Best Practices Guide
Utilize free platforms, our tools and your skills to best drive traffic and conversions.
Table of Contents
Click on any section below for rapid navigation or scroll down.
1 | Driving Traffic To Your Page
FREE sources of traffic to your webpage.
Free Traffic Sources
Strategies and best practices to make the most of each free source of traffic.
2 | Social Media
- Social Media Platforms
- Posting Best Practices
- Growth Strategies
Social Media Platforms
- Where is your audience?
- Differences between each
- Which are best for you?
Posting Best Practices
- Type of Content
- Schedule/frequency
- Hashtags & SEO
- Metrics
- Engagement & Impressions
Growth Strategies
- Playground Analogy
- Follow/Unfollow
- Like, Comment, Comment Likes
- DM Communication/Out-Reach
2a | Social Media
- *SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS*
- Posting Best Practices
- Growth Strategies
Understanding each platform and where to best spend your time. You don’t need to use them all, simply get good at a few that work best for you.
- 2.7+ billion users, 1.4+ billion daily
- 25-34 are largest segment of US users
- 68% of US uses Facebook
- 200 million members active in meaningful groups
- 97% of B2C companies and 89% of B2B companies use it
Best for photo/video and connecting with a community
Youtube
- 1.9+ billion users, 30+ million daily
- 5 billion videos watched per day
- 8/10 18-49 year olds use Youtube monthly
- Google platform, content appears in search results
- 6/10 people prefer video platforms to TV
Best for video and SEO
- 1+ billion users, 500+ million daily
- 71% of US between age 18-24 use it
- Users growing at 5% per year
- 70% of users look up a brand
- 200 million users visit a business profile daily
Best for photo/video and growing following
- 330+ million users, 126+ million daily
- 45% of users have college degrees
- 88% of business with >100 employees use Twitter
- ~34% female, ~66% male
- 79% of accounts are outside of US
Best for text and political initiatives
- 500+ million users, 105+ million daily
- 94% of B2B marketers distribute content
- 90 million senior level users, 63 million decision makers
- 49% of users salary exceeds $75k
- 51% of college graduates use it
Best for B2B (Business-To-Business) and informative content
Snapchat
- 310+ million users, 190+ million daily
- 34% of teenagers prefer it more than any other (1st)
- 73% of 18-24 year olds use it
- 3 billion snapchats created daily
- 14 billion daily video views
Best for video and connecting with teenage audience
2b | Posting Best Practices
- *TYPES OF CONTENT*
- Posting Frequency
- Posting Schedule
- Hashtags & SEO
- Metrics
- Driving Engagement & Impressions
a | Type of Content
Using videos, photos, stories and the “Rule of 1/3’s”
Video Content
- 64% of consumers say watching a video has influenced a purchase decision in the last month
- 50% of people look for product videos before visiting a store
- 45% of people watch more than 1 hour of video on Facebook or Youtube each week
- 4 in 5 consumers consider video demo's helpful
- Tweets with video get 6 times as many retweets as tweets with pictures
- 85% of Facebook videos are watched without sound
- Video expected to represent 80% of internet traffic by 2021
Photo Content
- Accounts for 75-90% of Facebook advertising effectiveness
- Instagram photos with faces get 38% more likes
- 45% of B2C marketers believe visual content is their most important type (1st)
- Tweets with images receive 150% more retweets than tweets without
- Article with images every 75-100 words were shared twice as much as those without
- Facebook posts with pictures get 2.3 times the engagement than those without
Stories
- Can post on Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat
- 400 million people use Instagram stories everyday
- 1/3 of most viewed stories come from business accounts
- Overstock.com ran Instagram story ads and saw an 18% return on investment and 20% decrease in cost per acquisition
- Photo/video or live content (show human side)
- Can link directly to your page (engagement & action)
- Include elements of stories into posts and posts into stories
“Rule of 1/3’s”
- 1/3 of your content promotes your business and services
- 1/3 is sharing other account's posts
- 1/3 is sharing personal or brand stories/history
2b | Posting Best Practices
- Types of Content
- *POSTING FREQUENCY*
- Posting Schedule
- Hashtags & SEO
- Metrics
- Driving Engagement & Impressions
b | Posting Frequency
General posts, Products With Purpose posts and the “7 Times Factor”
General Posting
- MAX - Less than twice per day. Pages with under 10,000 fans experienced a 50% drop in engagement if they posted more than twice per day.
