Social Media Marketing News from SMMW16; Twitter Lists, Snapchat Strategy and More

News travels fast and there’s a lot of it out there. It’s easy to miss something relevant and important. Let us help!

This was a big week in social media highlighted by the largest social media event of the year, Social Media Marketing World 16 in San Diego, CA. Below are some of the featured news articles that took place in social media marketing this week. To read the full story, click the headline of each article.

18 Epic Marketing Tips from Social Media Marketing World
By Susan Moeller
Buzzsumo

In the midst of meeting friends old and new, the BuzzSumo team was taking in sessions at Social Media Marketing World in San Diego. Here are 18 key takeaways from this idea-rich event.

Michael Stelzner:
“Live video is hot.”

In his opening keynote, the founder of Social Media Examiner, Michael  Stelzner, said that the growth in video marketing is the biggest surge that he has seen. The conference center was dotted with people filming live video snippets–some casually, others with more professional looking kits. Social Media Examiner led the way–facilitating live video with staging areas and numerous staff wielding smart phones and encouraging conference goers to chat about their experiences at the conference.

Brian Solis
“Experiment constantly.”

People make decisions in micro moments. They don’t have time to read an entire website or watch a video. When you design, you have to design for people with little time. Small incremental changes are important. Iterate, observe, repeat.

Mari Smith
“Facebook live creates video content that you can repurpose–you can download.”

Mari emphasized Facebook’s preference for live video, and suggested several tips for using it. Her reminder that the content could be repurposed for use later was a super suggestion that makes the platform more attractive.

“Facebook reach is highest when you are broadcasting live.”

Facebook wants to be the live television in your pocket, Mari said. Their algorithm incentivizes live broadcasting. When you are broadcasting live, you get better reach. Capitalize on this by broadcasting for at least five or ten minutes, and if possible longer.

8 Twitter Lists You Should Be Using
By Stephanie Nissen
SocialQuant

If you’re not sure what “Twitter Lists” even are, let’s start there. Twitter Lists, as stated by Twitter, are “a curated group of Twitter users.” As a Twitter user you have the ability to create your own lists of users that fit a specific criteria that you choose or to subscribe to a public list created by another user. To see more details on how to create a twitter list visit the support section of Twitter.

So, let’s ask the question, “What Twitter Lists should I make as a business?” I’ve come up with 8 lists that will work in any industry. These lists are going to keep you organized, help you to connect with the people you actually want to see on Twitter, and increase your Twitter effectiveness.

7 Tips for Incorporating Snapchat into Your Marketing Strategy
By Ashley Zeckman
TopRank Marketing

Let’s face it, Snapchat is an application that has many of us scratching our heads and wondering if it’s simply something the “kids are doing these days” or if there is valuable as part of a marketing strategy.

The good news is, Snapchat has faced tremendous growth since launching a couple years ago. In fact, there are an average of 9,000 snaps per second and over 8 billion video views on the platform per day.

So, how fitting that the session I attended about Snapchat Marketing at Social Media Marketing World yesterday started strong with the panelists sending videos of the audience to their respective Snapchat audiences.

In this session, led by Carlos Gil of BMC Software, these brand marketers and Snapchat influencers shared some wisdom on how they use Snapchat to create connections and build engagement.

The panel included Snapchat sensations Shaun McBride and Shaun Ayala (Shaun Squared?), as well as brand marketers Callan Green from L’Oreal and Joel Price of the San Diego Chargers.

These experienced Snapchat experts covered a plethora of tips and best practices for marketers during their session. Below are what I considered to be the top 7 takeaways that both B2C and B2B brands can use to create a more impactful Snapchat marketing strategy.

What Is the Difference Between Content and Content Marketing?
by Michael Brenner
Content Marketing Institute

What is the difference between content and content marketing? The answer is the destination you will use to attract and build an audience.

Content marketing is about attracting an audience to an experience (or “destination”) that you own, build, and optimize to achieve your marketing objectives.

