Last week I received the final email from my online social media professor, a message detailing the great strides our class had taken over the past four weeks. As I read through the email, it hit me how much I’d learned and the many lessons from this class. For four weeks, I participated in a social media certificate course from a highly regarded Berkeley professor, Tim Peters, in the comfort of my own home. Each evening, I’d dedicate an hour to reviewing the weekly readings and tackling writing assignments.
Now let me tell you, before this class my evenings were spent binge-watching the latest Netflix shows. While Netflix is entertaining, this class taught me the significance and growth that occurs when you decide to challenge yourself and learn something new. Below, I’ve summarized the effective framework I learned to become a better social media connoisseur.
PLATFORM GENRES
Have you ever scrolled through Twitter to see long autobiographies and lengthy essays? No! That’s because Twitter has cultivated its own genre. Twitter is the land of short and concise posts, redefining the power of 140 characters. On the flipside, LinkedIn and Facebook allow users to create descriptive and long posts. As writers, it is our duty to recognize the genre of platforms and preconceived notions that accompany them. Our readers have a “social media ecosystem” and to create meaningful engagement we must critically understand what they will expect to see.
IDENTIFY THE WHY
Whether you’re writing a Q&A, blog post or tweet, it’s vital to fully grasp the purpose of the post. I’ve had it happen all too many times where I’ve written a post and realized that it has three ideas crammed into a few short sentences. Instead, this class taught me to identify the emotions of my audience to fully capture their attention. The end goal is to leave the reader with a clear point of view, action item or opinion. If you’re interested in expanding your knowledge on identifying the why, check out this Ted Talk: Start with Why – How Great Leaders Inspire Action. The presenter, Simon Sinek, is a motivational speaker and best-selling author with five published books.
DUTY TO THE AUDIENCE
A simple yet commonly overlooked piece of advice is to know your audience. If you misunderstand your audience, you immediately lose your chance to engage with them. Without their engagement, social media has no power. Our job as writers is to put ourselves in the reader’s shoes and figure out how to persuade or instigate action through the messages we convey in a post. Focus your energy and writing on the knowledge and awareness you have about the audience and what content you believe they will reasonably engage with online.
Finishing this course made me realize that crafting strong, persuasive, and empathic social media posts accelerate any brand. Each post should follow these guidelines to persuade and create significant connections to target audiences. Next time you write a post, apply these lessons to create a strong post that can initiate action or persuasion.