Visual Contenting April 2016 | Page 33

CONTENT MARKETING Here’s what you need to know about Google+ headlines and content: • The highest-performing Google+ headlines are 60 characters or less • Readers only absorb the first and last three words of a headline, so headlines that are 6 words or less have the most impact • The ideal length of Google+ body content is 200-440 characters LinkedIn LinkedIn posts are designed to be short and sweet. According to BufferApp, the ideal length for a post on the platform is 25 words. • LinkedIn posts that are around 25 words encourage the highest number of clickthroughs. • For B2B companies, the ideal word length for a LinkedIn post can vary between 16-25 words. • For B2C companies on LinkedIn, the ideal word length for a post is between 21-25 words. Instagram Since Instagram isn’t focused on text-based content, but rather great visuals: there are currently no solid “best practices” for word count. You can, however, follow these tips for best results from your Instagram posts. Visual Contenting • Use creative #hashtags to promote interaction with your established network. Consider using the Instagram Explorer page to learn more about trending hashtags that can enhance your brand. Up to 15 hashtags per post is an average amount. Always be relatable with your hashtags to what your visual topic is about. • If you’re sharing an Instagram photo on Twitter or Facebook, be sure to lessen and streamline your hashtags. Photos with too many hashtags will look out of place on these networks. Some brands drop the hashtags in an Instagram follow-up comment if they’re streamlining. • Tell your brand story through captions. This offers context for your image and helps followers connect with your content. Pinterest When it comes to Pinterest descriptions, keeping them within the correct charactercount range can enhance their performance hugely. • 200-character descriptions earn the most re-pins • Pins that feature CTAs earn 80% more engagement than those that don’t • Research has found that pins with an image height 800 pixels or greater earn significantly more re-pins than those with smaller images Blog Posts Rule of thumb: blog posts are the place where informative, guidestyle, long-form content can shine. • Buffer found that the ideal reading length of a blog post is 7 minutes. This translates to roughly 1,600 words • As a general rule, longer blogs are more likely to provide quality markers for search engines, which allows them to rank higher • Blog posts that are longer than 1,500 words receive an average of 68% more tweets and 23% more Facebook likes than shorter posts. • Most web pages that sit in the top 10 SERP positions for any given keyword have at least 2,000 words • Eight-word or longer search queries have risen by 34,000%, which means that content targeting long-tail keywords will perform better today. 5 Key Best Practices for Social Media Posts No matter where you’re posting content, there are several rules you should always follow: 1. Be helpful. Readers want helpful content. It matters less if your content is 80 or 800 characters and much, much more that it’s helpful and well-written.