31-eighteen-solutions

Capturing Amazing Visuals from Events for Your Social Media Content

faithmeza1@gmail.com (Faith Meza) — Wed, 18 Sep 2024 16:15:00 GMT

In this digital age when visual imagery is essential to success on social media, it's important that you capture moments that are important to your organization. In events, this means getting good photos. Getting a camera with good photo quality isn't as difficult as it was a few years ago. Now it's all about being selective and picky about what kinds of photos you take. Here are some best practices for taking great photos of your events for social media.

Venue and Decorations

Posting photos of an empty venue set up and ready for the event may foster suspense and excitement. It is up to you whether you want to surprise your guests with the look of the venue or if you want to post it. If you don't like the aesthetics of your venue, wait till people have filled it and get a crowd shot. People will be more focused on the people instead of the environment.

Group Photos

Group photos are the most important type of event shot. The best types of group photos and videos are candid. Catch them in the middle of talking, when they'll be most receptive to the camera. (Nobody wants to be photographed eating!) Other group photos are great as well. These other photos can be from a photo booth or from teams or friends gathering to take a picture together at your event.

Singles

Single photos are for individuals that are highlighted at the event. For example, a person speaking or singing on the stage might be in a frame alone. Other than that, singles for events are a little awkward to put on social media because it ignores a bunch of the people that were there. This takes away from the event's effectiveness in the eyes of the viewers, so make sure that you use these only in cases of individuals on a stage or similar scenarios.

Crowds

Showing the sheer magnitude of your impact on the community may be shown through crowd photos. Don't overdo them, because people still want to see faces. One or 2 photos of them should be enough. If you do a crowd video, pan around the area to show where everyone is. In a photo, get a good angle on the crowd, preferably from the back, front, or sides.

Food and Freebies

People love food and free stuff. Showcase the food and freebies before the event to literally wet their palettes! You can also consider keeping it a secret till the event arrives and posting about it after the event and after you know that people have spread word of mouth about the surprises. Either way, it will encourage people to come to your event later!

Impact Content

If your event was meant to impact the community or individuals, ask people for a quote or get a quick video interview. Whether it's from one of your own team members or a random attendee, use your platform to spread stories of real experiences from people who were at your event. These are some of the most powerful ways you can show that your event was a success and to gather support for your organization. People outside the inner workings of your organization don't get to see behind the scenes. Don't keep these stories to yourself!

Attendee Photos

Everyone has their own cameras these days. If you want to get more photos from people to share, let people know your social handles or create an event-specific hashtag. This will give you the ability to repost stories and posts. If someone takes a really good picture and tags you in it, you can even ask them if they can send you the original to use in your marketing. In this day and age, opportunities to get great content are endless.

If this is overwhelming, get a few people to do the job for you. Delegation is a biblical principle people! (Exodus 18:14-26) Just make sure to set expectations of how many photos to take and what kinds of photos you need from the event. Remember, practice makes perfect! So the more photos you and your team take, the better your social media page will look. If you want more tips like this, sign up to get this blog delivered to your inbox!

Power Up with Social Media

faithmeza1@gmail.com (Faith Meza) — Wed, 19 Jul 2023 21:15:00 GMT

Looking for an easy way to power up your marketing strategy? Social media is the perfect way to level up! Starting your social media accounts are as easy as pushing a few buttons. Creating and nurturing relationships with your target audience and like-minded businesses is simple, and only requires consistency and patience. Social media can direct people to your website, increase your reach, and provide a cost-effective way to update your audience. Social media is where all your marketing channels intersect, making it an incredibly powerful tool for your company to use.

Instant Updates

Social media provides an easy way to update your audience instantaneously. The more touch points, the better chance people will remember you and your business. Your audience is more likely to see your content when you use all the content mediums available to you, but being consistent is enough to get more eyes on your business. Social media works especially well when you've got to make a quick change to an event. For example, if you're going to start at a different time or location, so cial media is a great way to communicate to your audience. You can also plan out your updates by batching your content out weeks before it goes out. This will not only prepare your audience in advance and give them time to invite others, but it will also force you to get all your planning done way before the event. If you're a procrastinator, or if you just have a busy schedule, I highly recommend batching your content out.

Website Marketing

Social media is a power-up to your website by creating a funnel directly to your website. All the content you put out on socials is a hook to drive people to your website. All socials have their own funnels to the website, and some have better funnels than others. For example, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter provide a direct link to your website. For Instagram, users must go to the link(s) in your bio. You can also add links to your stories. If you're looking to drive more people to your website, Pinterest is probably the best platform to drive people to your website. All you need is a great cover image! Incorporating social media to grow your audience and target your niche is essential to success online.

