What is Social Media Sharing?
Social media sharing means posting or re-posting stuff on sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok. This stuff can be photos, videos, article links, or any other online content.
When you share something on social media, it spreads from person to person and account to account. More and more people get to see that piece of content through all the sharing.
For businesses, getting their content shared a lot on social media is like free advertising. It allows their brand to get seen by tons of potential new customers and followers.
Why Sharing on Social Media Matters
There are several good reasons why businesses should care about social sharing:
Increased Reach & Awareness
The more something is shared, the more people become aware of that business's brand.
More shares = more potential customers seeing it.
Drive Website Traffic
If an interesting piece of content gets shared a bunch, it can send lots of people clicking through to the business's website or blog to learn more.
Boost Engagement & Loyalty
Brands with very loyal followers tend to get their content shared more often by those fans. This keeps that loyal engagement going.
Stay Top-of-Mind
The more a brand's content is constantly being shared across people's feeds, the more recognizable and memorable it becomes.
Cost Savings
Organic sharing is basically free advertising and promotion! Much cheaper than paying for ads.
Different Kinds of Sharing
There are various types of content that people share on social media:
Personal Sharing
This is when you share personal experiences, thoughts, and feelings. It could be photos, videos, or stories giving a glimpse into your day-to-day life.
Professional Sharing
This means sharing content related to your job, career, or industry. You might share articles, research reports, or news updates relevant to your professional field.
Promotional Sharing
This is for businesses or brands to share content promoting their products or services. It includes sharing ads, special offers, marketing videos, and so on.
Collaborative Sharing
This refers to sharing content that is created in collaboration with others. It can include sharing photos or videos of group events or projects.
Curated Sharing
This is when you share articles, videos or other stuff that you find interesting from sources around the web - not your own original content.
Crowdsourced Sharing
This involves leveraging contributions and content created by your fans, customers, or followers themselves. It could be user-generated content like photos, videos, testimonials, etc.
The Dos and Don'ts
While social sharing is awesome for growing awareness, there are right and wrong ways to do it:
DO:
Share a variety of different types of content like articles, videos, photos, etc. Make sure it's informative or entertaining.
Use eye-catching visuals like images and videos to grab people's attention.
Ask your audience questions and respond to their comments to create discussion.
Use relevant hashtags to help more people discover your content.
Share quality stuff from other trusted sources in your industry, not just your own material.
DON'T:
Overshare too many personal details that could risk your privacy or safety.
Share any offensive or discriminatory content that targets certain groups of people.
Repost copyrighted material from others without giving them proper credit.
Use social media just to argue with people or put them down.
Spam people's feeds with tons of irrelevant, low-quality posts they won't care about.
The main idea is to share a good mix of valuable, engaging content - not just promotional stuff about yourself all the time. Interact with your audience in a respectful way that provides benefit to them.
Popular Social Media Platforms for Sharing
There are lots of major social media sites and apps that people use for sharing different kinds of content:
This is one of the biggest platforms with over 2.9 billion users. People share photos, videos, and updates about their lives, and keep in touch with friends and family.
Instagram is all about sharing photos and short video clips. Over 2.3 billion people use it. You can apply different filters and effects to make your visual content look cooler.
On Twitter, you share short text updates up to 280 characters long, called tweets. It has around 400 million users. Lots of people use it to discuss breaking news, trends, and public events.
This is a social network focused on professional networking and careers. Almost 900 million people are on it to connect with co-workers, find jobs, and discuss industry topics.
YouTube
YouTube is where people share longer video content like vlogs, tutorials, product reviews, and more. It's huge with over 2.6 billion users watching all kinds of videos.
Snapchat
Snapchat lets you share photos and video clips that disappear after a short time. Around 375 million people use it daily, especially younger users.
TikTok
TikTok is all about sharing funny, entertaining, short video clips. Over 1 billion users share videos participating in viral trends and challenges on the app.
