This article was contributed by Mark Long.

Social media is the platform, not only to connect with friends and family, but your regular customers, your potential clients, and even with your rivals.

You cannot expect your online business to succeed if you are not connected via social media. However, to really make your social presence felt by all, you need to market your content effectively. Here’s how.

Click here to tweet these social media tips.

1.    Headlines are More Important Than You Think

The importance of headlines cannot be denied when it comes to social media and is often more important the content itself. You should create multiple titles for each post so you can promote the same content a number of times.

Here are some tools to help you generate some terrific titles and even analyze their worth.

• Ultimate List of Headline Templates
• Seopressor.com/Headline Generator
• CoSchedule Headline Analyzer
• Amazing Tools for Optimizing Your Headlines and Content 

2.    Connect Visually with Your Followers

It is of utmost importance to connect with your visitors visually. Start with an eye-catching, impressive cover photo. It may not seem very important, but it does make an impression on your visitors and drives clicks. Your cover photo is like a window showcasing your brand. Keep it fresh, new and exciting to keep those clicks coming.

3.    Use a Wide Variety of Mediums to Share and Promote Content

Go for dynamic content promotion and refrain from just sharing text. Videos and images are considered the highest shared items on social media. Informative and knowledgeable content, assembled in pointers retains the interest of readers much more than the lengthy paragraphs. Infographics are an excellent resource to share your content colorfully and interestingly. Although infographics require a lot of time and effort, they get shared much more often.

See here for some tools to great vibrant infographics and free stock photography.

5.    Share Your Achievements: The Numbers Matter

Keep a track of your number of followers, sales and awards and publicize them. People like progress and will feel like they are apart of it too. For instance, when you see that 1000 people have liked your page and they love the content you’ve been sharing on it, make a grand announcement. Pic by by Vladimir Marchukov.

6.    Feedback from Your Followers is Essential

Your followers are your customers and a customer is always right. Connect with them. Ask them for their feedback. And pay heed to it. If your brand or product can be improved to meet the needs of your customers, what more can you ask for? There is nothing better than a satisfied customer. They are in fact your brand ambassadors. They give you publicity without any investment from your side. You can, in fact, treat the comments and feedback that you get as a think tank for your brand.

However, when someone tweets or posts something to your account, whether it’s good, bad, or neutral, you must always respond.

7.    Ask Your Followers & Give Back

Your biggest promoters are your fans and followers. Ask and you shall receive. Get their assistance in sharing and promoting your content with their friends and followers. Their opinions hold more value than any other publicity that you do on your own.

However, there should be some perks for your fans as well. Thanking them and appreciating them publicly would be a good way to start, but you will have to go that extra mile; after it is your loyal customers we are talking about. Whatever you do, do it from the heart.

Here are some suggestions to appreciate your loyal fans and followers:

• Personalized notes, emails or other methods to appreciate the efforts of faithful fans. For example, Facebook recently thanked some selected users by creating a personalized friendship video and gave an option to edit it which definitely touched their hearts.

• You can also thank your customers by creating a photo or video which puts them in the spotlight. Get creative. You have a potential to do a lot of things –  it just has to have a personal and human touch.

• Free gifts, discounts, and other freebies are always appreciated by everyone.

8.    Share Your Post at Peak Timings

When does most of your targeted audience use the social platform that you are posting to? It is essential that the content you have worked so hard on is visible to a large number of viewers. Post at peak hours, according to the different social platforms.

Facebook has Facebook Insights to help you determine the peak timings of your target audience, and Buffer has a tool to optimize based on your previous posts.

9.    Share Your Content at Multiple Times

In the beginning, of the article, it is mentioned that it is beneficial to create several titles for the same post. It is important to do so because you can actually share the same post multiple times on different hours and dates. All your users cannot see your post at the same time, so by posting it numerous times with proper intervals, you can ensure your content reaches maximum numbers of viewers. Buffer is a great tool to do this.

10.  Utilize the Comments Section

The comments section on your own site is essential for multiple purposes. It allows you to communicate with your fans and it also gives them a chance to put forward their opinion and thoughts.

Commenting also allows you to voice out your opinion as well on other platforms. In fact, you can utilize the comments section on other sites to promote your content in an understated tone. For instance, you could offer your tips in the post and then link to your article with more detailed tips.

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Mark Long is a researcher and blogger with experience writing on multiple topics including SEO, AdWords, PPC, and more. He is currently writing for Saba SEO, a trusted San Diego SEO company.