Paper Marketing

Paper marketing isn't dead. It's great in providing a very physical reminder of what you want your audience to see. This too can be optimized with your socials. Although people may throw away the paper you've given them, they may follow you on your socials, provided you put the handles or QR code of the platform you want to drive your audience to. This way, your audience can get updates about your company, providing more touch points just by having the social media handles on your paper marketing. I recommend having just one QR code on the social media platform you'd like to direct your followers to.

Email Marketing

Using social media as a way to distribute your email campaigns is a great way to make sure you've got another touch point with your audience. Like all the other marketing points, email marketing has a symbiotic relationship with social media. Your socials can also benefit by having your profiles linked in icons at the bottom of your newsletter.

Get Vocal

You may already have opportunities to speak at events. Use 3 seconds of your time to say "Follow us on social media," which is enough to get the people that are interested in your business to remember that they've got the ability to connect with you. Don't forget that you can always do this at the end of lives, and ask to put it in podcasts.

Word-of-Mouth

The word-of-mouth aspect has been multiplied through the power of social media. All people have to do to share a business is click a few buttons to show people related businesses. People can share profiles or posts. Either way, your business has a great opportunity to niche down and spread through word of mouth.

SEO Marketing

SEO marketing can be boosted with your social media pages. Simply having a Facebook page can make finding your business so much easier! Facebook has great SEO ratings, and it can even pop up before your own website if your website doesn't have the right website authority. This also goes with LinkedIn and Instagram. If you add your social media pages to your page, you also create outbound links for your website that will signal to crawlers that you're linking to reputable websites.

Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is no new thing. Celebrities have been used to promote products for the longest time, however, influencer marketing today provides a more authentic way to reach your audience. Businesses can pay influencers that have built their own audiences to post on their platforms on behalf of the company. This may look like a product review, an unboxing video, or a photo of the influencer enjoying and promoting the product. Collaboration posts, tagging, and mentioning are all great ways to get your business in front of your target audience.

Building Authority

People don't always trust businesses from the get-go, which is why Google My Business, Facebook Reviews, and testimonials are used. Social media provides the ability to build your brand authority. It can work as a portfolio, showcase testimonials, and provides insight into your expertise. Based on social media alone, people may make a buying decision. Social media is a cheap, easy way to get in front of your target audience.

Social media brings all your marketing platforms together. Create a common place for your target audience to land and receive updates on all sides of your business with social media! If you're not sure how to use it or if you're looking to level up your social media strategy, contact me for a free social media audit! I'll give you 3 action items in a PDF that you can put into effect on your social media platforms.

How to Use Collaboration Posts for Growth on Instagram

faithmeza1@gmail.com (Faith Meza) — Fri, 19 May 2023 17:15:00 GMT

Growth is essential to success on Instagram. The best way to grow is by using the various tools Instagram provides its users, like the collaboration tool. The collaboration tool helps its users reach wider audiences on Instagram, especially new or niche audience. Collaboration is great for nurturing relationships, for strengthening connections with like-minded creators, and to showcase the legitimacy of your business.

Collaboration Posts

You may have seen collaboration posts before, with 2 usernames listed instead of just one for a post. Both of these users' audiences are reached in this post, causing a boost in reach for both collaborators. Watch the screen recording below to see how to create a collaborator post.

Instagram limits collaboration posts to 2 accounts. Tagging is still the same on the collaboration post, so even if you're limited to 2 accounts for collaboration, you can still mention or tag other accounts.

You know your audience best, and they know theirs. Make sure that the content you create is high-quality and will get the attention of as many people as possible from both audiences. After deciding on your post idea and which content medium you should use, get ready to tag your collaborator!

After creating your post, go to "Tag People." While tagging, y ou'll have the option to "Invite Collaborator." After you've chosen an account, share the post. The account you've chosen will receive a notification with the option to accept or decline your offer to collaborate on the post.

Note: You cannot add a collaborator after a post is already published. Make sure you add the collaborator before the post goes up.

Who you should collaborate with

As a business, you know your dream collaborators, and you know who you don't want to collaborate with. Unfortunately, we can't all get Chris Pratt to rep our Christian brands. What we can do is look for accounts that have our desired audience and work from there.

One of the best ways you can use collaboration posts is by finding a business with a similar follower count and an audience you would like to reach. Start creating a relationship with the account. Then you can propose a mutually beneficial collaboration post. This is a great way to build relationships business to business. You won't have to pay for this, and it will provide a lot of organic reach for you and the collaborator.

