not to use a really fancy font for your Facebook Page link. Remember, you want the link to be easily readable so you will get more Likes!

Add a Call to Action

When adding your link to your card, you may want to make it more “visible” by adding a “Call to Action”. For instance, most business cards list contact information in a list-like format with very little difference. If you really want to build your likes, you can do something as simple as adding the words “Like” or “Follow Me on Facebook” above or to the left of the Facebook Page link. This will make your link stand out, because it will look different than all the other contact information. You can also add a little more spacing around the link in order to draw attention to it.

Shorten it.

Always, always make sure that your link is the shortest version possible. For instance, you can leave out the “http://”, the “https://”, and even the www. This will not only make the link look cleaner, but it will also take up less space on the business card. Also, a little known fact is that someone doesn’t actually have to type out the full address to get your Page to show up. Modern browsers will “auto-add” the http:// to your link.

If you want to make it the shortest version possible just use your username and add the “@” symbol to the front of it. Be warned, using just the Facebook Page username may confuse the less tech-savvy of your peeps, though.

QR Codes…

Using a QR Code (quick response code) is a way to put your Facebook Page username on your business card which will allow someone to visit your page from their smartphone (once they scan it). We’ll cover QR codes in another blog post. For now, just know that they are dead useful in getting people to take an action from any printed advertisement.

UPDATED: Tutorial Infographic: How to Add An Admin to a Facebook Page

By Cassie Witt on June 10, 2015 0

This post was updated on 9/23/2020 to reflect the new look of the desktop Facebook Page interface.

One of the most common questions I hear about Facebook, is how someone can add an admin to a Facebook Page. I put together a tutorial I use to send to my own clients and thought I would share it. This has been updated for the latest changes to the Facebook Page admin area. It’s setup as a one-page downloadable image. You are welcome to save it to your desktop, pin it, or share it with your own audience. As always, if this was helpful to you, drop me a line in the comments below.

Download PDF Version

Tutorial: Get More Facebook Likes by Adding a Facebook Like Button to Your Website

By Cassie Witt on March 3, 2015

One of the easiest ways to get more Facebook Likes for your Facebook Page, is to add the Facebook Like button (targeted at your Facebook Page) to your website.

This is a simple and often overlooked tactic which could result in more Likes for your Page. Why does it work?

Consider these two scenarios.

In the first one, a visitor to your website sees the Facebook icon and is enticed to click it. Once they click it, though, they have to actually go to your Facebook Page in order to “Like” it.

In the second one, a visitor to your website sees the Like button and is, also, enticed to click it. Once they do, that Like is immediately translated to your Facebook Page.

It’s so much easier for a person if they only have to click once. Anytime you can make a conversion easier on the consumer, the more likely they are to do it.

How Do You Get the “Magic” Facebook Like Button?

First of all, how does it work like magic? The Facebook Like button works auto-magically with one click as long as that person is logged into Facebook. These days, who isn’t? Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I logged out of Facebook. And I would bet my right arm that you can’t either.

Facebook makes it easy for you to get this code to install on your website. To get started go to: https://developers.facebook.com/docs/plugins/like-button

As you can see from the screenshot below, there are some options that you can choose to enhance the Like button. But they need to be weighed against how much space the button takes up. For example the first set of options makes the button (and all its attributes) really big. The space you want to put it in may not be big enough to hold everything, and it will cut part of it off. All of the attributes are optional, except for your Facebook Page URL.

A Quick Note: The “Width” option will not increase the size of the Facebook Like button (which is quite small). Instead the width controls the overall width of the Like button element. For instance, in the example above, the Like button element area covers the Facebook Like Button, the Facebook Share button, and the words describing the number of likes. So, increasing the width would only increase the space around the entire button set.

The screenshot below shows my Facebook Page address (or URL) in the text box below “URL to Like”. To find your Facebook Page URL, go to your Facebook Page and copy and paste what’s in the address bar into the top-left box (as shown below). That’s step one.

The next step is to decide what you want the overall button to look like. I’ve already talked about how the default set of options gives users a lot more information, but makes the button much bigger in size. I’ll explain that extra information, and go through the rest of the options, with screenshots below.

