7 Best Social Media Writing Skills That You Must Practice
A rough estimate states that around 3.5 billion people in the world today use social media. Social media is the space that opens up myriad opportunities with almost instant reputation and recognition. While there is no special skill or talent required to get on the social media wagon, but one can stand out and make the most of its reach than you need skills. Writing and especially social media writing skills could be one of the most profitable assets to have at the moment if you want to do something remarkable in the digital space.
With its raging popularity, social media is a fiercely competitive space where much has become instantaneous – instant attention, instant reputation, and profits- to name a few. This is what attracts many, and everyone wants their slice of fame and fortune. However, it is extremely difficult to make your voice heard if you do not apply the right techniques. And the right techniques come from upgrading your skills.
Let’s talk about one such skill that you should possess or enhance in these times of social media boom – writing! If you are wondering why writing is so important or where does it feature in this social media ball game, then rephrase your question to where does it ‘not’ feature in the digital domain let alone social media platforms
Many creative writers believe that social media writing skills are not valuable and rather harm their creative process. On the contrary, social media could be a great place to improve your writing if you know how to use it to your advantage. So don’t form a wrong opinion before you try it for yourself. Given it’s a public domain, recognition and input for your work come quickly to you.
It encourages error-free, authentic writing. You have to be your grammar police, proofreader, and editor if you want to publish your work online since plagiarised content has no acceptance and will be discarded if you are not mindful. Won’t these practices make a more disciplined writer out of you?
Why Does Writing Ability Matter?
Writing is expression. It is the ability to write and express that separates us- humans from the animal kingdom. So, writing skills matter because it is the most important form of communication. The large transaction of information is all based on good writing.
Writing in the age of the internet is a marketing pitch in itself. Through effective writing, you create engagement for your audience. From creating a blog post to a tweet, writing ability always dominates a critical part of your social media profile. To motivate your audience to hit the click button you have to craft a headline that is magnetic and captivating enough.
An online user on average spends only about two minutes reading on the internet, which makes writing for the web quite a challenge. Clever social media copies can be the most effective strategy for brand building. Images, videos, or graphics all need to be supported through some form of writing to give it context. Think of the smart and catchy ‘Amul’ posters that we all love, it’s just the clever copywriting that made it so popular and supports the brand building.
In the social media domain, you must populate your accounts with two elements mostly –imagery and good strong writing. With the exponential growth in marketing on social media in the recent past, there is an ever-increasing demand for social media writing skills. So adding social media writing skills to your repertoire could come in handy to hold important positions like that of a digital marketer.
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So, whether you are someone with a lot of writing experience or you are a nonwriter looking to add some social media writing skills to your kitty, here are a few tips and tricks that you should start following today.
How to Achieve Your Social Media Writing Skills
Let it all out by writing and writing and then writing some more
You must have come across the phrase ‘writer’s block ’ quite often. When you begin to write you are most likely to experience it sooner or later. So what do you do? Write past it. Many experienced writers suggest that the only way to get over mental blocks is by writing out anything that comes across your head, sometimes not worrying too deeply about structure, punctuations, and focusing on the flow of writing. This is a brain exercise to power through whenever you feel stuck.
2. Define your purpose
For any kind of social media post, be it a blog post, an email or, a white paper, as a writer- be definite about the purpose. Clarity of mind and focus on your target when you write will help you craft something meaningful to your readers. To put it simply, never write just for the sake of writing. Your purpose will lead your reader to take an action like buying a product or hit that like button. Hence, define your purpose to raise a signal for your user.
3. Writing with hyper-focus
Developing social media writing skills can be an overwhelming process for many. Especially when you have multiple posts to write or write for various platforms, and to top it all, brainstorm a campaign altogether. Writing for social media is highly competitive, but do not wear out and instead strategize how you approach your tasks. Writing with hyper focus includes a tangible plan you can follow like targeting a smaller section to write at first, barf out your thoughts and do not stop, and make edits at last.
4. Writing with a voice–
This is by far the most significant trick to add to your social media writing skills. Most people can write, but they often can’t write with the correct voice. As a writer in the social media sphere, your voice becomes the brand’s voice. What you write and how effectively you pass on the message to your reader could transform your business or drive innovation. You will get better at finding your voice through writing with time and experience, but for starters always consider writing that talks of taking a positive stand, that is unbiased, and avoid opinionated writing.
Readers or users on the web only care for what they can get from what you write. So while developing your social media writing skills, it is crucial to understand that your personal opinions have less value. Therefore it is important to write with the reader’s perspective in mind. Paint your readers a picture that attracts them to read what you’ve written. Similarly, there are a few other practices that you can follow to enhance your selling approach through your writing. Here we discuss seven such writing skills for you.
7 Best Social Media Writing Skills to Practice
Research
To write engaging content for your social media posts, it is most important that they are highly relevant to your target audience. Like we discussed earlier in the article, the average attention span of an internet user is very less and they are mostly here to engage on the content they care about. So creating relevant posts means more popularity for you or your business.
