The secret to promoting content on social media: Be your own fan
Sell your content the way you goad friends to binge your favourite shows
Although no one else I knew shared this obsession, I grew up on a steady diet of car magazines from the US, thanks to the library my family visited religiously every fortnight. For a time, tweenaged me could rattle off the performance specs of every American production vehicle on the market in the 90s.
My interest in automotive journalism stayed alive decades later, mostly because there are terrific writers and editors in this field who bring passion, fun, and joy to their work.
This might all be too much of a preamble to point your attention to the intriguing tweet below from car news outlet The Drive, which demonstrates how a publication should promote its content on social networks.
It’s also doing a great job of selling the story beyond the image, title, and subtitle: you get a taste of what's in store for you, and wonder what else you might discover when you click through to the piece.
That only happens when your writer has a good nose for stories, and when the social media team is clued into what makes each story special or unique. Whoever wrote that tweet knows this story as well as a fan might; they know what’s worth pointing out in this particular piece to make it stand out from other homebuild stories.
This strategy has worked well for The Drive in the recent past: see these tweets that have racked up hundreds of likes following the same format.
This is the opposite of clickbait: demonstrate to your audience there's plenty to chew on if they visit your platform, and they'll appreciate the effort. It also gives you yet another opportunity to let your brand voice shine through.
Enjoy content breakdowns like this? Stay tuned for more, and comment to let me know what you'd like explained in future posts.