Welcome to The Social Smarty Show, your weekly podcast for social media marketing tips, tactics and practical digital marketing advice. Let's get you taking real action to grow your online audience, build connections and your business. I'm your host, Jodine McIntyre. Think of me as your digital marketing coach, cheerleader and wingwoman all rolled into one. Grab some of my social media marketing know how for free at www.socialsmarty.com/freebies. Now, before we dive in, make sure you subscribe so you don't miss any future episodes.
Welcome to episode number nine of The Social Smarty Show. In this episode, I'll be sharing with you six tools, resources, places I go to generate ideas for social media content. But before I dive in, I want to ask you a favor. If there is anyone you know who might enjoy listening to The Social Smarty Show, maybe a family member or a friend or a business bestie, then I would love for you to share it with them. It would really mean so much to me right now that that's out of the way. Let's kick off with number one.
My first tool that I'm going to share with you today is called Answer the Public. Now Answer the Public is a very cool tool that generates more ideas for your social media content than you will ever need. When you search for something on Google and Google tries to guess what you're searching, it sort of finishes off the sentence for you that is called a suggested search. Now Answer the Public uses that information from search engines like Google and Bing, and it generates a ton of useful phrases and questions that people are asking all around a particular keyword.
Okay, truthfully, I don't 100% understand how it works, but I do know that it gathers that information on what people want to know about a topic and it spits it out in this lovely word cloud. So, for example, I might jump on to Answer the Public. I type in the words Facebook Ads. That's my topic. I hit enter. And after 10 seconds or so, this big word cloud appears and it has all these different branches on it. It's got who, what, when, why, which can are how all those different types of words. And then from each branch, there are questions and phrases, the things that people are actually searching. So, for example, when I search for Facebook ads, some of the results are:
How much will Facebook ads cost?
Are Facebook Ads worth it?
What is Facebook Ads Manager?
Where is the Facebook Ads library?
Is it safe to buy from Facebook Ads?
And you can see how this tool is going to generate so many ideas for your content. Now you can export these results as a spreadsheet or you can literally print off the word cloud. But honestly, this one tool will give you weeks and weeks of social media content ideas. Now, there is a limit to the number of searches you can complete in a 24 hours period. But a little hack. If you want to get extra searches, just jump into incognito mode on your browser. But it's definitely worth checking out. And I'll pop a link in my show notes.
On to number two. The next place I go to for ideas for content is my Google and Facebook reviews. Now, when I Scroll back through my old Google reviews and Facebook reviews, even feedback that I've been sent in emails, this can give me a ton of ideas for content. So firstly, of course you can share the reviews as they are. They make really good expert content. If you're not sure what I mean by expert content and you're not following my E C AS framework, you might want to check out www.socialsmarty.co/planner, have a look there and it will all become clear.
Back to these reviews. So you can screenshot them and post them as they are. Or you can use Canva to create a really on brand sort of tile to pop your reviews on. And remember, if the review has been sent to you privately, like in a direct message or an email, make sure you ask permission before you share it.
But the other thing is that when you read through those reviews, you may notice particular words or themes coming up that you can expand on. Like, people might point out a particular benefit or a feature of your product that they love. And then you can create a social media post around that. Or they might talk about how working with you made them feel, the problem that you solve for them, why they chose to work with you, or buy from you. There are so many nuggets of gold hidden in your reviews and testimonials.
Now, the third place I like to go to to get ideas for social media content is actually Google's related searches. Now, this is a really simple tool on Google. You might not have even noticed that it's there. But when you search for something on Google and you delivered a page of results, you've got a whole page of results in front of you. If you scroll down a little bit, there's a section there that says people also ask. It's usually just a little way down from the top. And as Google explains, these are the questions that people commonly search for on Google that relate to what you're searching for.
So what you do is you search on Google for something that's related to your industry, your products or services, and then you take note of those related searches. So let me give you an example. I might search for Instagram stories. Now, when I Scroll down a little way, I'll see the box that says people also ask. And in there are questions like:
How can I see someone's story on Instagram without them knowing?
How do stories work on Instagram?
How do you see recent stories on Instagram?
Now, I can go ahead and I can create posts that answer each of these questions, see how simple that is. And I know that there's interest in these topics as they are actually things that people are searching for, so it makes total sense. Give it a go. It all comes back to getting that right search terms. It needs to obviously relate to your industry, your product, your services, whatever it is that your business is all about. And then have a look for those related search terms, right?
Number four is Facebook groups. Now, Facebook groups are an absolute goldmine for social media content ideas. The key here is to join Facebook groups where your target audience hangs out. Once you're in, then you start listening. Listen for the questions people are asking relevant to your industry or the type of product or service you offer. Listen to the struggles they're having. Of course, you can search through old posts too, so simply use the search function within the group and search for relevant keywords. I'm really lucky with my target audience because I am targeting business owners and there are a ton of Facebook groups specifically for business owners, so I get a lot of great content ideas from those.
On to number five. As the saying goes, it all goes down in the DMs. If someone takes the time to reach out to you via private message, via direct message to ask your question or offer you feedback. This can make fantastic social media content because if one person has taken the time to reach out to you, you can almost guarantee that there's at least one other person wandering or thinking the same thing that didn't bother reaching out. So what I would do is I would take that question or that feedback and I would flesh it out. I would really create a post around that theme or that idea. And if you are going to share maybe feedback that you received via private message, make sure you ask permission first. But it all makes really good content.
Now we're onto the last tool, which is number six and that is called Snazzy AI. Now this really is a snazzy tool. It uses artificial intelligence to help you write all sorts of copy. Head over to the website, you'll find a link in the show notes, sign up for a free account. And with that free account, there's lots of really cool tools. One of them is called Content Expander. Now it's really simple. You add in a topic in a sentence and then you choose the length. You can choose a short caption or a longer caption, and then you click the Write for Me button and soon you'll have a few paragraphs of text that you can use. If I'm honest, it's not spot on. But what it does do is it gives you enough to get things flowing or a starting point that you can move forward from.
Another free tool within Snazzy AI is called Remix this one you pop in a couple of sentences maybe from a previous post that you have already shared and then you hit the write for me button and it just mixes it up and rewords it for you. Again, it's not perfect but it just helps you repurpose your content in a different way. It's actually lots of fun to play around with so give it a go again, you'll find that link in the show notes, have a play around and if nothing else it will get you out of that content writing funk.
So there you have it - six resources to help you generate content for your social media channels. Let's run through them quickly one more time. Number one answer the public. Number two your Google and Facebook reviews and even your emails where you have customer feedback. Number three your Google related searches. Number four is Facebook groups, number five is your DMs, your direct or your private messages and number six is snazzy AI. Hopefully those have given you some tools where you can get the juices flowing, get the creativity running and help you get stuck into creating your content.
Remember you can download my free content planning guide at www.socialsmarty.com/planner if you enjoyed this episode I would love it if you could please leave me a review or a rating. Honestly it means so much to me and it can really help others find my podcast too. And while you're at it make sure to hit that follow or subscribe button and I'll see you next week. Stay social.
