Creating a social media post is an individual practice. Each author, social media specialist, or marketer chooses their own set of tools and rules for creating social media posts. But to create effective posts, they need to be analyzed and constantly improved.

The process of creating a post can be divided into three parts: preparation, practice, and analytics. This article will discuss how to craft compelling social media posts in detail.

Social media post creation: Preparation

Creating an effective social media post starts with working out the basics. You must understand why the post is needed, who it is aimed at, and what form it should take.

Here are some steps involved in preparing for your posts;

1. Set a goal

No goal means no effectiveness. Any post on social networks should fulfill its purpose: to cause a reaction, lead to the website, advertise the product, promote an upcoming New Year’s event, etc. The purpose does not have to be direct. It can be aimed at communicating benefits, increasing recognition, answering questions from the audience, etc.

Anyway, the business, content marketer, social media specialist, or even the copywriter determines the purpose of the social media posts. When writing a post, the author’s first question is why the publication is needed and what effect is expected from it.

Social media posts are a constant communication with the audience, which works both ways. When the goal is established, it’s easier to evaluate the performance of a post. If posts appear without a goal, it’s hard to realize how good they were. You can get a lot of likes but zero conversions to the website. So, set goals before you create social media posts.

2. Research the target audience

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A target audience is a group of people who share common characteristics that a publication is intended to reach. Knowing your target audience will be helpful for effective communication, tone-of-voice (TOV), and subject matter. 

If your goal is to advertise a product, audience persona-based marketing is a crucial component in your go-to-market research.

For starters, knowing people’s age, geography, and interests is enough. Statistics within social networks will help to determine demographics.

It is more complicated with interests. You can focus on the audience segment per the company’s strategy. Segmentation helps to build off competitors and target a certain group. For example:

• You can create posts for business owners and executives looking for new ways to optimize their work.
• You can create posts targeted at young people who want to get into IT.
• You can also create posts for those who like to cook but dislike buying groceries.

3. Determine the topic of the post

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You can image the topic, but making a content plan is better. It is a list of posts that will be published on social networks.

One of the most important parameters of effective posting is its frequency. A content plan helps to plan the publishing process of posts, choose topics, build a sales funnel, and decide what to post today.

Creating a content plan requires some effort. You need to decide on the topics and types of posts in advance and then write them out a few weeks in advance.

Here are some sources of content inspiration;

• Forums and Q&A services. To understand your audience’s requests and see the problems they often face.
• Blogs and media. To know what competitors and media from your field write about.
• Google Trends. This Google service lets you gauge people’s interest in topics and see trending news.
• Newsbreaks. These are important events that can be played up or commented on. 
• Comments and feedback. You can create posts according to questions that people ask most often in comments and write in reviews.
• ChatGPT. It can help you pick a list of simple topics on any subject.
• Content matrix. It can help in creating topics. It is a table or a mind map where rubrics, keywords, scenarios of product use, or ideas are stored.

In social media management, the content plan can have different proportions of publications, which can be a guideline but not a rule. For example, the feed can consist of 40% engaging, 25% educational, 30% user-generated, and 5% promotional content. But each company sets its own limits, and recently, such formulas have not been used at all.

4. Select the type and format of the post

Essentially, the type of post is the purpose of the post. A post can be:

• Commercial. Product descriptions, promotions, discounts, posters, lead magnets, and product news.
• Informational. News, research, notes, posts.
• Engaging. Surveys, discussions, questions, comparisons, and direct appeals to the audience.
• Entertaining. Picks, humor, comics, games.
• Educational. Instructions, guides, answers to questions.
• User-generated. Reviews, customer stories.

Posts are also divided by format:

• Text post. It can be short, medium, or long, with or without media. Emphasize text over visuals.
• Visual post. It can be a meme, poster, or comic book with minimal or no textual support.

Generally, the preparation part is more strategic work.

SEE: 4 Tips For Overcoming Your Fear of Posting on Social Media

Social media post creation: Practice

The first part, preparation, is the gathering of information to create your post. The practice is the creation. Here are a few recommendations that will help you cope with this task.

