Buffer Introduces Threads Integration for Seamless Social Media Management - Small Business Trends

Buffer Introduces Threads Integration for Seamless Social Media Management  Small Business Trends

* This article was originally published here

White House Social Team Is Fighting the Algorithms Just Like the Rest of Us - PCMag AU

White House Social Team Is Fighting the Algorithms Just Like the Rest of Us  PCMag AU

* This article was originally published here

7 Instagram Planning Tools to Stay Organized (and Calm)

Need an Instagram planning tool that puts the fun in functional?

Managing an Instagram account can feel like a juggling act, but the right tools make it a breeze. Imagine effortlessly scheduling posts, finding the best times to engage your audience, and organizing your grid for maximum visual impact.

In this blog, we’ll explore the best Instagram planning tools of 2024, highlighting both free and paid options to help you stay cool, calm, and collected.

Bonus: Download our free, customizable social media calendar template to easily plan and schedule all your content in advance.

What is an Instagram planning tool?

Instagram planning tools are software applications that help you manage and organize your content — even across multiple Instagram accounts.

These tools are designed to streamline the process of content creation, scheduling, and posting, allowing you to maintain a consistent and engaging Instagram presence, without the stress.

Instagram planning tools come with a variety of features to help you manage your account efficiently. Here’s a closer look at some of the key functionalities.

Build posts, Stories, and Reels

The best Instagram planning tools allow you to create and edit your posts, Instagram Stories, and Reels directly within the app. This includes uploading content, writing captions, adding hashtags, tagging other accounts, and cross-posting across your various social media platforms.

Some tools even offer built-in photo editing features and access to a library of stock images, so you can spend less time curating content — and more time watching it perform.

Or, built-in generative AI tools that help you draft post copy and hashtags with ease.

Find the best times to post

If you want your posts to be seen, liked, and shared, then it’s crucial to post when your audience is most active. The best Instagram planning tools analyze your followers’ activity and suggest the best times for you to post.

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Tools like Hootsuite let you do this both in the post creation stage, and within your wider analytics dashboard. That way, you can both plan ahead, and post at the right time in the moment.

Schedule content in advance

One of the biggest advantages of using an Instagram planning tool is the ability to schedule your posts ahead of time.

According to platforms like Instagram, it’s recommended to post at least 3-5 times a week. Doing that on the fly, day after day, while still seeing high-performing results, is just not realistic.

Planning your posts in advance, however, gives you an opportunity to maintain consistency without adding on daily tasks. It ensures that your content calendar aligns with important dates, holidays, and special events that your audience might be interested in.

This means you can plan your content calendar days, weeks, or even months in advance, ensuring a steady stream of content without the last-minute rush. Not to mention, you ensure that your Instagram feed is always active, keeping your audience engaged even when you’re busy with other tasks.

Get an Instagram planning tool that lets you plan and create posts, Reels, and Stories in advance. And, hey, a beautiful visual tool doesn’t hurt, either.

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Organize your Instagram grid

A cohesive Instagram grid is a visually appealing way to showcase your brand persona online. Instagram planning tools often provide a visual planner or drag-and-drop feature that lets you arrange your posts to see how they will look on your profile.

Not only is a cohesive Instagram grid layout good for your brand power, but it’s also good for attracting new followers. When someone lands on your page, they should be able to immediately catch your vibe and understand the care and work you give to your Instagram page.

Source: Hootsuite

Track and analyze your results

Understanding how your posts perform is crucial for refining your content strategy. Instagram planning tools often come with robust analytics features that allow you to track key engagement metrics such as likes, comments, shares, and saves.

By monitoring these metrics, you can identify which types of content resonate most with your audience and adjust your strategy accordingly.

Tools like Hootsuite offer detailed analytics dashboards where you can dive deep into performance data, compare the success of different posts, and measure the overall growth of your account.

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This data-driven approach ensures that you are not just posting for the sake of posting but are actively improving and evolving your Instagram strategy based on real-time feedback.

Listen in on industry trends

Staying ahead of the curve means keeping an ear to the ground. The best Instagram planning tools offer social listening features that help you monitor industry trends, track competitors, and stay updated on relevant conversations.

Social listening allows you to identify trending topics, popular hashtags, and emerging conversations within your niche. By tapping into these insights, you can create timely and relevant content that captures the interest of your audience. For example, a tech startup could use social listening to join trending discussions about the latest gadgets or tech innovations, positioning their brand as a thought leader in the industry.

Additionally, social listening can help you understand your audience’s sentiment and preferences, allowing you to tailor your content to better meet their needs and expectations.

Tools like Hootsuite and Talkwalker offer comprehensive social listening capabilities, so you can track brand mentions, tags, and customer sentiment all within a single dashboard.

By leveraging these features, you can maintain a well-organized, impactful Instagram presence that engages your audience and drives your brand forward.

The best Instagram planning tools for 2024

Now that we’ve covered what Instagram planning tools are and how they work, let’s dive into the best options available in 2024.

1. Hootsuite

Best for:

• Building, planning, and scheduling Instagram posts
• Cross-channel social media management
• Reporting and analytics
• Team collaboration
• Employee advocacy
• Social advertising

Price: Plans start at $99/mo with free trials available

Hootsuite is a comprehensive social media management platform that stands out as the top choice for Instagram planning. Here’s why:

User-friendly interface

Hootsuite’s intuitive dashboard makes it easy to create, schedule, and manage your Instagram posts. The drag-and-drop calendar simplifies the process of planning your content.

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Advanced scheduling

With Hootsuite, you can schedule posts at the best times for maximum engagement. The platform analyzes your audience’s activity to suggest optimal posting times.