The first set shows the like button in the “Standard Layout” which adds the additional information of the person’s friends (the name here has been covered up for privacy reasons) who Like the Page. This is great for showing “social proof”, which can help your Page seem more Likeable, especially if you have a lot of Likes already. If you have a smaller number of likes though, I’d suggest going with one of the other options. You can also see below that there is an extra button (the share button) and that there are faces shown in the screenshot below. Most of these have been covered up to protect the privacy of people, but I left my own mugshot there, so you can see an example of what they will look like.

If you uncheck the “Show Friends’ Faces” option, it makes the button are look cleaner. This option works well for those who don’t want the added space the “faces” take up and for those who don’t necessarily care about social proof.

You can, of course, disable the share button. Since you’re trying to get people to Like your Facebook Page, adding a Share button only confuses the issue.

The next layout type is the “box_count”. This displays the Like button with a Like count over it, and everything is stacked on top of each other in a, you guessed it, “box” configuration. This layout, and in fact, the rest of the layouts do not show faces. So, if social proof is important to you, go with the standard layout or the Like Box (which I’ll cover later). This option works for those site designs where a more square or vertical section is available to place the button in. It’s also good for those who want to still show off the number of likes they have.

Since the box count does not come with the option to show faces (even if you check it), the only other option here is to take away the Share button. This makes the button into a nice compact design that could fit almost anywhere.

The next layout type is the Button Count. This layout is much like the box count layout, except that the number of likes is on the side instead of on top. This makes this button much more suited to a horizontal space.

Of course, once you take the Share button away it will fit into an even smaller space. Again, this type of layout with the number of Likes showing appeals to those who want to use social proof to encourage more Likes.

The last layout type is the simplest. That’s probably why it’s called the Simple Button layout. It is not only the smallest, but it’s also a great option for those Pages which have a smaller number of Likes, and don’t want to advertise that fact. This button, too, can be combined with the Share button, if you like.

The version without the Share button is tiny, minuscule even. This means you don’t have to worry about where the button will fit.

Warning: Code Ahead!

A quick warning: this next section involves some html no-how. If you don’t know what you’re doing, forward this article on to your web developer or admin and have that person complete these steps.

Now that you know which button types are available, take a moment to choose which is right for your site. Then, click on “Get Code”. You should see a box like the one below pop up. As you can see, there are 4 options for the code. I bet you thought you were done with options! We are almost done, I promise. 😉

The first three options require a little bit more work to install them and give you some more options for how much information you get when someone presses the Facebook Like button from your website. However, they are not necessary, in most cases.

The easiest code type to use, and the one that will not bog down your site is the “URL” type. Which is just as it sounds, it installs a URL, which points directly to your Facebook Page, but has the added benefit of allowing someone to Like your Page with one click! Woot! Your next step here is to copy and paste the code into the html of your website where you want the button to appear. Again, if you don’t know what you’re doing get someone knowledgeable to handle it for you.

Alternatives to the Facebook Code

There are some alternatives to just grabbing the code off Facebook. If your website is on WordPress, then there’s several options in the form of “plugins” you can install with no programming knowledge. I won’t detail all the options here. Just make sure to check out the number of stars each of these plugins has, check out some of the reviews, and make sure it’s compatible with your version of wordpress before you install.

There are also plugins for drupal, joomla, wixia, and other website builders or (content management systems). Just use Google to search for them.

Whether you choose to grab the code from Facebook, or use a plugin, installing the Facebook Like button is just one way that you can increase your Facebook Page Likes.

Likes Are Just the Beginning

Remember, though, that Facebook Likes are only the first step in the journey. It’s great to say that you have 1,000, 10,000, or whatever number of Likes, but it’s not your end game. Those Likes represent real people who (hopefully) want to buy from you. Even if they don’t want to buy from you, they have indicated that they’re interested in your business in some way. Now it’s your turn to give something back to them. Give them a reason to read your posts, and keep them coming back for more. This is the way that you start cultivating relationships online that lead to sales.