How To Market With Social Media - What I Learned

Ok, so that really isn't me but that is what it felt like when I was trying to use the various social medias. I had no idea how to market with social media and didn't even know where to start.

Looking through some of the recent blog posts, it seems like Instagram is becoming more popular. This means I want to share what I have learned...

Reached My Breaking Point

Right around week 3 of my journey I had reached a point of frustration that I was having difficulty overcoming. Here is the honest truth about my "plan" going into social media:

• Facebook - Add family and friends that would apply to my niche and hope they can spread the word and help me gain followers.
• Pinterest - Just start pinning my blog posts and hope they wind up somewhere. Since I don't have Google+, I was using Pinterest in a similar way.
• Twitter - I followed some local breweries that would apply to my niche so I could re-tweet and see what happened. Really, I had no clue, but this seemed like the best way to get out there.

So I focused my time on Twitter. I tend not be someone who uses a lot of words so 200 or so characters was perfect. So here is what I was able to accomplish in my first two weeks on Twitter:

• 15 Tweets
• 29 Engagements
• 2 Follows
• 0 Re-tweets
• 7 Likes

I was ready to retire...

Then A Savior

In response to my blog, John added a comment...scroll to the end. He mentioned that a tweet lives for about 20 minutes.

That got me thinking about my posts late at night when most of America (my target audience) is sleeping. So what was I to do?

I kept reading his comment. He mentioned about a social media course he had taken (again, paraphrasing) and how he learned about Buffer. He also covers it a little here if you want a little more.

A quick detour on this journey to learning social media...

What Is Buffer?

Their website claims they are a "Social Media Management Platform". Here is a capture of the results of a Google search.

So what does that mean exactly? That means if you are doing Wealthy Affiliate on the side while working full time you can still be active in social media.

How do they do it? They give you the opportunity to schedule posts. I haven't yet figured out how to add polls, but I can send out tweets and links to my blog any time of the day.

What can I use it with? Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are free. Pinterest requires an upgrade to Premium and I haven't gone there yet (but may).

How Does the Story End?

Well, it has only been four days and I have only been using it for Twitter. So what did I see? More interaction on my tweets!

• I averaged about one like per tweet (I know, low but better than the 0.5 from earlier).
• My impressions jumped up to over 100 each tweet during the day (as opposed to 40 or 50)
• I gained 3 followers...baby steps

The numbers may not jump off the page, but it is making me seem more active. It is easy to re-tweet something during the day. But writing a well thought-out tweet takes time.

Buffer allows me to plan my tweets and schedule when they send. If you are trying to get yourself out there on social media, it is a free program to try to boost your participation.