Analytics and insights

Hootsuite provides in-depth analytics, helping you track the performance of your posts and make data-driven decisions. You can monitor engagement, follower growth, and more.

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Team collaboration

For businesses, Hootsuite offers robust team collaboration features. You can assign tasks, manage permissions, and streamline your workflows between teams.

Pro Tip: Learn how to create a social media approval workflow here.

Integration with other platforms

Hootsuite supports all major social media platforms, allowing you to manage multiple social media accounts from one place. This makes it easy to coordinate your Instagram strategy with your overall social media strategy.

Community management tools

Community management is crucial for fostering engagement and building relationships with your audience on Instagram. Here’s how leading Instagram planning tools like Hootsuite support community management:

• Engagement streams: Hootsuite allows you to monitor and interact with comments, mentions, and messages across your Instagram posts in one unified dashboard. This streamlines your response process and ensures timely engagement with your audience.
• Social Inbox: The platform consolidates all your social media messages, including Instagram DMs, into one inbox. This makes it easier to manage communication and respond promptly to inquiries or feedback.
• Tagging and notifications: Hootsuite notifies you when you’re tagged in an Instagram post or comment, ensuring you never miss an opportunity to engage with your community. You can also tag team members to collaborate on responses or escalate important issues.

2. Later

Source: Later

Best for:

• Brands new to social media
• Individual creators
• Post scheduling
• Users with minimal analytics needs

Price: Plans start at $16.67/month but are limited to 30 posts per profile

Later is another popular Instagram planning tool known for its visual content calendar and easy-to-use interface. However, its feature set is more limited compared to competing platforms. Later is a great choice for small businesses accounts and individual creators who prioritize visual planning.

Still unsure? Check out this comparison of Hootsuite vs. Later.

3. Buffer

Source: Buffer

Best for:

• Small brands/individual creators
• Auto-posting
• Minor reporting

Price: Plans start at $5/month for one channel

Buffer is a simple and effective social media scheduling tool. It offers basic scheduling and analytics features, making it suitable for users who need a straightforward tool without the advanced functionalities of Hootsuite.

Choose the right tool for your needs using this Hootsuite vs. Buffer comparison.

4. Sprout Social

Source: Sprout Social

Best for:

• Large, enterprise businesses
• Post scheduling and analytics
• Complex approval workflows

Price: Plans start at $199/month per seat

Sprout Social is a robust social media management platform with powerful analytics and reporting tools. While it offers comprehensive features, it comes at a higher price point, making it more suitable for larger businesses with a bigger budget.

Explore Hootsuite vs. Sprout in this comparison.

5. Planoly

Source: Planoly

Best for:

• Post creation, editing, and scheduling
• Visual grid design

Price: Plans start at $14/month for one social media channel

Planoly is an Instagram-focused planning tool with a strong emphasis on visual content planning. It offers a drag-and-drop grid planner, making it easy to arrange your posts. However, when it comes to analytics and reporting, this Instagram planning tool leaves much to be desired.

6. Tailwind

Source: Tailwind

Best for:

• Instagram and Pinterest scheduling
• Email marketing

Price: Plans start at $14/month for one social media account

Tailwind is designed for Instagram and Pinterest scheduling. It offers post scheduling, analytics, and content recommendations. Tailwind is a good option for users who are active on both platforms, but not great for those that operate on more than just two platforms.

7. CoSchedule

Source: CoSchedule

Best for:

• Managing marketing calendars
• Agency collaboration
• Social media scheduling

Price: Plans start at $15/month for five social profiles

CoSchedule is a marketing calendar that integrates with multiple social media platforms, including Instagram. It’s designed for teams and offers powerful collaboration features. However, its primary focus is on managing marketing efforts, not social media alone. This means some of its features and capabilities are lacking compared to other platforms.

Free Instagram planning tools

If you’re looking for budget-friendly options, there are several free Instagram planning tools available. While these tools may lack some of the advanced features of premium tools, they can still help you manage your Instagram content effectively.

Meta Business Suite

Meta Business Suite (formerly Facebook Business Suite) is a free tool provided by Meta. It allows you to manage your Facebook and Instagram accounts from one place. You can schedule posts, view insights, and respond to messages. While it’s not as feature-rich as Hootsuite, it’s a solid free option for basic Instagram management.

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Here’s how Meta Business Suite can assist with your Instagram planning:

• Cross-platform management: Manage posts and interactions across Facebook and Instagram from one centralized platform. This integration is ideal for businesses looking to maintain a cohesive social media strategy.
• Basic scheduling: Schedule posts in advance for both Facebook and Instagram. While the scheduling options are more limited compared to premium tools, it still allows you to plan your content calendar and maintain consistency in your posting schedule.
• Insights and analytics: Access basic analytics to track key metrics such as post performance, audience demographics, and engagement trends. These insights help you understand what content resonates with your audience and adjust your strategy accordingly.
• Message management: Respond to messages and comments directly from Meta Business Suite, ensuring timely engagement with your audience without switching between platforms.

The Instagram app

The Instagram app itself offers basic scheduling features for business and creator accounts. You can schedule posts and Reels, and access basic analytics. It’s a convenient option for those who prefer to keep everything within the Instagram ecosystem.

Here’s how the Instagram app can assist with your Instagram planning:

• Scheduling posts: Use the Instagram app to schedule posts and Reels ahead of time directly from your desktop or mobile device. Keep in mind, you can only schedule up to 25 posts a day, and up to 75 days in advance.
• Basic analytics: Instagram Insights can give you a quick look into your followers, engagements, and best performing posts. For more advanced analytics, stick with a third-party tool.
• Audience insights: Understand your audience demographics and preferences through the Instagram app’s insights. Find metrics like where your audience lives, when they are most likely to be online, and more.