Another way you can use collaboration posts is to pay an influencer to make one with your brand using your products or reviewing your services. This is a great way to show your legitimacy as a business. Influencers are constantly creating content for brands that have smaller follower counts than they do to help them grow. By paying them for their services, you are giving them some influencer credit, while also seeming to be a down-to-earth, but professional company. Word of mouth is great for marketing, especially from people that others in your target audience admire. If you've got the budget for it, this may be a good avenue for your business to take. For instance, one study found that influencer marketing generates as much as 11X banner ad ROI.

One thing you should be aware of while collaborating with another account is the engagement rate of their content. If they've got a high engagement rate, there are users that are actively interested enough to take action. If they don't have a high engagement rate, you can't expect as much from the post. Weigh the pros and cons of collaborating with that account, and go from there!

"Add Yours" Stories

This feature allows you to put up a prompt to create a chain story. This is a great way to start or be a part of a trend in your niche. If your audience has photos that they are looking for an opportunity to share, this tool is a great way to engage your audience. You'll also have the opportunity to follow the chain and see others' stories that are in the chain.

Collaborations are a great way to grow, especially in organic reach. Whether you're a business that's looking to break into a new audience or a nonprofit looking for new partners, this tool is a great way to make sure that your business expands.

Did you find this blog post helpful? Share it so that other marketplace ministers and ministries can see the benefits of combining their audiences! Don't forget to subscribe for more helpful info for your business! ��

Content Mediums and Their Strengths

faithmeza1@gmail.com (Faith Meza) — Fri, 12 May 2023 19:44:23 GMT

Social media is filled with different content mediums. They include long and short-form copy, long and short-form video, and carousels. You may have a favorite medium to use in your content strategy, but that doesn't always mean you should use it all the time. It's important to recognize the strength of using different content mediums in your strategy.

Video

Lately, everyone has been focused on creating more video content, largely because of platforms like Instagram and TikTok. This focus forced many to learn the ins and outs of video content editing. Short-form video content has been very popular over the past 3 years.

Short-form video content is a great way to create interest. Since the aim is to awe and inspire in a short amount of time, it condenses information or experiences and makes them easy to digest. If done right, these short videos will create a quick dopamine shot, rewarding people for watching your content and creating interest in the rest of your content.

Long-form video content, however, is also great to show in-depth expertise or progression. Long-form content is great for creating a lasting impression. Quick dopamine shots come and go in the social media world. When your audience is finding value in your content, they'll understand that they can come to your page to start troubleshooting or to get whatever value you're providing through long-form content.

Although there isn't as much of a rage around the long-form content, it's great for your own documentation, as well as a way to get more content ideas.

Images

Images provide great visuals. Whether you've created a graphic image or used candid photos, it's another way for people to verify the legitimacy of your business. Images should be sharp and clear, with thought to the lighting and settings of your photos. Coming from a perfectionist's point of view, this is not to say if the photos aren't perfect, don't post them. Control what you can and present them as best you can! Don't let imperfect photos stop you from posting your content.

Depending on your niche, for instance, if you're in the retail business, images could be the difference between a sale or a pass on the sale. If your product isn't presented correctly, it may be passed over for a similar product that is presented better in images. Images for the service side are great for building trust in the business, especially when it comes to showing who your employees are, what you're doing, and events you've gone to.

Carousels, or posts with multiple photos, are great for breaking down information or displaying multiple photos from an event. Carousels can be creative, with a scrapbook look to it or they can be simple with photos.

Platform-Specific Tools

Any niche can use polls specific to its audience. They can be serious questions or fun questions. You will get a feel for what types of questions your audience will want to answer because of the engagement rate. If your audience is big enough, you'll be able to ask them questions about what kinds of content they'd rather see. It's a nifty tool that you can use to grow your business through feedback.

Lives are great for engaging your audience. People will be able to interact with you in real time, further creating legitimacy to your audience and nurturing the relationship with your viewers. If you're a nonprofit, there are also options to get donations from your audience through the live feature.

Tagging and collaboration posts are great ways to ensure your audience can see who you're working with. The people you tag are more likely to see the posts that you create with them in it. They'll also be inclined to share the post with their audience because your post will show that they're working with more people as well. This has helped our clients grow their social media in the past as well.

Stories are great ways to guarantee you're engaging with your audience daily. Stories are available on many platforms. They are very simple to make, and can also nurture relationships. Your niche will have a bunch of content that you will be looking at and engaging with. Find the best content and share that to provide more value to your audience. Not only will you give your audience more value without much effort on your part, but you'll also be creating or nurturing relationships with the people who created those posts! Don't forget to tag them in the story to get their attention.

