Upon initial research, you may be left scratching your head at all the different types of digital marketing strategies. You may be familiar with the popular term SEO, but now you’re asking yourself: what are all these other acronyms? PPC? SERP? SEM?

Creating and applying a marketing strategy to your site can be very overwhelming, especially if you’re not very familiar with the different types of strategies out there.

The truth is, there’s usually more than one way to achieve your goal for your website. However, the trick to success is knowing the key advantages of each marketing method and applying them strategically in order to generate the best results. 

In this article, we’ll look at 4 main marketing tactics: SEO, SEM, SMM, and SMO. You’ll gain a better understanding of how to apply each one, and which strategies are best for you to implement for your website.

At-a-glance map of the digital marketing landscape (channels and uses)

SEO: Search Engine Optimization

SEO is the act of optimizing the content on your website specifically for search engines, like Google, in order to rank as highly on SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). Sounds simple, right? Well, it’s not entirely as easy as it sounds, but it’s also not impossible.

There are so many different things you can do on your website to ensure it is optimized for search engines. Depending on who you ask, you’ll likely get different instructions on what to do in order to improve your site’s SEO. 

While you can get very technical with SEO, there are a few directions you can take to ensure your content is optimized and your website is ready to be ranked.

The most important thing to remember when looking for ways to optimize your website is that fresh, original content trumps everything else. You may have heard about the keyword stuffing approach, where a specific word would be written into a piece of content over and over again.

While this strategy may have worked once upon a time, it’s no longer the way to go. Keyword stuffing makes your content sound unnatural and forced, and you’ll actually get penalized by Google for doing this. The best approach is to create well-written content that is easily digestible by readers and search engines.

Pointers for creating legible content for search engines:

• Make sure your headline or title is memorable. You might want to use your title to ask a question or make a statement that will grab a reader’s attention.
• Use a determined amount of diverse keywords. Select a couple of short phrases of a few words each to try and work into your text a few times, but don’t overdo it.
• The structure is important. You want readers, and search engines, to be able to skim an article in order to find the most pertinent information. As a rule of thumb, it’s ideal to keep sentences and paragraphs short and adding subheaders for different sections.
• Use your images wisely. Images can also be helpful for SEO. Make sure you add ones that make sense for the content, even better if they’re original. You should also add alt text (or alt tag) to each image as a sort of image description, and try and include a keyword there as well.

There are so many things you can do to optimize your content, but the above suggestions are a good place to start if you’re new to SEO.

Building high-quality links for SEO

You can add both internal links (other pages on your website) and external links (leading to other websites). When using internal links, make sure they’re relevant to the content you’re linking from. For external links, you want to be sure you’re linking to other well-ranking, reputable websites. Additionally, if you’re linking to another article, make sure it’s relevant and recent.

SEM: Search Engine Marketing

Many people think that SEO and SEM are one and the same, but that’s a false assumption. SEO focuses on organic traffic, whereas SEM is more focused on paid traffic and advertisements.

Search engine marketing is when you use paid online advertisements on search engines in order to direct people to your page. You’d likely turn to paid advertising platforms, such as Google Adwords or Bing Ads.

In order to rank with paid ads, advertisers will bid on certain keywords that people might search for. The winning bidder’s ad will then appear on the top of the SERP, making their website highly visible. The whole process of bidding on ads is done automatically by setting specific spending parameters.

The ads often go by the term PPC, pay-per-click, since that’s exactly what’s happening. Advertisers pay when their ads are clicked on.

Like SEO, keywords are very important to SEM, perhaps even more. Since advertisers spend money on each ad, it’s necessary to ensure that the keywords in those ads are exactly what people are searching for. Otherwise, you’re spending money on ads that likely won’t convert into clicks or sales. Many SEM marketers rely on keyword tools in order to accurately research the best keywords to use.

SEM can be a good strategy if you have products that you’re selling and you want buyers to be aware of your product. Often, users who are searching online for specific products are ready to buy, so spending the extra money on PPC ads can be worth the investment.