Want to try the best Instagram planning tool around, without breaking the bank? Schedule posts, Reels, and Stories ahead of time, and monitor your efforts using our comprehensive suite of Instagram analytics tools. Try it free today.

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The post 7 Instagram Planning Tools to Stay Organized (and Calm) appeared first on Social Media Marketing & Management Dashboard.

* This article was originally published here

Pinterest Ads: Everything You Need To Get Started

Did you know that Pinterest users spend twice as much time shopping every month as non-Pinners? Ka-ching!

Pinterest is unique among social platforms because its users are largely going there to discover new products, and they respond well to ads. Pinterest offers a mix of free and paid advertising tools, and combining both can earn you 3x more conversions and twice the ROAS (return on ad spend) versus paid ads alone.

Plus, Pinterest has one of the lowest CPAs (2.3x more efficient than other platforms) in social media advertising.

Sounds amazing, right? Buckle up as we dive into everything you need to know about Pinterest ads, from ad formats and specs to creative ad examples to inspire you.

Bonus: Download a free guide that teaches you how to make money on Pinterest in six easy steps using the tools you already have.

Benefits of Pinterest advertising

Discovery is at the heart of Pinterest. Users go there to find new ideas and inspiration, while they’re using other social media platforms to connect with friends and family.

Pinterest users want to discover new products, brands and projects. And Pinterest ads naturally work into that because they don’t interrupt — rather, they add to the sense of discovery.

Because users are already looking to shop, they’re more likely to appreciate ads than on any other platform.

Take a look at this example search for “living room furniture.” While there are organic pins in the results, we can also see ads from Wallpaper Direct and Wayfair that appear almost as native search results.

They look exactly the same as the other search results and they’re hyper-relevant to the search, making these ads incredibly useful and much more clickable than other social media ads would be.

But there’s more to Pinterest ads than that. Here are a few additional benefits that your company can take advantage of.

Generate sales

Pinterest users are ready to buy as they browse. If someone is searching on the platform for something like “living room furniture,” it’s likely because they’re redecorating their living room and are actively looking for both ideas and products.

Running ads to get your product in front of these searchers helps you make more sales, which helps your business make more money. Pinterest shopping ads can triple your sales performance, ensuring you’re bringing in an ROI to write home about.

Reach a wider audience

Pinterest ads can appear in both the home feed and search results. This means that even if someone is filtering through their home feed without looking for specific inspiration, they can still come across one of your products.

Pinterest has over 518 million users — more than the entire population of the United States — and the platform is popular across all age groups and genders. Not only can you reach a wider audience, but you can reach your audience.

Get more bang for your buck

Finally, Pinterest pins (say that five times fast) have a longer lifespan than other types of social media posts and ads. Someone may see one of your ads in their feed or search results and decide to save it to a Pinterest board rather than take action immediately.

This then gives your ad the potential to reach that user’s audience and be seen again by the user in question as they browse back through their boards.

By creating a longer-lasting pin that can reach a wider audience than you’re even paying for, you’re able to get more bang for your ad bucks.

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Pinterest ad types

You can choose from several different Pinterest ad types based on how and where you want your ads to appear.

Standard pins

Standards pins are the simplest type of ads to run on Pinterest because you’re essentially “boosting” or promoting an existing Pin.

This type of ad is a single image or video that appears in the home feed. The only thing differentiating standard pins from organic pins is a small “Promoted by” label.

When a user clicks an organic Pin, they see the Pin detail page. With standard pin ads, they’re taken directly to the URL you specify.

Standard pins may be simple but they’re also very effective, especially when combined with automatic bidding (covered later in this article). You can create a standard ad with any ad objective.

Video pins

Video pin ads are similar to standard pins — but they’re more eye-catching as they use video as the creative asset, drawing people in from the static image pins. They appear as video pins with the same “Promoted by” label as standard pins.

You can use any ad objective to create a video pin — just use video as your creative when building or choosing the pin — or you can choose a “video views” or “video completion” objective.

Carousel pins

Carousel ads look exactly like organic pins but contain a group of images users can swipe through on mobile or desktop. You can tell it’s a carousel by the small dots underneath the image.

Importantly, when a user saves it, the entire carousel is saved to their board. You can have 2-5 images per carousel ad.

The above carousel ad walks viewers through the steps to make a margarita. Pinterest carousel ads are also great for showing different angles of the same item, lifestyle shots of the product in use, or showing related accessories or items.

Shopping pins

Shopping ads are pulled directly from your product catalog, meaning you’ll need to have a catalog set up before creating one of these ads. Many platforms, like Shopify, offer a direct connection with Pinterest for this.

To create a shopping pin, select catalog sales as your ad objective before getting started with your ad creative.

One great thing about these ads is how easy they are. Anyone can set them up in minutes. Pinterest uses the data in your product information, as well as your industry, to automatically target Shopping ads to the most interested audience.

You can also set up your own targeting and advanced audience retargeting options, but this is one of the most “set it and forget it”-friendly ad types out there.

Shopping pins can look and act just like standard pins. The difference is how they’re made. With shopping pins, Pinterest can dynamically create ads based on your product groups, rather than you choosing or creating specific pins to promote.

Collections

Collections are shopping pins that promote multiple products at once. These are mobile-only ads that allow users to shop amongst multiple products at once.

In the feed, collection ads appear with one large, featured video or image and 3 supporting images. If a user taps your ad, you can then show up to 24 supporting images on the ad detail page.

These types of ads are perfectly suited for e-commerce brands, especially in the fashion, home decor and beauty segments. However, with the right creative strategy, anyone can benefit.

It’s especially powerful to combine video and product or lifestyle images. For example, use an editorial or lifestyle video for the featured asset and support that with product and detail shots for the secondary assets.

