Over the past few years, I’ve built a bunch of WordPress websites for clients, and honestly, I think I’m pretty good at it. Find a good domain, host it, find a good wordpress theme, add some plugins, and start creating some good content. Seems simple, right?
Well, it’s not THAT simple. Three months ago, I decided to re-vamp my website, and this time I asked my friend, Jim Spencer from JBS Partners, to run one of his reports on my website. I used the “Web Page Advisor” product from him, and boy, my website (this website) scored pretty low.
Here’s what Jim taught me along the way, and I thought I’d share with you. You’ll find his basic teachings below with my comments in orange
DUH, this one is a no-brainer but worth pointing out and noting that new search algorithms and products, Like “Google’s +1″ are placing more and more emphasis on user-generated content. You can’t trick Google with loads of tags, and keywords. They want to know what’s verified and liked by us humans.
Here is where I scored the lowest. I took the cheap route and decided to host with godaddy. Sure, it works, but you get what you pay for. New wordpress themes are now really “heavy” and take FOREVER to load using a cheap, Wal-mart-esque hosting service. Do yourself a favor, and pay more for a dedicated server. (Disclosure- I went ahead and did some private hosting with JBS Partners- load time of my site is dramatically faster.
Keep it simple, and easy to navigate. For example, I like the layout of Jim’s page www.webpageadvisor.com. It’s clear, simple and to the point. Not sure I need to keep coming back to THIS site, but I feel comfortable, and that’s half the battle.
Goes without saying. There are all sorts of widgets out there that keep your website socially optimized. For now, just stick with basics, Linkedin, Facebook,
and Twitter.
Ok, I won’t tell you how low I scored here….. :-) But there are lots of basics that you need to remember. It gets pretty technical, so I’ll simply refer you back to Jim
More Suggestions
- Lose the Flash- Can’t underscore this enough. It’s an ongoing joke how bad restaurant’s websites are- the reason? Most of them use flash. Click over here to see a very funny cartoon from the oatmeal on why restaurant websites are so bad… It’s another “heavy” app. and well, HTLM5 will take it’s place..
- Mobile, Mobile, Mobile- Test your website out on a bunch of different mobile devices. Chances are it looks bad.
- Think Tablet. I came across OnSwipe 2 days ago. This comes complimentary with any wordpress.com hosted website. It makes your website “tablet-friendly”. Right now, it’s only available to use with the iPad, but a year from now, assume that technologies like this will be out there for all kinds of tablets. So, as time goes on, more and more people will be looking at your website through a tablet. Are you ready yet?
Think your company is too big, bureaucratic, and important to dabble in social media? That increased accessibility from customers poses too much of a risk to justify the potential rewards?
Think again.
The US government is using social media to improve operations and provide greater transparency. In fact, according to BizReport, 66% of US Government agencies are using social networking tools. Last year, Mark Drapeau (Director of Innovative Social Engagement at Microsoft U.S. Public Sector) started an ongoing column at Mashable talking about the federal government and social media. In outlining a theory of social media use for the federal government, he explained the ultimate goal should be to make it easier for agencies within the government to communicate.
This internal use of social media is exactly what your big, bureaucratic, and reactive business should consider as well.
We spend a lot of time talking about social media as a marketing, branding, and advertising tool but often don’t acknowledge the benefits of using social media platforms to improve internal operations. That’s because today, social media is hard enough sell when you’re talking about visible increases to the bottom line in the form of sales; its harder to specifically quantify the benefits to an organization thanks to internal social media tools.
Amy Mengel at Mengel Musings wrote about a recent event in Albany where the New York State Senate’s CIO office explained how it is using social media to “pull the state government out of the DOS-ages”. (Love that description!) They focused on external uses of social media, which are also very important in the public sector: transparency, participation, and collaboration. New York State, like the White House itself, is even using open-source software so, as Mengal said, citizens can access information about their government whatever way works best for them.
But consider the example highlighted in a Harvard Business Review article last week of using social media internally. In one example, a company used it to revise a classroom training program more efficiently and effectively. The article mentioned micoblogging specifically, but the tips it contained, and those generated by the comments, are useful in the adoption of any social media tool:
- Have specific goals,
- Lead by example (ie, get the top executives involved),
- Provide training.
Bottom line here: If the Department of Defense can handle social media, so can your business. So, get educated on what tools are available, develop a plan, and start small.
Photo Credit: Flickr
(This blog post brought to you by friend, content strategist and speaker at this years SXSW Festival, Margot Bloomstein. You can find her on Twitter at @mbloomstein)
What’s the connection between social media and content strategy? Well, for one, you can’t have social media strategy without content strategy.
Nope, this isn’t a way to carve up more of the project budget; in fact, content strategy may just help your social media budget stretch further by reducing rework and unsuccessful campaigns.
Let’s back up to some definitions:
Content strategy is planning for the creation, aggregation, governance, and expiration of useful, usable, and appropriate content within an experience. It stems from a message architecture, or hierarchy of key communication goals. Moving forward, it comes to life through
Content audit-what do we have and how well is it working?
Prescriptive content matrix -what do we need, how much, in what structure, who will create or find it, and at what frequency?
Editorial style guidelines-what’s the appropriate style and tone to convey the message architecture?
Editorial calendar- to coordinate all the moving parts in a predictable, manageable way.
Notice how I didn’t mention copywriting? Though you’ll need copy to express your ideas, it’s just one small and tactical component of your strategy–which may also address user-generated content, imagery, and sound.
So back to social media–you know, the line item more and more businesses are prioritizing as they see the benefits their competitors experience. Positive interactions between brands and their target audiences drive loyalty, purchasing, donations, involvement, and visibility. So how can you ensure the time and money you invest in social media will result in those positive interactions? A social media strategy can ensure you’re using different channels–e.g., Facebook, Twitter, blogs, online forums–to their respective benefits. Strategy can also help you address consistency and frequency of interactions–two necessary components to ensure your brand is creating positive experiences across all its touchpoints, not undermining its own work, and building something worthwhile, not embarrassing. You know those CEO blogs that boast only one or two posts–and the last one was six months ago and didn’t receive any comments anyhow? That’s embarrassing. And depending on your industry, it may be more embarrassing than the keg stand pictures also featuring your CEO.
So where do content strategy and social media strategy intersect to benefit each other, and the clients they serve?
As content strategy first addresses the most important topics to communicate–documenting them in the message architecture–it can directly answer the elephant-in-the-room question of most social media campaigns: what should we blog/tweet/post, anyhow? As a content strategist, I often work with social media strategists (or wear that hat myself) to prioritize blog/tweet/Facebook topics and help writers evoke brand voice in an editorial style that consistently supports those themes. If it’s most important for your brand to communicate its innovation, long sentences laced with passive voice will undercut that goal. Style matters–even in the 140-character world of Twitter. I counsel my clients on how to create a unique, brand-appropriate voice they can “translate” between Twitter, Facebook, and longer-form blog posts. I’ll also explore tools like an editorial calendar to help them synchronize themes across social media channels.
In short, partnership between content strategy and social media strategy answers a lot of questions: done right, no one should ever ask “Wait–what should I be writing about, and for when?!” again.
