Navigate The Perplexing Social Media Landscape By Making Your Content Shareable

While pursuing my marketing and economics degrees this spring semester at Carthage College , I have the great opportunity to take a Social Media Marketing course taught by Stephanie Baiocchi . Although we have only scratched the surface of the material that we will be diving into over the course of the next three months, our early discussions about the importance of making your content shareable have been especially stimulating.

The backbone of our discussions have come from Brendan Kane ’s One Million Followers. Brendan has played parts in the rise of many of today’s headlining names such as Taylor Swift and Rihanna. He repeatedly notes that one of the driving forces behind his success has been making content easily shareable. Brendan uses insights from his time working with Taylor Swift to get this point across. He writes that one of the most successful methods he used in growing Taylor’s following was meet and greet events. Taking a photo with one of the world’s biggest celebrities is as shareable as it gets. Kane points out that (at the time of publishing) the average Facebook user has 338 friends, so for every 100,000 fans Taylor meets with, she could potentially be reaching up to 1,014,000 people assuming her fans do share those photos.

This potential for exponential growth is great, but what about navigating all the clutter out there? Or rising above algorithms??

Well, not only does shareable content help you grow quickly, but it also helps keep your followers engaged. As Brendan points out, “even after you reach a million followers, the content that you post will only reach on average 2 and 5 percent of your audience.” This is scary, but your followers are much more likely to have your content pop up on their feed if it is shared by one of their friends. Not only does this help your content push its way through clutter and algorithms, but it also proves it is resonating with your audience. Seeing a rise in shares in your analytics is a crystal clear indicator that you are hitting the spot with your followers. Plus, shared content is trusted much more to fresh eyes!

Now, what makes content shareable?

Well, the blueprint of creating shareable content involves just three things: value, emotion, and inspiration. People decide to share a piece of content to their network because they believe it will provide value to them. Dull and shallow content will simply be looked at and scrolled passed. Next, users share content because it strikes an emotional chord with them. They enjoy the feeling they get when interacting with it and want their friends to feel it as well, so they share it with them. Finally, viewers share content that inspires them. Content that generates feelings of self-fulfillment or growth in the world is sure to be shared. This is because it makes the sharer feel better they interacted with it and boosts their spirits knowing that they will be able to inspire their network as well!