Another nice thing about collection ads? Pinterest can automatically create them for you, including choosing related products from your product catalog. Nice.

Quiz pins

Quiz pins enable you to share personalized content with users based on how they respond to a quiz. To create these, you’ll create a cover pin that each viewer will see, as well as a results pin for each potential result.

Source: Pinterest

This can be a great way to provide hyper-relevant content to your audience based on their response to something. Like in the example above, you can gather a clearer idea of which pet is best for your audience’s lifestyle to then provide them with even more personalized content.

Showcase pins

Showcase pins are another mobile-only pin type. They consist of multiple pins within a single ad unit, with each pin able to link to a different page of your website.

These ads help your audience find exactly what they might be looking for on your website. While the full ad itself cannot be saved to a board, each individual pin can.

Pinterest ad sizes

Ad sizes vary based on the type of ad you plan to run. It’s important to stick to the right ad specs so that your visuals appear as high-quality and seamless as possible, improving your overall ad quality — and hopefully ad clicks.

The recommended ad sizes for each ad type are as follows:

• Standard pins: 2:3 aspect ratio, or 1000 x 1500 pixels. Max size 32MB. PNG or .PEG file type.
• Video pins: 1:1, 2:3, 4:5, or 9:16 aspect ratio. Recommended 6-15 seconds in length, though max length is 15 minutes. Max size 2GB. MP4, MOV or M4V file type.
• Carousel pins: 1:1 or 2:3 aspect ratio. Max size 20 MB per image. 2-5 images per carousel. PNG or JPEG file type.
• Shopping pins: Follow the same specs as standard pins.
• Collections: 1:1 or 2:3 aspect ratio for hero image. 3-24 secondary creatives. Max size 10MB. PNG or JPEG file type.
• Quiz pins: 2:3 aspect ratio, or 1000 x 1500 pixels. 3-60 seconds in length if using video. Max size 32MB. BMP, JPEG, PNG, TIFF, WEBP, MP4, MOV, or M4V file type.
• Showcase pins: 2:3 aspect ratio for title pin and cards. 1:1 aspect ratio for feature images. 3-60 seconds in length if using video. Max size 32MB. BMP, JPEG, PNG, TIFF, WEBP, MP4, MOV, or M4V file type.

How much do Pinterest ads cost?

Your Pinterest ad costs are fully up to you, as you set your own bidding maximums. However, keep in mind that the more you spend, the more potential reach you gain.

When creating a Pinterest ad, you’ll be able to choose between two options: a lifetime budget or a daily budget.

A lifetime budget runs your ad continuously until that budget has been hit, then turns the ad off.

A daily budget runs the ad each day until your daily limit has been reached. This is a continuous ad that runs until you manually turn it off unless you set specific date parameters.

However, just because you’re able to set your own budget doesn’t mean you need to go in blindly. Let’s talk about benchmarks so that you can get an idea of what you’ll be spending to reach your goals.

One survey found that, on average, you’re looking at:

• Up to $0.10 per click
• Up to $2.00 per conversion
• Up to $1.50 per 1000 impressions

More than half of the survey’s respondents spend up to $500 per month on Pinterest to see these types of results, meaning you can make a big impact without needing a huge ad budget.

How to create ads on Pinterest

Ready to start running your own ads on Pinterest? We’ll walk you through the eight steps it takes to easily create ads on Pinterest and start increasing reach, traffic, and sales through this platform.

1. Head to the ads manager

First things first, you need to navigate to the Pinterest ads manager. If you’re already set up with a Pinterest business account (which is required for running ads), as soon as you go to Pinterest.com, you’ll be sent to your business hub.

From there, click the Business hub menu in the top left corner to access more options. Under Ads, head to Create campaign to get started.

2. Select your campaign creation mode

There are two modes for creating your Pinterest ads campaign: automated and manual. The next step is to decide between the two.

With manual campaigns, you can get a bit deeper with your objective, targeting, and bidding. If you want to create some of the more complex types of ads, you’ll need to run a manual campaign.

However, most of the steps are very similar, so we’re going to continue by showcasing what it’s like to create an automated campaign. Play around with the manual campaign options as well — but understand that even though it gives you more options, it’s still a similar process.

3. Choose your objective

With automated campaigns, you can choose from two main objectives: conversion and consideration.

In order to run a conversion campaign, you need to have the Pinterest tag that tracks conversions set up on your website. Otherwise, you can only run consideration campaigns that help get your business and its products/services.

Some of the manual objectives you can choose from include:

• Brand awareness
• Video views
• Video completion
• Consideration
• Conversions
• Catalog sales

4. Select or create your pin(s)

After choosing your objective, it’s time to select or create the pin that you want to feature in your ad.

You can easily choose from pins you already have created and saved to your boards in order to save time. Or, you can create a new pin. You’ll need to choose this option to create one of the more in-depth ads, like a collection pin.

5. Add targeting details

One nice thing about the automated campaign is that it selects your targeting for you based on who Pinterest thinks will benefit most from your ad.

If you prefer a more hands-on approach, you’ll need to create a manual campaign. But Pinterest also benefits from serving relevant ads to their users, so you can trust their judgment.

In this area, you can select any restrictions you want to set, such as specific ages (e.g., if you’re promoting alcoholic beverages) or specific locations (e.g., if you only operate in certain areas of the world).

6. Input your budget

Now it’s time to decide how much you want to spend on your ad.

The automated campaign lets you choose from a few options, like $5-10 per day, but you can input your own daily budget if you want to set a different amount.

Then you’ll choose the duration of your ad. Preset options include running continuously, 10 days, or 30 days. You can also set your own duration if you want to try a different time frame, like a full quarter or a two week span.