1. Follow the rules for writing posts

There are content rules and formulas that are especially relevant for sales posts. For all other types of social media posts, there are several time-tested rules:

• The post is written with social media in mind. Social networks have different expectations of posts. In Telegram, the audience is fine with long texts without any design, but the same text on Instagram must be shortened or reorganized into a carousel.
• The unity of meaning is observed. One post should be devoted to one thought or one goal. 
• There are conclusions. After reading the post, readers must draw a conclusion.
• There is a call to action (CTA). Go to the website, write a comment, and buy – there is a temptation to add these CTAs to the end of the post. But it’s better when the post itself leads smoothly to action, and the finale no longer needs a direct appeal to readers.
• The post has structure. Use paragraphs and headings, emphasizing homogeneous elements with bullet points, steps, and actions.
• Visual noise is absent. An abundance of fonts, emoji, and hashtags greatly impairs the perception of text in the post.
• The post is proofread. Remove unnecessary information and logical repetitions and write for people in simple and clear language, respecting the TOV of the company.

Following these rules for writing posts is not just about adhering to linguistic conventions. It’s a strategic approach to effective communication. Essay Tigers can help you create well-crafted content that improves comprehension, readability, and overall user experience.

2. Use visualization

You can create a design in Figma or Canva. However, not all posts need visualization. And you must understand this.

Here are some things to remember when selecting pictures for a social media post:

• Picture compliments or interestingly plays off the text of the post. It doesn’t seem redundant or used for beauty.
• Unique illustration is always better than an image from a photo stock.
• Pictures work as an independent element of content. It creates a mood or conveys the atmosphere.
• Pictures should not be overloaded with colors and graphic elements. 
• Don’t use images obtained illegally. If you use clients’ photos, you should also get their permission.

How to design the text on the Instagram carousel post:

• The caption should not duplicate the text on the photos. The introduction for the carousel post text should be original.
• Use no more than two fonts. The best way to achieve contrast is to change the stroke of the font. 
• Write in small type. The text should be read in less than a minute. Ideally, keep to 200-250 characters or less.
• Illustrate. Where possible, texts should be replaced with an illustration, image, graphic, or illustration. This can be done easily with the use of an online drawing app.
• Put the text on a solid-colored background.
• Keep the style consistent. Use templates to keep the carousel in the same style.

With lots of information flying about, capturing your audience’s attention is paramount, and visual content achieves this with greater efficacy than text alone. Images, videos, and infographics not only stand out in crowded social media feeds but also foster higher engagement levels. 

3. Publish posts according to the plan

You can post manually or use an auto-posting service, where you can schedule dates and places to post. As for the most successful time, it doesn’t play a special role.

Smart algorithms work in social networks so that content appears in each user’s feed individually, depending on their behavior and requests. On Telegram, most subscribers turn off notifications and read posts sometime after release.

SEE: 5 Tips For Creating High-Quality Social Media Content For Your Small Business

Social media post creation: Analytics

This is working on improving your post’s performance indicators: the level of engagement, the number of reactions, and reposts. You need to track results and constantly refine your content accordingly.

1. Analyze the effectiveness of your posts

Regularly look at your post statistics and track performance against your goals. For example:

• Promotional post – how much traffic to the website you got
• Entertaining post – how many likes it got
• Engaging – how many comments were collected under the post

It is better to compare the data at equal intervals, for example, once a week. Statistics are available both within social networks and in third-party tools.

Here are some metrics to look at to evaluate the effectiveness of a post:

• Subscriber dynamics. It reflects the audience’s overall interest in the content. An increase in unsubscribes may indicate irrelevant posts for the audience.
• Level of engagement on the post. All reactions to the post are divided by the number of subscribers or views. This indicator helps to understand the interest in the post.
• Clickability level. It is the number of clicks or conversions divided by the reach. It helps to assess the quality of the promotional post.

Analyzing the effectiveness of your social media posts is not merely a retrospective exercise but a forward-looking strategy. It empowers you to refine your content, optimize your approach, and build a more impactful online presence, ultimately contributing to the success of your broader digital and business objectives.

Make your social media posts better

• Get rid of ineffective topics. The data collected from analytics will help you understand which posts were successful and which were not. So pay more attention to your data.
• Update topics. Good topics run out quickly, so there is always a risk to start writing posts on the same topics all the time. To prevent this from happening, create a content matrix and update it regularly with new ideas, topics, and headings.
• Experiment with text and visuals. Change the volume of posts, tone of voice, structure, and subject matter, and measure how your audience responds. Constant updating carries the risk of unsubscribes but, at the same time, keeps the audience from getting bored.

You can develop a more nuanced understanding of your target audience by delving into demographic data, user behaviors, and preferences. This knowledge enables you to create content that speaks directly to the needs and interests of your audience, fostering stronger connections and building a more loyal and engaged community.

Bottom line

An effective social media post is valuable to the audience. It can be written in 3 lines but hit so well that it will be more effective than a dozen more lengthy and elaborate posts. Think about values rather than content plans. Then deliver it to your audience in the best way possible.