SMO: Social Media Optimization

If you are putting a lot of effort into your social channels, you want to make sure they’re optimized for your goals.

Social media optimization aims to increase awareness of a specific product, event, or brand using various social channels. This can be done on a number of different social sites, like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Pinterest, among others. The ones you choose will depend on the nature of your business and what you’re trying to achieve.

With SMO, your goal is to develop your social media accounts to a high level so that users are attracted to your content. Ideally, you want social media users to share your content and interact with it, whether that means becoming a dedicated follower, a recurring client, or simply leading them to visit their website.

There are tons of ways social media can positively impact your business’s overall marketing strategy. If you’re not sure how or where to begin, check out our guide on how to use social media to grow your business.

SMM: Social Media Marketing

SMM follows a similar pattern to the marketing strategies we’ve already seen. It uses techniques from SMO with the main difference being that ads are created for a paid campaign. 

Whereas SMO is primarily used to foster long-term brand awareness and connect with audiences on a multitude of social platforms, marketers mainly use Social media marketing i.e. SMM to create ads to promote something very specific.

For example, you might pay to run a campaign on Instagram where users will see paid ads in their feeds of a product you’re trying to sell. Or, you can run a similar paid campaign on Facebook where users will see an ad that leads them to your website or a landing page.

The end goal depends on your business and what you aim to achieve, but the means are similar to SEM in that SMM uses precise, targeted paid ads to reach a specific audience.

Paid vs Organic Traffic

If you’re pitting SEO vs SMM or SMO vs SMM, you’re bound to get varied results. The truth is, there isn’t one answer to which method is best. 

The organic traffic you get with SEO and SMO can really grow your business and allow you to reach a wider audience. On the other hand, SEM and SMO offer much quicker results that can be instantly quantified.

SEO and SMO are made for the long term. These strategies require an investment of your time. They also require regular attention in the form of quality content, whether it’s an engaging Instagram post every day, or posting an informative article on your website once a week. It can take months, or even years, to see success from SEO and SMO, so it takes a lot of diligence and patience on your part. However, the success you see will likely not fade as you’ve built a strong foundation of solid, regular, and reliable content that your audience now depends on.

SEM and SMO are best for short-term goals. For example, if you have a new product you’re trying to promote and sell as quickly as possible, paid advertisements can be a great way to get your product seen by the largest amount of people. However, it’s important to keep your budget in mind. You can increase ad spending when you have a special promotion, but a high ad budget likely isn’t sustainable in the long run.

It’s also important to consider the difference in the leads you tend to get from each strategy. Paid traffic isn’t necessarily as high-quality as organic traffic. Users that come from organic traffic are generally more meticulous in their search, whereas users from paid traffic want immediate answers. Either way, you need to make sure your website and social accounts are set up to the needs of both paid and organic traffic.

Which Marketing Strategy Is Best For Your Business?

A lot of business owners will debate the effectiveness of specific strategies. They’ll weigh the costs of SEM against the long-term commitment of SEO, and then ultimately settle on one option.

However, the best marketing strategies use a combination of two or more of these methods. SEO and SMO will take a lot more time to develop, as they require regular creation of relevant content, while SEM and SMM involve paid traffic. The best one for your business depends on your goals and requirements.

Questions to ask yourself before investing your time and money into one strategy:

• What is my budget for marketing? 
• Do I have the time and resources to dedicate to long-term marketing plans for SEO and SMO?
• Am I trying to achieve success on a short-term campaign, or do I want to create a long-term marketing plan?

Once you’ve answered these questions, you’ll have a better idea of which direction you should go in.

Though SEO and SMO don’t specifically use paid advertising, that’s not to say that you don’t have to spend money on them. Many small businesses don’t have the resources or know-how to create effective content, so they are left to hire a new employee, turn to outside consultants, or use paid SEO software.