Content is everywhere. There’s product content, sales content, customer-service content, event content, employee-generated content, marketing and campaign content. Even advertising is content.

With content marketing you are attracting an audience to a brand-owned destination versus interrupting or buying an audience on someone else’s platform.

How to Use Facebook for Business: 13 Essential Tips [Infographic]
By Lindsay Kolowich
HubSpot

Facebook is constantly making changes to the design of the profiles — for businesses and individuals alike. They’ve made a few cool changes in the past few years, including adding call-to-action buttons to business Pages and letting you record company milestones, like product launches and events.

There are a lot of ways Facebook is helping brands build a follower base, increase visibility, improve branding, communicate with and engage fans, and even drive traffic and leads.
To learn more about how to use Facebook for business, download our free guide here.

So, what can you do to optimize your brand’s presence on Facebook? Check out the infographic below from Cafe Quill for helpful tips on getting the most from your Facebook business Page.

The Buzzfeed Approach to Social Media Strategy
By Daniel Marks
Moz

I initially started writing a post about how BuzzFeed tailors its content to different social networks. What image sizes do they use? What type of content works on one network but not another? What tactics do they employ? But as it turns out, there isn’t anything that revolutionary in the way BuzzFeed approaches their content on these social networks. There are a few interesting things they do, such as:

Using silent, square videos on Facebook that work well on any device and don’t require sound to be understood.

Posting almost exclusively list-based articles on Twitter.

Aggregating Reddit-type content from elsewhere onto their Instagram feed without much connection to BuzzFeed.

The Quest for Attention: Takeaways from #SMMW16 Day 1
by Jason Miller
LinkedIn

At Social Media Marketing World 2016, the 3,000 marketers in attendance were looking for an edge in the constantly evolving world of social media. Marketers are struggling for new ways to gain the attention of their audiences. Here’s how Gary Vaynerchuk, CEO of Vayner Media, during his session at the event, described this difficult situation: “I spend my time trying to understand attention. I go where the attention is at its height, but the rest of the market underestimates it.”

Marketers are also looking for new ways to gain attention on established platforms as well as on the new entries. Here are 7 takeaways from Day 1 of Social Media Marketing World for marketers hoping to earn more attention and to boost the performance of their social efforts:

This biggest missed opportunity in content is playing it too safe.
It takes guts to create the type of content that’s truly engaging. MarketingProfs and Content Marketing Institute recently released B2B research which revealed that creating engaging content is a top challenge for marketers.

How do we create content that doesn’t feel like marketing? “Bigger, bolder braver content marketing” was the answer Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer of Marketing Profs, proposed in her session about content quality vs. quantity.

Shoving ads into a social construct and calling it social media marketing will no longer suffice. Instead, focusing on a bigger story puts your business in context of what people care about. “Use your bigger story to convert more people into your squad,” Ann said. “Ask yourself, if you covered up your logo, would you recognize you?”

Smart companies don’t follow shifts. They lead. They tell a story with depth and breadth that doesn’t otherwise exist. As marketers, it’s our job to tell bolder stories with richer insights and therefore create better experiences for our audiences.

11 Tools That Will Save You Time with Content Marketing
By Neil Patel
QuickSprout

Quality content marketing takes a lot of time and effort—there’s just no way around it.

But there are, of course, some marketers who accomplish more than others and in less time.

I’d like to see you become one of those efficient content marketers, if you’re not one already.

There are a few ways to become faster, and one of the best is to use tools.

There are a ton of tools out there—some good, some bad. Some save you time, but some may actually cost you time.

I’ve put together a list of 11 tools that I’ve tried at the very least or use on a regular basis.

Instead of having to test out a ton of tools, I hope you can take my word that these are quality tools that will save you time. This, coincidentally, will save you even more time.

Get content ideas, fast

All content marketing begins with content. It’s in the name after all.

As you might know, a content idea can determine the success or failure of the content before you even start.

It’s important to get it right, and it’s a difficult thing to do.

Naturally, it can take a lot of time.

However, you can speed up the process significantly by using the tools in this section.