7. Publish your campaign

Finally, it’s time to publish! Review all of the settings you input to make sure they match your desired targeting, budget, duration, ad creative, and anything else you’ve set.

You can also, at this point, choose to switch to advanced ad creation in order to input even more changes that you couldn’t throughout the automated campaign creation process.

Or, if you’re happy with how it looks, simply click Publish and let your ad start running!

8. Monitor your campaign

Once you’ve published your campaign, you don’t want to let it sit without monitoring it. Throughout the campaign, you can return to your Ads Manager to monitor its performance and ensure it’s reaching the right audience.

Make any changes you need to make if it’s not performing well. You don’t want to waste money on a useless campaign.

Then of course, at the end, you can measure your campaign performance to your overall goals to see if you were able to hit the audience, the reach, and/or the sales you were looking for.

Best practices for advertising on Pinterest

Want to get the most out of your Pinterest ads? Keep these best practices in mind as you create your ad visuals and build out your campaigns.

Test both automated and manual campaigns

Automated campaigns make your life easier. Pinterest even lets you know at the onset that creating an automated campaign can take just 2-3 minutes while manual ads can take up to an hour, depending on how in-depth you want to get.

If you plan on running multiple campaigns, taking advantage of the automated settings can save you a lot of time, though it might not get you the results you want.

This is why testing both options is a good idea. If manual campaigns are generating exponentially more results, then of course it will make sense to dedicate that time to your campaigns.

But if the results are the same, or if automated campaigns are performing better, don’t waste extra time building out a manual campaign. Use the automated features and sit back to watch your results pile in.

Use vertical aspect ratios

Take a look at this search query on Pinterest for “home decor.”

Every image is some form of vertical. Imagine if your ad was a small horizontal amongst these vertical images. It would get lost. Even square images don’t stand out as much as vertical images, though Pinterest’s ad specs say you can use square.

To ensure your ad stands out amongst the other results, stick to vertical aspect ratios, usually a 2:3 aspect ratio or around 1000 x 1500 pixels.

Stay on brand

Incorporate your brand fonts and colors into your Pinterest ad graphics. Make sure your ads and your pins on this platform are recognizable and similar to your ads and graphics on other platforms. This can help with brand recognition and strength across the board.

Choose the right landing page

Be strategic about the landing page you pair with your Pinterest ad. You should be sending your ad clickers to the page that continues the journey they started by viewing your ad.

For example, if your ad showcases a specific couch, make sure it leads to that couch’s product page, rather than your website’s home page or a full collection page. You want to make it as easy as possible for someone to take action after seeing your ad.

Play with different ad types

You might start your Pinterest ad journey with a handful of standard ads. They’re simple and effective, so why not?

However, we recommend testing out the various ad types. Try a quiz ad or collection ad to put even more personalized content in front of your audience. See which ad types perform best. Aim to consistently increase your reach and sales.

Include a call-to-action

Tell ad viewers exactly what you want them to do, either in your pin description or on your ad graphic. Calls-to-action like “learn more,” “shop now,” or “take the quiz” can help increase clicks and conversions.

Get creative with your visuals

Finally, get creative with your visuals. You don’t have to just have a single product photo as your ad creative. You can create a collage, use a video, or design a graphic that showcases even more to your audience.

More creative ad visuals grab attention better, increasing views, clicks, and conversions.

3 great examples of Pinterest ads

Get even more inspiration before you launch your first (or next) Pinterest ad. Here are three proven success stories with Pinterest advertising.

1. Kroger

Kroger ran some holiday ads during the 2023 holiday season in an effort to get even more shoppers in the door. One of those ads was a quiz ad meant to help people discover new holiday dishes so they can add the key ingredients to their Kroger shopping list.

By positioning itself as the number one destination for holiday grocery shopping—and by using unique and visually appealing ad creative—Kroger was able to increase awareness, generate a 50% quiz completion rate, and hit a 67% lower CPM (cost per impression) than estimated.

2. Sweaty Betty

Sweaty Betty is a women’s activewear company that runs shopping ads through Pinterest. With basic product photos as the ad creative, Sweaty Betty targets people by identifying the most popular exercises and clothing types, focusing their ads solely on those.

This trend analysis has worked well for Sweaty Betty, helping Pinterest become their number one ads channel, and increasing their ROAS (return on ad spend) by 39% YoY (year over year).

3. Cetaphil

Cetaphil knows that Pinterest is always on top of new trends, so the brand decided to lean into that with its first big Pinterest ad campaign.

By using language like “2023 Trend” in its ad and creating an eye-catching, product-centric graphic, Cetaphil was able to grab the audience attention it was looking for.

With these ads, Cetaphil was able to increase brand awareness by 4.5% as well as boost pin recall, helping to improve the overall conversation around its brand and its face wash.

Manage all your social media — including Pinterest — easily with Hootsuite’s automatic scheduling tools and detailed, cohesive analytics. Spend less time posting and more time discovering what your audience wants. Try Hootsuite today.

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The post Pinterest Ads: Everything You Need To Get Started appeared first on Social Media Marketing & Management Dashboard.

* This article was originally published here

YouTube Marketing in 2024: How To Get Started

83% of adults in the U.S. are on YouTube, and people watch over a billion hours of content each day. That means your business has a huge opportunity to reach your audience via YouTube marketing.

But shouting from the rooftops about your products without a plan won’t get you anywhere. You need a strategy to succeed — and that’s exactly what you’ll find here. Keep reading to find the 10 steps to crush YouTube marketing in 2024.

Bonus: Download the free 30-day plan to grow your YouTube following fast, a daily workbook of challenges that will help you kickstart your Youtube channel growth and track your success. Get real results after one month.