With practice, you'll be able to find the content that your audience appreciates the most. The content your audience appreciates the most is the content you should focus on. Create more of that content, but don't neglect to differentiate the content mediums as they may help your audience digest the information differently. If this post helped you out, subscribe to our newsletter below!

Content Ideas to Grow Your Christian Business

faithmeza1@gmail.com (Faith Meza) — Fri, 30 Dec 2022 22:48:45 GMT

Christian businesses have a lot of assets when it comes to content ideas. After all, we have the biggest Influencer and Author of the bestselling book in history on our side. �� God gave us creative brains and tools to create what we need to promote ourselves. In case you need some ideas, here's a list of 14 content ideas for Christian businesses.

Christian Memes

Memes are the future of content. Christian memes can be used to convey theological arguments, relatable situations, and marketing messages. They're great for growing your reach.

Remember, people don't follow business accounts for ads. They follow business accounts for value. Memes are definitely a value add when you're reaching your target audience.

Quotes

Do you ever wonder why you see so many screenshots from Twitter? I'll tell you why. It's content that is short, sweet, and cuts right to the core. They can take big ideas and sum it up in one sentence.

Christian quotes are easy to come by and are very shareable. Use these to grow.

Verses

Remember that stat that the Bible is the bestselling book of all time? There's a reason for that. The Bible's content is the highest quality you can get!

Bible verses are life-giving. If you want to spread life as a company, a simple way to do that is by posting a Bible verse. They're also very shareable.

Product Photos

Product photos are very effective if you use them the right way. Use the 80/20 rule. Make sure 80 percent of your content is useful to your audience, while 20 percent is used for the explicit promotion of your business.

When you're using product photos, you should make sure they're taken with a high-quality camera. Find some mockup examples and set your products up accordingly. Freshen them up with a simple editing tool, and viola, you should have an attractive photo for your audience.

Giveaways

Giveaways are perfect to help grow your audience. The amount of response corresponds with the amount of hype you give your giveaway! Don't let them forget about your giveaway while they have the opportunity to enter.

If you're going to give away a simple prize, leave simple instructions. If it's a huge prize, then you could consider asking your audience to do more to win the prize. Partner up with other creators to get more responses to your giveaway, especially if you're new to social media or are just getting started again.

Other Christian Creators

The Christian niche is responsive to helping other Christian businesses out, at least in my experience. After all, we all know that we're part of the body of Christ. That's why I have started highlighting Christian businesses on my blog in specific niches.

Social media is a place for you to network. You can bring goodwill to yourself by sharing other businesses on your Instagram stories for example. In that case, make sure to tag them so they see it. ��

Informational Carousel Posts

Carousel posts are usually pretty popular, especially when it is informational. People appreciate when you find and provide or break up complex information for them. If you create useful information that is easy for people to understand, people will want to consume it.

Video Posts

Video is also the future of content creation, so if you want to grow as a creator, you're probably going to have to integrate video. This doesn't necessarily mean that you'll have to show your face in every video, but your face definitely gives your content a more personalized feel.

There are plenty of free video tools out there to get started, and there are even stock videos. Use what you have, and if you have little time for a personal video, then just sneak a stock video in the background, a gif meme, or animation in one or two of your posts. Easy peasy!

Behind the Scenes

Behind the scenes is more of a personal post. You can see the process that contributes to the final product, which is especially helpful for businesses with higher-quality goods.

When you're pricing based on what goes into the product or service, it's good to show people exactly what goes into the final product. People feel more reassured of the quality of their product. That's why "Package an order with me" videos are so popular.

Throwback Post

A cousin of the Behind the Scenes post, the Throwback post shows how your business has grown or how your team has grown.

Throwback posts are great to show that your company has worked hard to get to where it is, and that you're not showing any chances of wanting to slow down.

Employee Spotlight

An employee spotlight will not only make the employee feel appreciated, but it will also give your business another face to associate your brand with. The more faces, the better for personal connection psychology.

It's also likely if you tag your employee that he or she will share your post as it also benefits their online résumé. Win-win!

Values Post

Even though people might already know that you're a Christian business, sometimes the word "Christian" doesn't cut it when it comes to your target audience, and that's a good thing! Value posts can help you convey exactly what you support and believe.

If you're a Christian company, one way to "prove" it would be to put out some content on why you believe what you believe or thoughts on specifics, like the Trinity.

Another example might be that you don't support abortion and write a post about why. Just be ready for the heat when it comes. This can bring both good and bad traffic to your page, or with the way that social media companies are towards touchy subjects they want to protect, you could get shadowbanned.

Holidays

These will save you from a few headaches when you don't know what to post or when you want to have an easy-to-put-together post. If it's one of those days that celebrates something to do with your niche, that's even better.