It’s important to weigh the costs of hiring someone to optimize your content organically. Paid ads can add up quickly, so it might be more budget-friendly to hire someone to take care of your social media channels and digital content.

The post What’s the difference between SEO, SEM, SMM, and SMO? appeared first on WiseStamp.

When someone is looking for a product or service they are most likely to search online than to open a phone book. Do those even exist anymore?

That’s why it’s important for you to make it as easy as possible for potential clients to find you. In order to make that happen, you need to actively promote your SMB online.

1. Develop Your Personal Brand

According to a study by LexisNexis and Martindale-Hubbell. 85% of law firms find that the majority of traffic to their website is directed at their lawyers’ bio pages.

That’s because your potential clients are looking to hire a lawyer, not a firm. They want to see who these lawyers are as individuals. Only then they will actually pick up the phone to give you a call.

This means that each lawyer in your firm should take steps to actively promote their personal brand online. This will help them come across as more than just a generic picture on a company website.

Improved bio’s:

Since the bio pages are generally where visitors to your website head to first you want to make sure that they are as informative and engaging as possible. Have each employee fill out their own bio’s that include all of the following information:

• Past work experience, licenses, and other credentials.
• Relevant keywords, for SEO rankings.
• A professional photo.
• Links to publications and social channels.
• A clear call-to-action that lets visitors know what you want them to do.

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Linkedin profiles:

Linkedin is a business-oriented social platform for networking with other industry professionals and each employee at your company should have an account here.

To ensure that your employees get the full benefit from their Linkedin accounts, they should do the following:

• Complete all details of their Linkedin Profile, including work history.
• Write an engaging description of themselves and the services they provide.
• Upload a professional profile picture.
• Join groups related to the industry and participate in discussions with other group members.

2. Generate Content

One way to get prospective clients to visit your website is by offering them valuable content.

This will help draw people to your website and keep them engaged. It will establish your business as an expert that will increase brand awareness.

You can use a tool like BuzzSumo to find out topics that are popular online. Then create a post on legal aspects of the subject.

Creating a publishing schedule is a good idea. This will help you plan posts in advance. Select topics to write about that are relevant for particular times of the year.

3. Get Social With It

In addition, to encouraging your workers to become active on social media. It’s a good idea for the company as a whole to have accounts. On the most popular social media platforms: Linkedin, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.

Social media is a great way to connect online with potential clients and other industry professionals. It’s a very effective way of sharing articles on your website.

Linkedin:

Create a company page, fill out the profile, and add an attractive banner and logo. Encourage all of your employees to follow the page. Make sure to update your page regularly with articles from your website. It should be interesting news and current company updates.

Twitter:

Create an account and begin following clients, other alliances, and professional influencers. Twitter is a great place for networking in real-time and for learning about your competitors.

Facebook:

Create a Facebook business page for your company. Send a one-time email to your business contacts and friends inviting them to like it. Here you can share links to articles on your website and introduce topics for discussion to engage visitors to your page.

4. Set up Email Signature Marketing

With email signature marketing every email that you send is an opportunity to market your services, which is why it’s crucial to optimize all aspects of your email. One way of doing this is by including a signature that has your contact information, but you should consider going beyond that. Try adding a call to action and social icons linking to your social accounts.

Use email signature management to design a professional and attractive email signature that includes all of the information that you need to promote yourself and your business.

With the WiseStamp Signature Manager, you also get full control over all of your employees’ email signatures so that you can ensure that they are all in line with your brand, and even update them all at the same time with your newest blog post or promotional material.

5. Advertise Online:

• Adword campaigns: Google AdWords are a great way to get your small business prominently listed in Google search results.
  
• Facebook ads: Since many of your prospects are probably spending some part of their day on Facebook. Facebook ads are a great way to reach them. There are several different types of ads, so take a look at the options and decide which you think would be meet your needs.

6. Create Videos

Youtube is the second large search engine and it’s owned by Google, which means videos receive attention from Google searches. That’s why it’s a good idea to invest in creating a few videos that can be posted on your website and shared on Youtube.