- MIN - Several sources recommend posting a minimum of 2-3 times per week.
- TARGET - Once per day or 3-4 times per week.
Products With Purpose Posts
- Mention in posts 2-3 times per month
- "Jab, jab, jab, hook." - Gary Vaynerchuk theory - Offer 3 pieces of content with free value for every 1 you call for action.
- Podcast content
- Service information, how-to's and reminders
- Thank you's
- Seasonal related shopping
The “7 Times Factor”
- Consumers typically need to see an ad 7 times or more before buying
- People typically don't act the first time seeing and learning about a new service
- 47% of buyers biew 3-5 pieces of content before buying
- Consumers like to "get to know" brands, products and services
- Just because a message doesn't immediately convert, doesn't mean it isn't working
- People at different points in life and busy at different times of the season (kids out of school in the summer, heavy shopping season Nov/Dec)
- As a great publicist said, "you just beat the drum."
2b | Posting Best Practices
- Types of Content
- Posting Frequency
- *POSTING SCHEDULE*
- Hashtags & SEO
- Metrics
- Driving Engagement & Impressions
c | Posting Schedule
Different days and times are better to post than others on different platforms
General Posting Schedule Guidelines
- Most consistent and best engagement is 9am-3pm M-F
- Best time frame - 10am-1pm Wed & Fri
- Best day of week - Wednesday
- Worst day to post - Sunday, least engagement
- Least engagement before 7am and after 5pm
- As a great publicist once said, "you just beat the drum."
Post Engagement Heat Maps
- Global and nonprofit post engagement
- Various social media platforms
Facebook Engagement
Instagram Engagement
Twitter Engagement
LinkedIn Engagement
Be creative, these are general guidelines only
Our Friday at Midnight Post
Each following and account are unique and different. Although engagement can be high during these times, there is also a much larger volume of posts during these times and which can make it tougher to be seen and featured on feeds.
With all of this said, our most viewed post to date is a video of an otter sliding down a bank of snow we posted at midnight on a Friday. Ultimately, we encourage you to be creative. Change and test different types at posts at different times of the day/week to find out what best works for you!
2b | Posting Best Practices
- Types of Content
- Posting Frequency
- Posting Schedule
- *HASHTAGS & SEO*
- Metrics
- Driving Engagement & Impressions
d | Hashtags & SEO
Hashtags help posts get seen in searches and support brand campaigns.
#
General 411 on Hashtags
- Used to appear in search results 95-99%
- Used to promote brands/campaigns 1-5%
- Tweets with hashtags get twice as many retweets as those without
- Different on each platform (see below)
- Facebook - 0, no impact, not clickable or searchable
- Twitter - 1-2, more than 2 and engagement drops
- LinkedIn - 2-3, no limit, findable in search but engagement can drop
- Instagram - Use of max 30, no change in engagement, most don't read, can't bury at end of comments
- Instagram - Users can actually follower hashtags now
Types of #’s
- Brand
- Trending
- Content related
Use #’s with 5,000-250,000+ posts
- If more: Will get lost among numerous other posts
- If less: Not enough popularity to be searched for
- Simply start typing and the number of times each # has been used appears under the phrase
- Can search for and use several other tools for keyword search volume (not just keyword use volume)
Pro-Tip:
Enter sets of a) brand and b) content related keywords into your phone’s keyboard “text replacement.” For example, we post a lot of environmental related content. “ENV” in our phones = #environment, #climatechange, #globalwarming, #sustainability, etc. This can help save time while making your hash-tagging strategies a key part of your exposure and growth.
2b | Posting Best Practices
- Types of Content
- Posting Frequency
- Posting Schedule
- Hashtags & SEO
- *METRICS*
- Driving Engagement & Impressions
e | Metrics
Key metrics to understand, track and grow.