For example, a vintage niche might like to know that it's National Typewriter Day on June 23, whereas most others wouldn't really care. The vintage niche might want to share it just because it aligns with their interests. The link below will give you some days to look out for. ��

National Day Today Website

Use Content Idea Generators

If you're thinking, wow, I knew all these already... Well, sorry. �� That's because this applies to all Christian content creators. Maybe this will make up for it. Here's a list of tools you can use to generate your own ideas for your niche:

Create content off your findings with these tools, and you should be good to go!

Time Expenses

Time is such a valuable thing for companies, so as much time as you can save while being effective and consistent on social media is truly the most difficult thing for companies. There are two things you can do if you're having difficulty fitting social media into your schedule.

1. Batch Your Content

If you've still got enough time to set aside to batch content, I highly recommend batching it and scheduling it out. You'll save yourself a lot of hassle when it comes to posting every day or every few days.

2. Hire or Outsource

Keeping up with social media trends can be difficult, especially if you're already struggling with time. If you don't have the finances to hire an employee to do social media for you, then consider outsourcing to me! I'm a social media manager for Christian businesses, so I work with you and your values.

5 Instagram Engagement Tips

faithmeza1@gmail.com (Faith Meza) — Tue, 01 Nov 2022 19:42:35 GMT

Any marketing guru can tell you that content is important. If they really know what they're talking about, they'll tell you that content isn't enough. Good content only gets you halfway there. The rest is up to you! Your ability to create authentic social interactions will set you apart from your competitors on social media! Here are 5 tips to start engaging the right way on Instagram.

1. Use your Search Tool

Think of hashtags as your own private search tool. The niche hashtags that you're already using to get discovered are also the greatest way to find and engage with your target audience!

When you type in a hashtag into the bar and search, you'll see two main sections, "Top" and "Recent." The "Top" section is the section with the most popular posts under the hashtag. You can comment under these to get noticed by the leaders in your niche and interact with their audience to create value for them. Sometimes, posts under "Top" can be a few days old. if you want to comment under the most recent post, just click on the username and go to the latest post in their profile.

"Recent" on the other hand include all contributors to the hashtag as it happens in real-time. "Recent" allows you to reach the people that are interested in the topic, but aren't as popular. This is where your target audience lives. If you've still got a small account, then you'll be able to find some similarly sized accounts. Use "Recent" to find partners and smaller accounts that are interested in your niche. Interact with each of these posts.

2. Be Real

In the unreal world of Instagram, make your account stand out with authenticity. If you're familiar at all with Instagram, you've noticed bots commenting under random people's posts with a generic compliment or a random call to action. So spammy! Don't do that. Instead, make sure you're leaving genuine compliments and adding or creating conversation around a post.

See something beautiful? Compliment exactly what is beautiful in the photo or video. Have a nifty thought in your industry that is related to the post? Add it! What the Instagram algorithm and ultimately people are looking for on Instagram is value. Add it everywhere you go. Adding real thought to the conversation is what brings people to Instagram.

3. Use Stickers

Stickers can be so helpful for engagement on Instagram Stories. There are other stickers that you can use on your Instagram stories to get more engagement on your Stories. Some of these stickers might include Polls, Questions, or Quizzes. People respond to interesting topics, so make sure you pick something your niche can relate to.

Here are a few common ways to use engagement stickers:

- "This" or "That"

- "True" or "False"

- Pop Quizzes

Got a store? Use the "Support Small Business" Sticker to direct people to your profile! Use mentions and locations to get found by people in your niche and local area. Use all the tools in your tool belt!

4. Create Engaging Content

Your feed posts are an opportunity to create engagement. Add a question at the end of your post to start a conversation.

Become an industry th ought leader. Use your own expertise to make an opinion on a debated topic in your industry. Most likely, you'll receive friendly feedback and comments under your posts.

5. Be Consistent

You may have already heard this about posting on Instagram. Well, let's take consistency to engagement! If you engage every day for 10 minutes, I guarantee that you'll see some growth in your account. For some people, engagement is truly a chore. But it's worth it! You'll find exactly who you need to connect with on Instagram. This consistency brings constant growth. Don't neglect engagement.

Pro tip: Engagement around the same time that you've created a new post is a great way to drive traffic to your latest post. If you've got unliked comments, like those right after posting! Go to the "Recent" section to find the people that are most likely still active on Instagram to like and comment on their posts. The active ones are more likely to check out your most recent post after you've done the same for them!

Conclusion

Engagement is just as important as content. If you're consistent and authentic in your engagement strategy, you'll get growth!

Need some great content to go with that engagement? Check out my Instagram templates for Christian businesses!