What is YouTube marketing?

YouTube marketing is the practice of promoting a brand, product, or service on YouTube. It can involve a mix of tactics, including (but not limited to):

• Creating organic promotional videos
• Working with influencers
• Advertising on the platform

To market your business on YouTube — whether you’re an entrepreneur or an enterprise corporation — you need to produce what your target customers want.

Sounds simple, right? It is, as long as you know what your customers really want, not just what you think they want (a trap far too many businesses fall into).

Plus, you need to make sure the right people find your videos. YouTube is a search engine so you’ll need to optimize your content for the YouTube algorithm, just like you do for Google SEO.

But why is YouTube marketing so important for your business to invest in?

Let’s cover a few major benefits that YouTube can provide.

• Reach a major audience. YouTube is the second-most visited website in the world. Its users spend an average of 28 hours per month streaming content on the website. And four in five internet users have used this platform at one time or another. Find even more important stats in our roundup that prove just how valuable YouTube can be for business.
• Video content sells. One video marketing survey found that 90% of marketers have gotten a positive ROI from video. And 88% of marketers have found that video helps their audience better understand their product or service.
• Your videos can appear in search results. Not only do you need to pay attention to YouTube SEO, but by considering Google search results, your videos can reach an even wider audience.
• Take advantage of YouTube monetization. Once you’ve built a solid audience, you can make even more money from the ads that appear on your videos.

Now, without further ado, here is your complete, step-by-step checklist for how to successfully promote your business on YouTube.

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10-step YouTube marketing strategy

Follow along with these 10 steps to create your business’s YouTube marketing strategy and start promoting your products or services with high-quality video content.

Step 1: Create a YouTube channel for your business

First things first, you have to create a YouTube channel.

Since YouTube is part of Google, you’ll need to create a Google account first to sign up for a YouTube channel. You can use an existing account or create one just for managing your business channel.

Here’s how to get up and running:

• Create a Google account. Or, if you’re a Google Workspace user, use your admin account or create a YouTube-specific account.
• Go to YouTube.com and click the profile photo in the top right corner.
• Click Create a channel at the top of the dropdown menu that appears.

• Enter your business name and handle and upload your logo as your profile photo in the popup that appears before clicking Create channel. (If you’re not sure if you want to use your business name as your channel name, consider using our YouTube channel name generator for some inspiration.)

From there, you’ll be taken to your brand-new YouTube channel!

Click Customize channel to start branding it and inputting key information you’ll need to share with your audience if you hope to gain any subscribers.

To fully complete and brand your new YouTube channel, fill out the following details in each tab:

Basic info:

• Name
• Handle
• Pronouns (only if you’re a solopreneur)
• Description
• Channel URL
• External links
• Contact information

Branding:

• Profile picture
• Channel art/banner image
• Video watermark

Layout:

• Video spotlight
• Featured section(s)

Here’s an example of a fully branded YouTube channel so you can get an idea of what to expect once you’re finished:

Check out our step-by-step walkthrough to create a YouTube account for more details.

Now we’re ready to tackle your YouTube video marketing strategy.

Step 2: Learn what your audience likes

Alright, now for the tough stuff. What does your audience really want?

To figure this out, you need to answer two questions:

• Who are you making videos for?
• What are they already watching on YouTube?

To start, it’s helpful to know some basic YouTube demographics. As of January 2024, there’s a pretty even gender split, with 51.2% leaning female and 48.8% leaning male (there is no data on other genders).

Plus, YouTube remains a popular platform for users across generations. The largest distribution of YouTube’s user base falls between the ages of 18 and 49, followed closely behind by those aged 50-64

Source: Pew Research Center

YouTube isn’t only popular in the USA, though. There are over 100 localized versions of YouTube for countries around the world.

Spend some time researching who your target audience is already following on YouTube. What types of videos do they watch? (If you don’t have your target audience figured out yet, we have a free buyer persona template to help out.)

There are a couple of ways to do this.

If you already have your YouTube channel set up, check out your YouTube Analytics.

Specifically, you want to look at audience data like traffic source, viewer age and gender, geography, and the like.

This will give you valuable insights into your audience’s demographics and interests. You can see how many people are finding your videos through search, seeing it in their suggested feed or from other sources.

Or use social listening to find your audience.

This tactic allows you to continuously search social platforms, including YouTube, for mentions of your brand or specific keywords.

If you’re already a Hootsuite user, you’re in luck. Hootsuite’s powerful social listening tools, including sentiment analysis, can help you understand how people really feel about a topic.

Hootsuite just acquired the leading AI social listening solution Talkwalker. That will let you understand the sentiment behind brand mentions with Talkwalker’s AI-powered tools — right from your Hootsuite dashboard!

Talkwalker is also one of the few AI social listening tools that literally listens —monitoring audio content in videos and podcasts for mentions and references to your hot topics.

By seeing what people are saying about you or your industry, you can find out what people want to know and use that for video content ideas.

Book your free Hootsuite Listening demo

Step 3: Research your competition

The fastest way to grow on YouTube is to figure out what’s working for your competition and then do that…but better.

You can start by looking up channels from the competitors you already know. Perform a competitor analysis for the following:

• Subscriber count
• Average views per video
• Frequency of posting
• Overall video quality
• What people are saying in the comments
• The main topics they post about

And then ask yourself:

• What are their most popular videos?
• How are they presenting themselves?
• What is their brand voice?
• How can I differentiate my company from them?
• What ideas can I get for new content from this channel?

Put all your notes into a spreadsheet to help you keep track.

One of your sheets should also consist of a SWOT analysis. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. Understanding these traits can help you figure out how to improve on your competitors’ strategies.