How to Use Social Media for SEO?
Getting your content shared a lot on social media can actually help improve your website's rankings. Here are some tips for using social shares to boost SEO:
Share Your Website Content
Post links to your website pages, articles, videos etc. on your social accounts. This increases visibility and can send traffic from social media to your site.
Always include the website link when sharing.
Use Target Keywords
Include relevant keywords in your social media posts and captions for the content you share. This can help that content show up in search results for those keywords.
Get More Backlinks
When people share your content on their own social channels, it creates inbound links back to your website.
Backlinks are really important for SEO, so encourage people to share and link to your stuff.
While social shares may not directly impact rankings themselves, they still provide major SEO benefits like increased visibility and establishing brand credibility online.
Stay Engaged
Respond to comments and messages from your social media followers. This helps build a loyal audience more likely to share and engage with your content.
Boost Your Brand
Use social platforms to reinforce your brand identity and position yourself as an authority in your industry niche. Improved brand recognition aids SEO.
Track What's Working
Monitor which types of social media posts are getting the most shares, likes, comments etc. Then create more of that high-performing content going forward.
Social sharing tools
Here are some popular social sharing tools that can help you effectively share your content on social media:
Hootsuite: This is a popular social media management tool that allows you to schedule posts across multiple social media platforms, track performance analytics, and manage social media conversations.
Buffer: This tool allows you to schedule social media posts, track engagement, and analyze performance across multiple social media platforms.
Sprout Social: This social media management platform provides tools for scheduling posts, monitoring brand mentions, analyzing performance, and managing social media conversations.
CoSchedule: This tool allows you to schedule social media posts, manage content, and track performance analytics from a single platform.
SocialPilot: This is a social media scheduling and management tool that allows you to manage multiple social media accounts, schedule posts, and track performance analytics.
Agorapulse: This is a social media management tool that allows you to schedule social media posts, track performance analytics, and manage social media conversations.
Canva: This is a graphic design tool that allows you to create social media graphics and visuals. It offers pre-designed templates, stock photos, and easy-to-use editing tools.
BuzzSumo: This tool allows you to analyze social media performance and find popular content in your industry. It can help you identify trends, find influencers, and generate content ideas.
Examples of SM Sharing Campaigns
Here are some successful social sharing examples:
Coca-Cola's "Share a Coke"
For this campaign, Coca-Cola put people's names and nicknames on their bottle labels. They asked customers to share photos on social media of Coke bottles with their names.
It went totally viral - over 600,000 photos were shared! This helped increase sales and make the brand more popular.
Dove's Real Beauty
Dove asked women to share unedited photos of themselves on social media using #RealBeauty.
Millions of women joined in by posting their pics and personal stories. It made people feel really loyal to Dove and engaged with the brand's message.
Airbnb's #WeAccept Campaign
After the US travel ban, Airbnb started this campaign asking people to share stories of acceptance and inclusion using #WeAccept.
Over 87 million people saw these shared stories across social media. It really boosted Airbnb's positive brand image.
Oreo's "Dunk in the Dark" Tweet
During a blackout in the 2013 Super Bowl, Oreo quickly tweeted a simple pic that said "You can still dunk in the dark."
Thousands instantly retweeted it. Such a timely, witty message made Oreo's brand seem really clever.
REI's #OptOutside Campaign
Instead of asking people to go shopping on Black Friday, the outdoor gear company REI told their customers to go spend the day outside in nature instead of buying stuff.
They used the hashtag #OptOutside on social media. Millions of people then shared photos and stories of their hiking, camping, and other outdoor adventures using that hashtag.
By encouraging this, REI made its brand look super outdoorsy and environmentally friendly.
Conclusion
Sharing content on social media has become a really important part of marketing for businesses today.
With all the different social media sites and tools available, businesses can easily plan and manage their social media strategies. They can automatically share content, and track how well their posts and campaigns are performing.
This allows them to continuously improve their social media approach over time.