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Monday, August 3, 2015

Top 5 Blogging and Social Media Tips from #SoFabUOTR in Dallas!

Some members of the TSMRI team headed to Dallas for SoFabU on the Road at the end of May. The members experienced a day packed full of engaging lessons about blogging and social media (and energizing foods). Now it's their turn to share their favorite tips from the day with you.


Tip #1: As a blogger, you need to be a good storyteller and good wordsmith.
Writing is all about your focus, passion, and delivery. Make sure that your delivery is full of details that are specific to what you are discussing. To illustrate this concept, this story helps bring your audience into the kitchen with you when the steaming broccoli comes out of the oven. The way you phrase your posts should have an individual style to it, so that when someone is reading your post, they recognize exactly who wrote the phrase.


Tip #2: Choose consistent imagery and color scheme to define your personal brand.
Your brand should be easily identified in a row of Instagram pictures. If you are an antique collector, maybe your images show tiny details in sepia tones. Maybe you're a mountain climber, your Twitter media should include outside pictures teeming with adventure. Whatever your brand is, be sure it can be told through your imagery. They say a picture is worth a thousand words and you want to tell the right story.


Tip #3: Every video you make should have an arc. 
This "arc" is what keeps your audience watching the video and coming back for more (and subscribing). Know what you want the video to be before you shoot it. No matter your topic, you can create an arc. Doing a travel post? Your arc is chronological. Showing your audience a new recipe? From the ingredients through the process and to having a bite of your dish, you've made an arc. Trying out a new product? Give your first impressions, feature benefit examples, and then your final verdict. Follow the concept you planned beforehand and your video creation will be "in the bag."


Tip #4: Your social media should be 1/3 original content and 2/3 shared content.
Being able to share content from other people is a great tool. Sharing means more time to create less individual content for your readers, which should equate to better content. It also means that you know what interests your readers and have developed the skill of curating that content for them. Readers will start coming to you more often because you've organized everything they want to see in one spot, and that's a time saver for your readers who are searching for the material.


Tip #5: "You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write."
This quotation made the favorites list as soon as the TSMRI team heard it. Sometimes when bloggers write for an audience, they forget about their driving force and think more analytically. That can be a useful quality, but your voice should always come through your writing. If it is a post that you are really passionate about, do not over-edit! Do yourself and your readers a favor and let them hear you.

Here is a Storify with the top 28 tweets from #SoFabUOTR in Dallas:


The TSMRI team had such a good time at the conference, and they made many new friends and changed how they look at certain aspects online. They look forward to expanding on these changes with time. Thank you for reading, and thank you SoFabU for a day full of learning!



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