Have your content creator create a series of videos addressing different topics within their specialty.
Videos can feature your company discussing various situations in which have assisted clients or they may answer some of the commonly asked questions that you receive. Videos will help potential clients feel more connected to your firm.

7. Optimize Your Website for lead conversion

If visitors to your website are coming by to browse and then leaving, you need to make some changes. to your site that will convert these visitors to leads.

Call to Action

Add a clear call to action to each page of your website, all of your ads, articles, and marketing material. This lets visitors to your site know exactly what it is that you want them to do, which probably involves clicking a Contact Us button that will open up a form where the visitor can fill in their contact information.

Live Chat

Many law firms have found that adding a Live Chat feature to their website encouraged visitors to contact the firm with questions. More so than providing an email address or contact form. This is probably because a live chat feels more casual than sending an email or making a phone call and also offers instant gratification.

Mobile-friendliness

Make sure that your website can be accessed on all mobile devices. Since a large number of your visitors will probably be using their phones or tablets to access your site.

8. Get listed in local directories

Make sure that your SMB is listed in all of the local business and industry directories. It’s important to find the most common directories on the web and list your business.

For example, if you are a law firm, below are some of the most popular industry directories that you should be listed in.

Popular industry directories:

• HG.Org legal directory
• FindLaw
• Lawyers.com
• LawInfo
• Yahoo Directory

9. Participate In Local Events.

Getting involved in local events can be a great way to promote yourself both on and offline. If you host a seminar or sponsor the local softball team, there are sure to be participants taking pictures and posting them to Facebook and Instagram.

When this happens make sure that your company’s page is tagged in the pictures. You can request from the poster to include a link to your website as well.

10. Monitor Your Online Reputation

Sign up for a service that alerts you whenever your company is mentioned online. You can set up alerts for your company name when your name comes up in an online discussion or in a review, you will be notified.

Then decide if you would like to respond to the comment. Offering an appreciative “thank you” to a client who’s praising your services, or defending yourself if you come under criticism. Try Talkwalker, which is a free social media monitoring tool that will let you know when your company name is mentioned online.

11. Track the results of your online marketing activities

Now, you have gone to all of this effort to bring more traffic to your website, it’s time to see if any of your marketing activities have worked. One of the best ways to do this is by using Google Analytics to track your website’s visitors to see where they are coming from, how they found you, and what are they doing on your website.

Once you have this information you can see if your online marketing activities are working and which areas might need some tweaking. Each social network offers its own set of analytic tools that will allow you to measure the results of your activities on those specific platforms.

By following these 11 guidelines you can stay ahead of your competitors and stay on track. By Promoting your law firm online you will soon see a definitive rise in your website’s traffic.

Stayed tuned for next week’s blog post, we will continue to share our latest updates on how to promote your business in the marketing world.

The post 11 ways to promote your law firm online appeared first on WiseStamp.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed professional, small business owner, or entrepreneur, there are many different ‘yous’ that take part in your day-to-day. Likewise, you are also emailing with different types of contacts all the time: new leads, existing customers, partners, and many more.

You might be doing it with full intent or subconsciously – but you are using different tones to give yourself the best chance of winning your next task. And your email signature should represent that. Here are a few tips on how you can change your signature based on your specific email agenda.  

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1. Marketing email signature

Improve email response rate and generate more link clicks.

You can drive better email conversions with email signature marketing. This simply means arming your email signature with the marketing arsenal needed to generate conversions.

Practically this means adding a banner, a video, social media links, a CTA button, etc., and customizing the call-to-action. Update it as often as needed! See how the signature example below drives conversions with the “newsletter” call-to-action!

Whether you’re selling a product or providing a service, you are going for the almighty “conversion.” A conversion is when a prospect or customer takes the specific call-to-action that you directed them to. For example, “Join our newsletter,” “Register for our webinar,” “Download our app,” “Download our e-book.”