So how do you create relevant posts? This is where research comes into play. Take into account the general demographic that your audience is placed in and then dive deeper into what their needs are. Picking on your audience’s priority to develop your content will give them a chance to connect with your posts.
It’s all about connecting at an emotional level. If your audience feels positive about your content, if they find solutions after using your product, they will come back for more. Along with this as a writer, your research should further entail the topic or subject matter you write about. Reading is the flipside of writing. If you read better you write better. So read up a lot before you begin to write your social media post.
2. Play with Language
It’s all about connecting at an emotional level. If your audience feels positive about your content and finds solutions after using your product, they will come back for more. Along with this, as a writer, your research should further entail the topic or subject matter you write about. Reading is the flipside of writing. If you read better, you write better. So read up a lot before you begin to write your social media post.
So, when you write a post on LinkedIn, it will read differently than a post on other platforms like Instagram or Facebook. The way you phrase matters significantly. So not only do you have to keep your audience and their language in mind, but the message you send out should have your voice too.
3. Short, Crisp, and Simple Writing
To build trust and let your audience identify with your posts, consistency is key. If you are consistent in the manner in which you write, the language which you use, it will emotionally connect your audience. Time is valuable and attention is sparse. So as a content writer your biggest challenge perhaps would be to create posts that grasp the attention of your reader. It becomes important for you to convey to your readers that you value their time and attention.
It is always advisable to keep your posts well-informed but short. The content you put out should be easy to read and scan through. Strictly stick to the topic you are writing about and frame your paragraphs in a manner that is crisp with some kind of information for the reader.
The use of jargon and fancy vocabulary does not always make your writing attractive. On the contrary, in terms of your social media writing skills, it may repulse many in your audience. So make use of good words but keep it simple at the same time so that it attracts people from any background.
4. Images and Videos
The best writing creative practice is for social media or otherwise writing to tell a story. What could be better than telling your story through pictures and videos! Written content automatically becomes more attractive when it is followed with some form of imagery or video content.
The inclusion of graphics makes your content more engaging. Any social media expert will advise you that social media algorithms suggest visual content to rank higher. This is one of the reasons why most social media platforms include live video features today for faster engagement and better reach.
5. Use a Call To Action
In enhancing your writing skills, writing from your audience’s point of view is crucial. What you write should be convincing enough for them, but never fail to prompt them to take action. This is called CTA or call to action, without which most people will only read through your post but not derive any real value.
The purpose for adding a call to action may vary in their purpose. Some of the common calls to action that you might have come across are asking to like, comment, and share a post, or subscribe to a newsletter, or direct to another social media channel or a website.
6. Edit & Proofread
Editing and proofreading your content are important practices for any writer and therefore you must include them in your social media writing skills as well. Editing what you write makes you sharp and provides you with the eye for detail. More importantly, it is while editing you understand how you can write and convey a crisp message.
As far as proofreading is concerned, in the social media domain, your value as a writer is based on how error-free and original your content is. Proofread so that you can avoid plagiarism and duplicate content at all times.
7. Making Most of Social Media Tools
Do not shy away from using the many free and paid tools that are available on the internet. While no tool can make you a good writer, that is only based on practice but the social media tools make your tasks much easier to do. Not only that, it will enhance your writing skills in more ways than you know.
Consider these tools like a highlighter for the content you create. Make the most of these tools as per your task and make the process of social media writing more enjoyable. Here are a few tools that may suit your social media writing skills:
- Dropbox paper – This is best for writing, editing, and most importantly collaborating with others.
- Canva – The best free-to-use designing software. You can be a self-taught graphic designer with this one.
- Grammarly – A must-use tool for writers. It helps you write clear, correctly, and effectively and can be integrated into many online platforms.
- Hemingway App – Another must for social media writing. It makes you a succinct and simplistic writer.
- Pomodoro Technique – Pomodoro in Italian means tomato. It’s a time management technique invented by an Italian in 1980 and works best when you are overwhelmed to complete a long piece of content. It makes you a habitual writer.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What are some of the special skills required to become a social media influencer?
You don’t need any special skills but a bunch of skills like writing skills to begin with, because it’s all about the ability to communicate with your audience. Creativity, content curation, management, and marketing could be some other areas to focus on.
2. Does social media marketing make any real difference?
Yes. Social media marketing is an effective way to build your brand cost-effectively. Its reach is wide and with the right pitch, you can market your product or service, create awareness about it in very little time.
3. Do I need to pursue a special course to be a social media executive?
No. There is no special course one needs to become a social media executive, but you need good knowledge of how social media platforms work based on algorithms. A course in content writing and digital marketing usually focuses on social media management.
Conclusion
With social media gaining popularity, every business whether small or big is finding a beneficial marketing pitch in their social networking accounts. Social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, are all about instant connection and sharing with a target audience.
Therefore, this is the best domain to build a relationship with your potential clients and build a reputation for your brand. There is a myriad of marketing techniques and tricks when used rightly with the social media algorithms that can yield engaging content to grab the audience’s attention. And one such trick is to have strong social media writing skills. The power of a good and precise social media copy is the best way to communicate your selling approach effectively and capture a client’s interest.