Posts
- Likes (interest)
- Comments (engagement)
- Shares (engagement)
Account
- Followers (trust & popularity)
- Likes (trust & popularity)
- Following (less than followers)
Action
- Webpage Visits (drive)
- Retailer Clicks (drive)
- Conversions (end goal)
2b | Posting Best Practices
- Types of Content
- Posting Frequency
- Posting Schedule
- Hashtags & SEO
- Metrics
- *DRIVING ENGAGEMENT & IMPRESSIONS*
f | Engagement & Impressions
Driving engagement increases impressions, likes and followers
What Drives Views & Virability?
- Shares, comments and likes
- Time spent watching video
- The more shares/comments/likes per view a post gets, the more often algorithms will show it in feeds
- More impressions (views) your post can get the better!
Ways To Drive Engagement
- Sharing quality content and through captions
- Ask open ended questions/opinions/ratings
- Ask to tag and share with "friends," "someone you love," "someone you want to do this with," etc.
- Contests - Follow our account, like this post, share with 3 friends, etc.
FUN FACT: The most effective Facebook ads average 4 word titles and 15 word descriptions. “Short, sweet and to the point.”
2c | Social Media
- Social Media Platforms
- Posting Best Practices
- *GROWTH STRATEGIES*
Growth Strategies
- Follow/Unfollow
- Like, Comment, Story View
- DM Communication Outreach
Grow your following, likes, webpage views and conversions. Similar to the importance of the number of 5-star ratings/reviews online, a large social following leads directly to automatic consumer trust automatic and credibility for you or your organization.
Follow/Unfollow, “The Playground Technique”
- The elementary school playground technique - running around to others kids and saying "Hi, want to be friends?"
- Execution - follow and unfollow accounts 2-3 days later (can continue following accounts you choose and build relationships with)
- Most effective technique for growing account (besides viral content or general popularity)
- Used by all automated growth software and most social media growth companies/professionals
3 Follower Targeting Strategies
- Similar accounts - People liking and commenting on posts by any accounts similar to yours
- Relevant hashtags - People liking and commenting on posts with relevant hashtags to you and/or your organization
- Geographic - Search geographic hashtags to find accounts and posts in your area
One of the best things about this technique is your ability to target your following and connect with your ideal followers.
Rate/speed
- ~100 follows/unfollows per day (~2,500 per month)
- This is the industry recommended "safe" speed/rate but it's worth pushing the limits and seeing when you get a restriction as you maximize the acceleration of your account growth
- Restriction - If you follow/unfollow too many accounts in too short of a time period, Instagram and others will restrict this for a certain time period
- Restrictions only last 1 day, week (typical) or month (it remains unclear exactly what each platforms ever changing limits for these types of activities)
- What to do if you get a restriction? Don't follow/unfollow any accounts for 2-3 days. If you get a warning the action is still restricted wait 7-10 more days before trying again - at this point the week ban will have usually lifted. If you're still unable to follow wait 30 days from the day of the first restriction (30 day bans are uncommon unless you are using automated software)
- Will my account potentially get deleted? No, accounts typically get deleted for posting inappropriate content or vulgar comments
Pro Tip
- 5-20% of people will follow you back (based on targeting and your follower count)
- Targeting - Audiences you target of some accounts/posts will follow you back more than others
- Your Following - As your following grows a higher percentage of people will follow you back
Interaction – Like, Comment, Story View
- Like the posts of accounts you're following in your feed and others (targeting posts with less than 100-150 likes will be more effective)
- Comment - posts on any amount of likes/comments (noticed by account posting and others seeing the post)
- Like's other's comments and respond to them
- Respond to and like all comments on your posts
- Watch stories, can also comment on them - posting account can see it
Genuine interaction can help attract new followers
DM Communication Outreach
- Basic outreach through direct messaging
- Can attract new followers and increase engagement with current following through direct messages
- Can send news and announcements
- Can help to personalize the message specific to their account, profile or reason for your reach out to them
3 | Email
- Building an Email List
- Email Schedule & Frequency
- Email Content
Building an Email List
- Why? (Stats)
- Strategies
Email Schedule & Frequency
- Seasonality
- Time of Day/Week
- Fequency/Cadence
Email Content
- Types
- Tips
- Optimal Email Campaign
3a | Email
- *BUILDING AN EMAIL LIST*
- Email Schedule/Frequency
- Email Content
Building An Email List
Email is still extremely effective and one of the most preferred channels of communication by online marketers.