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2. Sales email signature

Turn your email signature into a mini-landing page with your sales offering.

Much like obtaining a new client, landing sales is what keeps us all in business. WiseStamp has made it easy to showcase your products while maintaining the feel of a professional email signature. You can use our Showcase my eBay/Etsy Store apps for immediate access to your recent products, with dazzling product pictures.

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We also recommend adding a banner image of your best-selling product. This will display as a large picture under your signature, and can be hyperlinked directly to your e-store, product page, checkout page, or wherever in the sales funnel you prefer.

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3. Branded signature

Keep yourself or your company top of mind and get reviews.

After the sale has been made, we all need to make sure to maintain our relationship with clients and to make sure they feel they’re getting the level of service they deserve.

During your nurture campaign, Customer Success, and Customer Support communication you can keep your brand top of mind with a beautiful branded email signature.

You can also make sure to leverage the good experience you provide your customers by asking them to rate or give us feedback. This will maintain professionalism not only in your email signature but in your level of support as well.

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4. Support email signature

The first rule of customer support is making it as easy as possible for your clients to contact you. The second rule is creating trust. A support email signature does both elegantly for you.

It should have your headshot image to let the client feel they are speaking to a person and not an organization, or god forbid an automated system.

It should also have all the necessary information to contact you or your team in their preferred channel (phone, email, contact form, chat, etc.). You’d want to include a clickable phone number, your website link, an icon leading to your chat app, your email address and of course a big and clear “contact us” banner. You can provide all this easily with our email signature manager.

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5. Job hunting email signature

Make a professional impression during your job application process.

We’ve all been there, sending out emails with portfolios and convincing letters as to why we should be the chosen one. No matter the position or line of work, you always want your email to stand out, and your WiseStamp email signature will help you do that.  

If your work is visual, use the Instagram app to showcase your latest content. You can also choose from a variety of LinkedIn badges so that the hiring manager can check out your profile with a click! The signature example below uses both the Instagram app and LinkedIn social icon, which is an ideal way to get hiring managers to explore more about you beyond your CV.

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6. Personal (non-work) email signature

After all, is said and done and your workday is over, there are always emails from friends and family to attend to. And when it comes to your personal network, you don’t want to wear your business “hat” (or your business signature). So, that’s why we recommend creating a “personal” signature.

This is a signature that can display what’s going on in your personal life, so you can connect your personal social media pages with the social icons so that your personal contacts can keep up with your day-to-day life even if they are not a direct part of it.

Final Thoughts

We all wear many different hats throughout our business day, and just like we don the proper apparel for each role, we should also dress our emails to correspond with the different hats. Whether it’s to pitch a sale or set up a meeting with an existing client, there is always a good reason to include a professional email signature that matches the tone of your email.

The post Why you need multiple email signatures appeared first on WiseStamp.

Reddit is known as the place to go to tell your tale if you’ve published a book, starred in a movie, or orbited Earth in a space station. But on a higher level, Reddit is a place to share deep thoughts, experiences, and expertise. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a subject that doesn’t have a Reddit community, or subreddit, dedicated to it.

This article will lay down the fundamentals of an effective Reddit marketing strategy.

This article is divided into 2 sections, both of which contain information vitally important to your success as a champion Reddit content marketer.

• Part 1 – 3 secrets for success in using reddit for marketing
• Part 2 – Step-by-step instructions for getting your Reddit account up and running.

So let’s get started!

3 secrets for success in using reddit for marketing

Unfortunately, most marketers fail on Reddit because they don’t take the time to learn how Reddit works, or understand the users who populate and power the platform. 

Unlike many other social networks, where you can create an account and figure things out as you go along, in Reddit you either sink or swim. That’s why it’s important to do your research and learn the rules before you become active on the site.

1. Be Genuine

It sounds kind of hokey, but it’s true. If you want Redditors to believe that the content you share is worth reading, or the product you recommend is worth trying out, they need to trust you. And in order for that trust to develop you need to just be yourself.

