From San Francisco to London, one of the biggest problem companies face is how to produce quality content. More precisely, they are seeking to create content that stands out on social media. Content that is authentic, engaging, and unique. There is only one problem. Most businesses don’t know what this content actually looks like. To find out more, I went and asked David Schneider - director, actor, writer, and creative director of the social media agency That Lot – to share his wisdom on content creation in 2017.
1. Buying content from influencers VS hiring a social media agency
Interestingly, influencer marketing seems to be shifting to a new point, at which an influencer is to create quality content for a brand, without having to post it on her or his own profile. It’s a win-win situation. On the one hand, the influencer doesn’t have to clog her or his feed with sponsored posts. On the other hand, the brand now has Instagram-ready content at its fingertips. Influencers already have a lot of industry experience. They know how to connect and engage with their community. If the brand’s target group is the same, even better, as the label can simply pay the influencer for the content, and is ready to use the content on its respective social media platforms. There’s no need to hire a social media manager or an agency. Finally, since saving money while gaining awareness is a priority for most startups or recently launched businesses, this is an ideal way to go about it.
Naturally, this is not applicable to every brand. The importance of social media agencies is not to be forgotten. An agency’s level of experience and industry know-how can be priceless; especially when one considers the limited amount of time most businesses leave to focus on their social media output. Combine this with an always-changing algorithm, and hiring an agency, such as That Lot, sounds like a fabulous idea. Nevertheless, if you are someone who just started a business, I would highly recommend you to work with micro-influencers and having them create your content.
2. Dare to be intuitive!
Given David’s tremendous experience in content creation, it was fascinating to have a conversation with someone like him. He is not only super active on Twitter with close to 280K followers, but also runs an award-winning social media agency, with clients like Channel 4 or Nando’s, all the while he is writing scripts for this TV career.
Now, the question I’ve been pondering on is “How does someone become a talented content creator?” Surely, it’s more than genes. Experience in many other fields and the ability to combine your knowledge is also essential. “For me it’s like taking all the stuff that I learned in TV and film, and being so rigorous and disciplined with social media, to the point that it drives people mad at times”, David says. In contrast, he admits that he is extremely intuitive, but he’s learnt that it’s not enough to just say “It’s better that way. Trust me”. As he says: “Explaining my intuition is one of the things I had to learn throughout these past years.”
3. Analyze your date! Every. Time.
We’ve already learned about the importance of data analysis from the superstar bloggers, the Beganovic sisters, in one of my previous posts. David concurs, “I am not going to put out a tweet in the middle of the night. You simply wouldn’t do this. You need to know when to put it out. Creating great content is a fine balance between intuition and data.”
Once you have a community behind you, you can easily test out what kind of content works, and master your game over time. You will get to know the words, the tone, and the kind of imagery that lands you the most engagement; whether this is a re-tweet, a click to a link, a share, or a comment.
As a blogger myself, that’s something I had to learn early on. You need to know what kind of content your community wants and loves and you should share exactly that. “Sometimes you think what you’ve done is brilliant and it deserves an Oscar for social media, but there are just 2 likes, with one of them probably being from your mom. At other times, it’s just something I just throw out there, and it goes viral. Great content gets the results. Nevertheless, good things don’t always go to plan, but I am still proud of them”, says David. This is a point I can relate to very well. If blogging is your profession, I don’t recommend to play with it. At the end of the day, stats count.
4. Live and Breathe Your Topic
The work World Surf League puts out is one of my favorite examples of quality content with huge reach, despite the lack of Facebook ads. Do you remember the article I wrote about them? For me the biggest lesson from them is that you are more likely to create engaging content if you are truly enthusiastic about your topic. And that’s the point; most social media managers lack passion and/or knowledge about the matter. WSL lives and breathes surfing. It’s what they do best and that’s what shines through their content.
“A real essence of a good creative is his or her enjoyment. If you are not having fun with whatever you are doing, you won’t go anywhere.” David is the kind of person who is wholehearted and always eager to learn and create more, which makes the success of his social media agency not very surprising at all.
5. Learn How to Trick Yourself
As with everything, there are times you feel stuck. Times, during which you feel unable to write more. The idea just won’t come. Can you relate? “If you run a regular blog, you feel pressure. Over the years, I did a lot of newspaper columns. As soon as I finished my work for the week, I would already feel pressured about what to write the following week.” It’s good to know that I am not alone, David! Even though there is no boss giving me deadlines, I still manage to create this pressure as an entrepreneur. On the flip side, I have never experienced writer’s block. I don’t believe in that, because I am passionate about putting out my story. I have never questioned what I write. Instead, I learned to put it out and let it go.
I do have to admit, that, when ‘writing five interviews’ is on my list, I would much rather procrastinate and forget about them though. David can relate to this, too; “There are those certain times when you have to write something, like a sitcom script, and you get writer’s block. Either I know how to get around it or I must get up for a walk, even if it’s just to make a cup of tea. I sort of trick myself not to think about anything, and so the ideas will come by themselves. Over the years, I learnt how to trick myself.” This might be one of the best secrets to creating great quality content. Let’s all try to trick our brain a bit more, shall we?
6. Struck a chord
At last, once you publish something, do not let the negative comments ruin your attitude. I know, it’s easy to say, but when I asked Mashable’s writer, Raymond Wong, about it, he said “All comments are good comments. It means you wrote or produced something that struck a chord with your followership. You got them thinking. Whether it’s a good or a bad thing, at least they engaged enough to respond. You are one person who is writing something and you are letting the entire world read it. How can you win? There is no way to appeal to and please everyone, so stop trying to. Produce content you are proud of and put it out there.” By the way, Raymond occasionally has five million views on his videos as well as hundreds of thousands of followers on his Facebook live. He made his point so perfectly clear. To stand out on social media, struck a chord with your community, and let your voice be heard.
David is confident about striking a chord, too, “Twitter is horrible in some way. I get a lot of negative feedback, because my content is quite political. But there’s always loveliness. For instance, there was this one time when 6ooo people took the time to contribute their opinion to a poll. It’s a wonderful sense of community as well.”
Let me guess what you are thinking right now. How about “Where should I possibly start?!” If I was Gary Vaynerchuk, I would tell you to go and put your voice on as many platforms as possible. But, you know what? I am not Gary, and I don’t agree with that. For example, I personally wouldn’t feel comfortable going on Snapchat. Why wouldn’t I do that? Because it doesn’t come natural to me and my followers would see that. Say no to creating unnecessary stress for yourself. Even David agrees on this argument; “Not every platform is for everyone.” To finish off, I will quote the social media guru once more. “You must enjoy it.” With that in mind, go and look around, test and learn. And once you know what works for you, do more of that.