Vishal Pindoriya
There are “social networks” out the wazoo today, and many of them get pretty specific in their contexts. Heck, even Lady Gaga has her own private social network for her fans, and she actually uses it quite effectively in keeping a loyal base of fans. But your business can’t be on all them, and it shouldn’t be on all of them. The broader you go the more complex things get, and then there’s the fact that if you don’t fit in the “scene”, you’ll be called out for it. A bad reputation is the easiest thing in the world to acquire.
That’s why I rarely mention many platforms outside of the big 6: Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Each of these excel in certain areas, and together they cover pretty much everybody who’s online. When it comes to business, however, there’s another player that should be put in the formation: SlideShare.
There several reasons that you should be using SlideShare, one of them being that it is one of the most underutilized “social” platforms out there, making the size of your fish a little bigger there, and the size of your ocean a little smaller. The other side of that coin, which is just as good if not better, is that SlideShare results tend to show up at the top of Google search results. Here are four ways your business can take advantage of SlideShare.
1. SEO
Top positioning in search results for SlideShare presentations tells us that Google responds very well to the site, and that there is enough traffic there to bolster the results of any worthy content creator. In simpler terms, if you can put together some snazzy presentations that are optimized well you could generate hundreds of hits very quickly, considering the ratio of good providers to hungry consumers on the site.
In case you are the last to know, SEO as most people know it has been dead for over a year. Content has become king again, but that doesn’t mean that the crawlers are ignoring metadata and keywords, either. Stuffing articles full of keywords, even at a 2-3% ratio or higher, only gets you inquisitive looks and raised suspicions from the 2.0 bots, following the last couple of algorithm changes. SlideShare is one perfectly acceptable and highly efficient vehicle for great search results positioning.
2. Branch Out
Trying new things as a company works best when you have a lower exposure threshold. You don’t want to fall on your face in front of a million Facebook fans, but in front of a few thousand SlideShare browsers it probably wouldn’t sting as bad. Slideshows don’t have to be boring business presentations. In fact, one type of content that is perfectly suited to slides is also one of the most popular: lists or listicles.
If you normally can put out stunning technical content, you could try your hand at humor to see how it’s received by your audience. SlideShare is a great place to try and branch out in your approach to online marketing and your style. You’ll have enough people for good feedback, but not enough to become the butt of the site’s favorite joke.
3. Condense Vital Information
Whether you want to use for it for employees or for your audience, a slide presentation is a great way to condense the important information, the parts that really need to be shared, into easily digestible pieces that they can feed themselves at their own pace. It’s a good way to avoid a room full of employees with their eyes glazed over while you ramble. It’s also a good way to tell people how to prepare for a natural disaster, or any number of other things.
Remember the image part of the slides. Text alone loses interest. You image should keep their attention on the slide, but not necessarily on the image itself. Imagine a wonderfully made infographic, then try to break it up into smaller pieces so that each section/slide gets the message across in a brief, informative, and attractive way.
4. Extend the Circle of Social Life
The last slide on any SlideShare presentation should always have share buttons for other networks. It’s not as common for someone on Facebook to share something with Twitter, or vice versa, but from SlideShare, people will likely share to at least one. This gives you yet another point in your web where cross-platform sharing opens up the door to new potential clients. Tracking these clicks and shares is simple with Sendible’s social media management software, and you can also use it to post your presentations to SlideShare, so your dashboard tracking is in place from the first second it’s up.
Having a well-integrated social media presence is a must. Each platform should point the way to others, and all should point to your website ultimately. You if aren’t getting any clicks on the “buy” button, it’s all for show anyway. Make sure that you are covering at least three social platforms with your strategy, and think about adding SlideShare to that strategy as well.
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