Join subreddits that interest you and participate in conversations about your hobbies. Talk about books, movies, your favorite vacation spots, or your newest phone apps. Let your fellow Redditors get to know you as a person and become a part of the community.

If you do this regularly, when other users visit your profile to learn more about you (which they will do) they will be greeted with a list of interesting comments and contributions from your history, which will help give you authority and prove that you are active on the site.

Bandholz is the founder of Beardbrand and these are the results that I see when I click on his username. It looks he’s a pretty active member who often shares valuable content.

2. Become one with Reddit

To really succeed on Reddit you have to become a Redditor yourself.

You want to understand how Redditors think and communicate so that you can interact in the same manner and share content that will be well received. So before you create your Reddit account, just spend some time on the site visiting the different subreddits and reading the submissions and comments.

You will notice that many Redditors have a certain sense of humor and sometimes the comments themselves will take on a life of their own. If you can adopt this style you will do very well here.

A word of warning: While it’s helpful to mimic the funny and irreverent style of commenting that’s popular on Reddit, don’t forget that you are here as a professional. This means that you need to be more restrained in your conversation than the average Redditor. So stay classy and don’t say or share anything that you wouldn’t want your boss or clients to read.

What kind of content do Redditors like to read and share?

Well, take a look:

Top 4 Reddit posts of all time

#1

#3

#4

#5

Redditors enjoy sharing content that entertains, educates or kicks off a good discussion, so be creative and see if you can find ways to present your content in a way that will appeal to the Reddit community.

3. Provide value

If all you do is share links to your website or try to make your product the topic of every conversation, you will pretty quickly make a bad name for yourself. This can lead to all of your contributions being downvoted, and you may even be outed as a spammer by other Redditors. In order to avoid this from happening you need to ensure that everything you share on the site will provide value to your fellow Redditors.

key activities for building relationships and creating trust:

1. Offer tips and advice on topics that you are knowledgeable about, without asking for anything in return.
2. Share links to interesting articles that aren’t your own.
3. Share detailed information about how your business achieved successful results in various activities. Beardbrand gained Redditors respect by sharing a post on r/Entrepreneur detailing how they built their brand and the resulting profits.

And now, young grasshopper, you are ready to begin your Reddit journey.

How to start content marketing on Reddit (step-by-step)

Reddit happens to be my favorite social media platform and I love sharing with other marketers (or anyone that will listen, really) the various tips and tricks that I’ve picked up throughout my years as a Redditor. If you’ll listen, I’d love to share some tips I’ve seen work time and again.

1. Open an account and pick a username

Choose your username wisely because once created it can’t be changed. It’s a good idea to pick a playful name that reflects you or your business, but without giving away the fact that you’re here as a marketer. You can simply use your own name or initials but you’ll score more points from your fellow Redditors if you show some creativity. 

If you are running a paid ad campaign then using your company name is acceptable because you are openly representing your brand. Some examples of this are XboxModerator and redbullESPORTS. Feeling uninspired? Try this username generator.

2. Join subreddits

When you create a Reddit account you are automatically added to 50 default subreddits, which you can view here. Go through the list to see what’s there, unsubscribing to any groups that don’t interest you or aren’t relevant to the audience that you want to reach.

You can also take a look in your sidebar for a list of all the subreddits that you are subscribed to. The content from these subreddits will show up on the front page of your Reddit account.

Next, start joining subreddits based on topics that do interest you. A good place to start is by doing a search. Do you like food and cooking? Search for “cooking. ” The results will show you subreddits about cooking, food, and various diets, as well as discussions about cooking that have taken place in the past.

Pay attention to which subreddits those discussions took place in since it may give you ideas of other relevant groups that you can join.

To view discussions and links shared on all of the subreddits, click the “All” button at the top of your page. This is a good way to discover new subreddits that may interest you.