Why Use Email Marketing?
- 2.9 billion email users worldwide (250 million US)
- 99% of consumers check email everyday (50% of US checks email 10+ times per day)
- 93% of business marketers use it
- 83% of business marketers use newsletters (40% say they are most crucial to their marketing success)
- 80% of retail professionals say email marketing is their greatest driver of customer retention
- 59% of B2B marketers say email is their most effective communication channel in terms of revenue
- 77% of people prefer getting promotional messages via email instead of direct mail, text or phone
- 86% of business professionals prefer to use email for business communication (73% of millennials)
- Email subscribers are 3x more likely to share content on social media than others
FUN FACT: The most effective Facebook ads average 4 word titles and 15 word descriptions. “Short, sweet and to the point.”
List Building Strategies
- Make it easy to subscribe - clean, clear and simple
- Add email newsletter signup near top of the homepage of your website - one of the most important calls to action
- Can offer value in exchange for email address to help capture rate - something free and simple
- Collect email adderss whenever you can - personal contact, signing up for events, etc.
- Send an email subscription confirmation and welcome email
3b | Email
- Building An Email List
- *EMAIL SCHEDULE/FREQUENCY*
- Email Content
Email Schedule & Frequency
When and how often to send what type of emails
Top-10 Consumer Spending Events (National Retail Federation)
Seasonality
- JAN - missed items from holiday wishlist, spring break travel, storage, household items
- FEB - Valentine's Day gifts, Super-Bowl parties, bed, bath, living, kitchen
- MAR - Spring break, St. Patrick's Day, summer travel, spring/summer clothing
- APRIL - Easter, tax return, home updates, spring cleaning
- MAY - Mother's Day, graduation, summer gear, dinner/event hosting, patio
- JUN - Father's Day, graduation, summer break, outdoor activities, youth sports/activities
- JUL - 4th of July, Amazon Prime Day, travel/on-the-move, recreation, yard
- AUG - Back to college, back to school, summer events/activities, beat the heat
- SEP - Back to college, back to school, winter/holiday travel, football weekends
- OCT - Halloween, home, winter/holiday travel, winter clothing, home decor
- NOV - Black Friday, Cyber Monday, holiday shopping, latest technology, winter sports
- DEC - Holiday shopping, gift cards, party hosting, family
Time of Day/Week
- Tuesday is the best day to send (10+ studies)
- Thursday is the second best day (use Tuesdays and Thursdays if you send about 1-2 emails per week)
- Wednesday is 3rd best
- 10am - On-task, focused, ready to respond
- 2pm - Start looking for distractions in afternoon (typically)
- 6am and 8pm - Also showed to be effective, people starting and ending their day
Frequency/Cadency
- Develop a cadence, people become familiar through patterns
- Helpful for the audience and senders
- Friendly reminders continue to keep you top of mind when people are shopping
- Optimal email type/schedule below (Email Content)
3c | Email
- Building An Email List
- Email Schedule/Frequency
- *EMAIL CONTENT*
Email Content
What to types of emails to send and what to include
Types
- Informative - general awareness of service, how to execute, basics, friendly reminders
- Thank you's - shows followers others are donating even if they aren't - people want to do what others are doing
- Seasonally related shopping - based on content above
- Contests - Although we don't use them a lot, contests can be a good way to increase awareness, open and click-through rates
Tips
- Subject lines are important for open rates - need to stand out a bit from the clutter (ALL-CAPS, emoji's, engaging headlines, breaking news, stories, stimulate curiosity, short, free stuff, among others)
- Keep it simple, short and sweet messages
- Power of 3 - programmed to learn in patterns and 3 is the smallest pattern possible - messaging stick, engaging and efficient
- "Blood, sweat and tears," "mind, body, spirit," "lights, camera, action," "click, shop, donate"
- Create simple sets of tasks for users to complete if they are interested (1) visit our webpage, 2) click on your store, 3) automatically donate when you complete your purchase)
- Clear CTA "Call to Action" - Above the fold, easy to find (Learn more, bookmark page, shop now, shop and donate now)
- The more you or another person can be on video demonstrating, explaining, reminding or thanking, the more personal and impactful the message
- Optimize for mobile - 46% of all emails opened on mobile
- Unsubscribe - include an unsubscribe button (if people start to unsubscribe, it could be a sign you're sending too many emails or they don't like the content)
Optimal Email Campaign
- Launch campaign - 1 email per week for 3 week (1 introductory/informative, 1 seasonal, 1 thank you)
- 1 informative/general awareness every 6-8 weeks
- 1 seasonal/shopping related every 6-8 weeks
- 1 thank you every 6-8 weeks
- General rule - one email every 3-4 weeks specific to the service
NOTE: These general rules apply to emails specifically focused on your Products With Purpose page/service. It helps to include reminders, CTA’s and links to your page whenever you can in your other general email communication.
