In the past year, the social realm has seen some significant changes with the introduction of Google Plus and the explosion of Pinterest. Both of these platforms happen to have strong image use tie-ins.
Of course to try to dominate the stream of the ever-present social media behemoth, Facebook, you need to use a lot of photos there, too.
With image use at the center of most every company’s social media strategy, have the lines begun to blur on the differences between platforms? Are we approaching a point of FacePlusTrest?
When I think about the percentage of my updates that are “shares” from another user vs. the updates that are original content I create, I can definitely say that the pendulum has steadily swung towards “shares” in the past 12 months.
The “pinnable image” from Pinterest is now regularly seen on Facebook and Google Plus. The notion of turning quotes into images and adding text to images, then sharing those images, and then hoping those images are repinned or shared over and over – creating the social media virality we all desire – has become standard social media operating procedure in a lot of ways.
It is because of this marked increase in sharing others’ content that content curation has become a significant part of the job of those who manage social media accounts.
This image received 51 LIKEs and 96 shares from a page with 370 fans.
A post on a different fan page (of 350 fans) received 26 shares and 20 LIKEs.
Content curation is a hard skill to teach and to learn, and often is best acquired simply through trial and error. What content will work best for your fans and your business is not going to be the same content that works best for the next business. That is true regardless of whether or not you created the content yourself.
You know your fans and customers the best, and should use that knowledge as your gauge for deciding what updates and images to share. And as soon as you spot a clever, witty, funny or smart image in your Google Plus stream? Try sharing it with those in your Circles and give this content curation thing a whirl.