If you’re in an experimental mood, try clicking on the “Random” button in the navigation bar. Do this is a few times and you will likely discover a whole world of subreddits that you would never have thought to look for. (Disclaimer: I accept no responsibility for where you may end up. But enjoy the ride.) 

The 10 most popular subreddits at this time:

• /r/AskReddit 
• /r/funny
• /r/todayilearned
• /r/pics
• /r/announcements
• /r/worldnews
• /r/science
• /r/IAmA
• /r/videos

3. Start socializing

There are four main interactions that you can take part in on Reddit:

1. submitting a link or text comment
2. commenting as a response to someone else’s submission to a text comment
3. upvoting
4. downvoting

Participating in these activities will not only help you integrate into the Reddit community but they will also gain you points, or “karma.” The more karma you have the better your standings.

Commenting:

to leave a comment simply enter a subreddit and look through the discussions there to find one that you feel you can contribute to. If someone likes your comment then they may click on the up arrow by your comment, thereby upvoting you and gaining you some comment karma.

Submissions:

your ultimate goal may be to submit articles from your own website or blog but for now, limit yourself to sharing content from other sources. Begin by reading the reddiquette so that you are familiar with the basic guidelines for participating on Reddit. Each subreddit also has its own set of rules for posting and basic etiquette, which you should read as well. These can be found in the sidebar.

Next, take a look at the content other members are sharing so that you can get an idea of the type of articles or links that are appreciated here. 

If your submission is well-liked then it will get upvoted, gaining you Link Karma. If it gets enough upvotes it may make it to the Front Page, where it will receive more views and will likely be shared on other social media platforms.

If you’re a regular reader of Mashable you will probably notice that many of the news items that they share are originally from Reddit. 

In addition to sharing links, you can also create a text submission, which means you would actually need to write some content in a provided text box, in order to generate a discussion or share information.

Some subreddits will only let you share these types of submissions, though this can be an excellent way to showcase your expertise on a subject and lead readers back to your website where they can find more information of value to them.

3. Upvoting/Downvoting:

When you see a comment or submission that you like or agree with, give it some love and upvote it. This will give the submitter some much-appreciated karma.

On the other hand, if you come across a submission or comment that you disagree with, or which you feel is not appropriate for the subreddit, you can go ahead and downvote it. Don’t go overboard with your downvoting though, because nobody likes a troll.

4. Grow your karma

It takes a bit of time to build up a nice amount of karma, and once you become familiar with Reddit you will probably discover your own tricks for growing your stash.

This particular Reddit strategy is one that I use often to grow my comment karma:

1. Pick a popular subreddit that covers a subject that you are knowledgeable about, or which covers a variety of topics. Subreddits like AskReddit or TodayILearned are good options.
2. Go into the subreddit and click on the “Rising” button in the group’s navigation bar. This will show you the recent posts that are gaining traction but aren’t yet overwhelmed with comments.
3. Pick a question that you feel qualified to answer and leave a comment.
4. Upvote the question to help it become more popular
5. Check back later to see how this post is doing. If it does become popular then your comment on it will have been noticed by everyone who came afterward, making it likely to be upvoted (or maybe downvoted, but that’s a risk you have to take).

Another option is to submit your original question or comment to one of these popular groups and if it gains traction, go back a short time later and leave a comment. This way you will gain both comment karma and link karma if your post does well.

Now go off and make some Reddit magic!

The post Reddit marketing strategy: how to use Reddit for content marketing appeared first on WiseStamp.

Even before the dawn of the Apple watch and glance media, content marketers have been looking for ways to get their audience’s attention in the quickest way possible. Perhaps one of the most significant learnings was to make everything image-centric (because our dominant sense is sight).

Don’t say it, show it. The thing is, there’s a whole load of visual content out there, and figuring out how to make your content shareable is like finding the holy grail. Fortunately, high shareability may be legendary but it’s not fictional. Check out these tips and tricks to raise your content’s shareability by notches.