4 | Sharing
- What Can People Share?
- Benefits of Your Content Being Shared
- How To Drive Sharing
What can people share of yours?
- Your webpage (link, url)
- Social media posts - all platforms
- Emails
- Videos
- Including your webpage link in shareable content helps to drive traffic from this increased exposure
Benefits of Your Content Being Shared
- More people see it! More people become aware of your message
- Best form of awareness - from a trusted recommendation
- Virability - the more likes, comments and shares your content gets, the more often it will be shown to people
How to Drive Sharing
- Ask people - they won't share it unless you ask them
- Make it easy - share buttons, links
- Tell people to share for different reasons
- "Share with someone who would love this." "Share with someone who would enjoy getting involved too." "Share with your partner, 3 friends, someone that can relate, etc." "If you think your friends would like this too, we'd love you to share it. Thank you so much!"
- Type of content most likely to be shared - a) video, b) photo, c) text
- Popularity - more likes, comments and shares the more popular the content seems and more likely people will be to share it
- High quality content people are proud to share with those close to them
- Optimize for mobile - 46% of all emails opened on mobile
- Unsubscribe - include an unsubscribe button (if people start to unsubscribe, it could be a sign you're sending too many emails or they don't like the content)
5 | SEO
- Social Media Posts
- Webpage, Back-linking, Domain Authority
Social Media Posts
- Most impactful on Instagram and Youtube
- Using your 30 hashtags on Instagram is best thing you can do to be found in organic search on the platform
- Youtube - Title, description and tags are important for SEO on Youtube (remember your Youtube videos can also be shown in Google search results too)
- Include the recommended number of hashtags in your Twitter (1-2) and LinkedIn (2-3) posts to help get found as well
Webpage, Backlinking, Domain Authority
- Google wants to deliver the most relevant search results to it's user
- Looks for sites with the related search results with the highest domain authority
- Content, credibility and the backend of your website are 3 important ranking factors
- Content - Relevant searches terms and keywords included in you titles, subtitles and text of content gives it a better chance of showing up more often. The content is as popular as the subject is being searched for.
- Backlinking - The more people that link to your page from their website or blog posts, the more of a trusted authority you become to Google and will be shown more often
- Website plugins - plugins and other data from your website setup can help Google read and understand it's content better to help rank better in search results
6 | We Help Drive Traffic
- Podcast
- Posts & Newsletter
- Communities
- Charity/Community Navigator
Podcast
When featured on our podcast, we post your clips to our social media as well.
Posts & Newsletter
We follow your newsletter and include random news in our social posts and newsletter.
Communities
Benefit from revenue communities drive for you that you’re included in as well.
Navigation
Your page also becomes part of our cause or community navigation menus.
7 | Goals For Success
“Success isn’t always about greatness. It’s about consistency. Consistent hard work leads to success. Greatness will come.”
Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson
Growing Your Revenue
- The difference between pages that succeed and not, are those that manage expectations and continue to see the end of goal of complete adoption by your following
- The 7 times factor can often be a 15-20+ times factor
- Timeline of graph represents 18-24 months (pace adoption can be often be much quicker depending on your relationship with your following)
- Stay patient early on, just because you're not generating as much revenue as you might want, doesn't mean you're not building familiarity and awareness
- Stay consistent, continue to spread awareness, information, reminders and thank you's
The best thing you can do is “beat the drum.” We love to help you succeed and are always here if you need anything.
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