We’ve got a free social media competitor analysis template to get you going right away.

At first, your goal is probably to grow your subscribers and audience as fast as possible. So write down your competitors’ subscriber counts and views. Track your own progress against theirs monthly.

Plus, if you’re competitive, the desire to crush their numbers will motivate you to keep going with your channel, even if growth is slow at first.

Step 4: Study your favorite YouTube channels

Besides learning from your competitors, you should also be learning from your favorite YouTube channels. These don’t even have to be channels related to your industry — just channels you enjoy and want to learn from.

Consuming YouTube content will help you learn a lot about what’s working, especially since it’s always changing.

For example, did you know good audio quality is more important than video quality? Bad audio can deter people from watching your video or subscribing.

A lot goes into making YouTube videos people want to watch. When you watch others, pay attention to things like:

• Video thumbnails
• Channel art
• How other creators are linking to posts or products
• How other creators edit their videos, including text popups and other special effects

There are even entire channels devoted to video editing and YouTube growth. You can track them, or keywords relating to YouTube growth, in your Hootsuite dashboard.

Step 5: Plan and create your content

Now that your channel is set up and you’ve gotten an idea of the content that works well on YouTube, it’s time to put together a content plan for your own YouTube videos.

You’ll want to start by compiling a list of ideas. This might include:

• Questions your audience has asked you
• Trends you find online in your industry
• Popular competitor videos
• Options from our list of 100+ YouTube video ideas
• Experiments you want to try

Compile a list of 10 or so ideas to get started with. While you can find the right publishing cadence later, it’s a good idea to start your channel with a bang, uploading several videos that you can start promoting.

Then, you’ll want to create a video creation, publication, and promotion strategy. Add tasks like:

• Recording your content
• Editing the video together
• Uploading to YouTube
• Optimizing your video (more on this in the next step)
• Scheduling your video content
• Promoting your video

Once you’ve created your first batch, find a consistent schedule — like every 1-2 weeks — that you can keep up with in order to grow your channel.

Step 6: Optimize your videos to get views

Now let’s talk about how you can get views for all of the content you’re planning. YouTube’s 2 billion users watch about 1 billion hours of video content every single day. So how do you rise above the noise and get YouTube’s algorithm to show your videos?

If you’re familiar with SEO and Google’s algorithm, YouTube works in a similar way, but with one key difference — personalization.

When you search a phrase on Google, you’re served roughly the same website results as other people. I say “roughly,” because some results change based on location.

But if you and a buddy sat next to each other in the same room, on the same Wi-Fi and searched for the same keyword, you’d see the same results.

Not the case on YouTube.

When YouTube shows you search results, they take into account the keyword and similar things Google looks for: How popular a video already is, keywords in the title, etc. But YouTube also factors in your watch history and the types of videos it knows you like to watch.

That’s why no two users’ YouTube homepage or search results will be 100% alike.

Personalization plays a role, but it’s still important to do all those other YouTube SEO tasks to get your videos found in search.

Here are six ways you need to optimize your videos to get more views.

Do keyword research

Before you can optimize your video, you need to know what you’re optimizing for. Keyword research gives you the phrases people are using to find content so you can add it to yours, too. (More on this in a sec.)

You can use Google Keyword Planner for keyword research. Additionally, type your topic into the YouTube search bar and see what comes up. These are all things real people have searched for. This can give you ideas for new keywords.

Add your keywords to your video

You should have one main keyword and a few additional ones for each video. Here’s where to add them:

• Video title. Make sure your main keyword features prominently in your video title
• Video description. Input your main keyword within the first three sentences, then add 1-2 related keywords
• Video tags. According to YouTube, this has minimal impact, but use your keywords as tags anyway (consider using a tool like TubeBuddy to help find more relevant tags)
• Hashtags. Include 1-2 hashtags with your main keyword and a relevant keyword at the bottom of your video description

Use timestamps

YouTube timestamps are like breaking your video into chapters. It allows viewers to skip around to the sections they’re most interested in. This increases the chance they’ll watch more of your video.

Take a look at how the Hootsuite Labs team uses timestamps to help their audience navigate longer videos:

Create a detailed video description

Each video’s description should have a unique section of a few sentences describing what it’s about. But, you can create default descriptions to save time for the parts you want in every video.

Here’s what you want to include in your full video description:

• Synopsis of video
• Timestamps/chapters
• Relevant video and website links
• Link to your homepage
• Links to your other social media accounts
• Links to your products or services mentioned in the video
• A call to action
• Hashtags

Create an engaging video thumbnail

Custom thumbnails are so important for views. Besides your title, it’s the only other thing users have to decide if they want to watch your video or not.

What counts as a good YouTube thumbnail will vary depending on your audience. As a minimum, make sure it isn’t just a screenshot from your video. Use a photo or your brand elements and add some text to lure viewers in — like Hootsuite does on the Hootsuite Labs channel:

Current specs are a 16:9 format with a minimum size of ​​1280 x 720 pixels.

Respond to comments

YouTube is a social network, right? So act like it. Responding to viewer comments shows you’re there to build a community, not to push out self-promotional content.

Here’s a secret: It also boosts your video’s status to the algorithm because more comments = a more popular-seeming video.

Step 7: Market your YouTube channel and attract followers

Now it’s time to promote your video content so you can get more subscribers and grow your channel. Once you’ve started creating, publishing, and optimizing your videos, you need to create a distribution strategy that helps spread the word.

While YouTube SEO should help you improve your overall reach on the platform, there is also work to be done off the platform.