1. Secret formula: 80% image, 20% text

Think of online content as a billboard. The content needs to be able to make sense and impact in a very short amount of time—about 3 seconds.

First off because a lot of elements are competing for attention and second because your readers are always zooming past in a hurry. Getting your audience’s attention would be difficult if you block their vision with a wall of text.

The image would need to dominate the content at 80% with the copy at 20%. Take a look at Kohl’s Yes2You Rewards posting.

What the readers see first is the visuals, followed by the supporting copy, and then the branding. These elements work together in that order—grabbing their attention first with the photo and intriguing them further with the ambiguous but relatable copy—to make the reader pause, consider, and be led to the explanation in the post caption.

Your content needs to be presented in such a way that people are able to discern whether your content is something they would want to read more of.

2. Use super high-quality photos

Aside from the fact that absolutely nobody wants to share shoddy, pixelized images, good-quality photos contribute to your credibility. High-quality images mean you are a primary source of content or you have a reputable source. High-quality images mean all the details on your post are visible for your audience’s full appreciation.

Second, it makes for maximum impact. Can you imagine the above picture of boxer Manny Pacquiao without the gritty details and the clear-eyed stare? It won’t have the same force and mood—without which their network of athletes won’t be able to connect with the image and, ultimately, be compelled to hit the share button.

3. Apply a striking color palette

This goes hand in hand with the first item. Not any ol’ image will do. You need to provide high-quality content with lots of visual appeal. This can sometimes be acquired through the effective use of color.

If you’re looking for color inspiration, try using a color picker to extract the hues from your favorite photograph. This can provide you with a synchronized palette that you may readily apply to your designs or images. Or take the color wheel and use a striking palette of complementary colors, like in the example below.

4. Make it relevant to your audience

Another way to make people care about what you’re posting is to find that intersection between what you’re about and what your market is into. Watch what look they’re into and/or what current event they may be involved in.

It could be something universal like Father’s Day, which you will then intertwine with your brand story. Connect with your market and add an extra dose of meaning to your content.

5. Apply subtle but recognizable branding So you already have a memorable brand. Now you just have to be careful where you tread–there’s a fine blurry line between self-branding and shameless self-promotion. Your order of priority should be user experience (make it meaningful and relevant) and then branding.

Your branding is the visual cue that would link your content to everything you stand for. This trigger could be in the form of color, logo, or iconic imagery. Always have them at arm’s length when designing or posting.

Fine example:

Kinfolk has thoroughly embodied the concept of a slow lifestyle through quiet imagery and color constantly applied throughout all their postings.

6. Optimize your images

If you don’t size your image according to the platform you’re posting on, there’s a chance your followers will see a crucial part of your image. This also reflects on your branding and how your organization cares about the way information is presented.

7. Add a call to action

There are times when you just have to ask. An organization like WWF relies on people’s support and action and subtly asking nicely has done wonders for them. Aside from the actionable, thought-provoking copy, they included the hashtag in their post and added a link-through in their text caption.

Another way to use this technique is to add a linked share button and make it easier for your followers to just click and spread your post.

8. Make it an infographic

There’s also content that’s not quite as simple as announcements or ideas that can be communicated with a single picture and one line of copy. These could also be information that your audience wants to know—were they more accessible? Creating an infographic means providing information that is entertaining and easy to digest. Infographics are so popular because they make tedious-looking figures and data come alive with color and illustrations.

Through infographics, World Vision gives its audience much-needed information about their advocacies and how the reader can help. Infographics take a bit of time to do but the return on investment is awesome.

After all, the more people know, the more they care.

Start designing viral content today

Many factors go into the shareability of any content. Your market, timing, the platform you’re using, and many other factors that nobody can control. However, with just a bit of attention to detail and some visual tweaking, you can create posts that resonate with your audience and ultimately create an impact for your brand.

The post 8 viral content shareability hacks your competition is using appeared first on WiseStamp.