Cross-promote your new YouTube channel on your website, other social media platforms, email newsletter, and more. Some distribution channels include:

• Adding a link to your channel from your website and email newsletter
• Embedding relevant videos onto your landing pages and blog posts
• Linking to playlists and videos from your social media channels and newsletter
• Collaborating with other brands or creators for cross-promotion
• Sharing links to relevant videos in online forums and communities

Get the word out that your brand now has a YouTube channel, create consistent (and great) content, and watch that subscriber count grow.

Step 8: Test YouTube advertising

Not growing fast enough? Try YouTube ads.

Most YouTube ads are videos but you can also place banner ads, either in videos or on the website. You can also make your video ads either skippable (after the first 5 seconds) or unskippable (for a max of 15 seconds).

Here’s an example of what a skippable YouTube ad looks like:

As a Google company, YouTube ads operate through the Google Ads platform. Running successful ads requires a strategy of its own, which we detail in our guide to Google Ads.

Besides the campaign strategy, before you try out paid ads, make sure you have:

• A rock-solid understanding of who your audience is
• Optimized your YouTube channel’s visual branding and description
• Uploaded at least 5-10 videos so your new visitors can get a sense of what you’re all about

Step 9: Try working with YouTube creators

One great way to boost your reach and become a more well-known presence on YouTube is to work with YouTube creators. There are tens of thousands of influencers on YouTube, giving you a wide range of video creators to choose from.

Plus, while new social platforms pop up all the time and become the “hot” place to advertise, YouTube has remained a high-performing channel for brands. And it’s the number one platform for consuming influencer marketing content.

As with any form of paid advertising or marketing campaign, you can’t jump straight into an influencer partnership without some prep work. A few things to keep in mind before you start include:

• Know your audience and know your goals
• Follow FTC guidelines for disclosing paid or sponsored content — ensure your creator partner uses the hashtags #ad or #sponsored, as a minimum
• Choose an influencer who aligns with your brand and who you trust to produce high-quality content
• Analyze your results after the campaign and learn what to do differently next time

Influencer video content examples

There are several different types of influencer videos you can work with a creator to make. Some of those include:

• Unboxing/haul videos. Influencers will open different PR packages that brands send to them; these are common ways influencer gifting campaigns are featured
• Tutorials. Influencers will dedicate a full video explaining how to do something using your product/service
• Product reviews. Influencers will try out your product/service and review it for their viewers
• Product placement/mentions. Throughout regular videos, influencers will subtly showcase or mention products that they use, sometimes providing discount codes for their audience
• Micro-ads. Influencers will include a micro-ad or promotion of your product in the middle of their video
• Sponsored videos. Your brand sponsors an entire video, i.e., if a makeup brand sponsors an influencer’s “get ready with me” video

Here’s an example of a sponsored video where makeup artist NikkieTutorials is creating a full-face makeup look using only SHEGLAM products:

If you want to work with influencers, you’ll need to compile a list of relevant creators and start reaching out to them to get an understanding of what they offer, what their rates are, and if a partnership makes sense.

Step 10: Analyze and adapt

As with all marketing, you need to track your YouTube analytics at least monthly. Use YouTube’s built-in reports to see what your audience is watching, what they like the most, where your traffic is coming from and more.

Use analytics to track your channel growth, too. Write down your numbers monthly for:

• Subscribers
• Views
• View duration
• Top videos
• Watch time
• Impressions
• Your click-through rate (CTR)

This becomes your benchmark to measure your channel by each month. Not growing? Then it’s time to adjust your YouTube marketing strategy.

5 YouTube marketing tools

Boost your YouTube marketing results with the use of helpful tools. Some must-haves are as follows.

1. Hootsuite

Hootsuite’s YouTube scheduling tools are perfect for crafting a consistent and easy-to-manage YouTube content strategy.

While you can always just schedule your videos within YouTube Studio, why step out of your (work)flow? Hootsuite can schedule all your social media posts, not just your YouTube videos.

More than a scheduler, Hootsuite’s dashboard allows you to monitor brand and keyword mentions across all your channels. You can do everything you need to for social media directly from Hootsuite.

That includes post creation, advertising, and analytics reporting, and you can save a ton of time by responding to comments directly from your dashboard.

Your entire team can have access to collaboration tools that allow you to effectively manage social accounts at scale, all in one place.

Try Hootsuite free for 30 days

2. TubeBuddy

TubeBuddy is a Chrome extension that can be a huge help when it comes to optimizing your videos and creating a solid content strategy. As you use the YouTube search bar for keyword research, TubeBuddy’s extension can provide you with keyword scores, ensuring you find the best content ideas for your strategy.

More than that, it can help you pull together tags, write comprehensive descriptions, and get basic analytics from your videos that help you adapt your strategy and continue your growth.

3. VidIQ

VidIQ is another tool that can help you find the best keywords and optimize your content. It also comes with an AI content generator to help you write descriptions and maximize each video’s potential.

Get personalized video ideas, analyze forecasts for video performance, audit your competitors, and access a wealth of AI tools that you can use to improve your content.

4. Canva

Canva can be a big help in a number of different ways. If you don’t have a video editor and/or graphic designer on staff, Canva is the perfect tool for getting help with video editing, thumbnail creation, and any other video or graphic needs you might have for your channel.

Create your channel art, design a template for stunning video thumbnails, and even create short videos using Canva’s video and graphic design editing functions.

5. Mentionlytics

Mentionlytics is the perfect tool for monitoring online conversations around your brand and industry, helping you find even more content ideas for your YouTube channel. Get insights from across websites and social media channels that can feed into your strategy.

Plus, Mentionlytics offers social media reporting, publishing capabilities, sentiment analysis, and more to help with your other marketing tactics.

Let Hootsuite make growing your YouTube channel easier. Get scheduling, promotion and marketing tools for your entire team, all in one place. Sign up free today.

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With files from Chloe West.

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