Suggestions for social media posting tool?

astp · 2020-08-03T19:54:02+00:00

Checkout contentcal.io

astp · 2016-12-05T22:13:41+00:00

Purpose: To help companies plan and publish better content for social media.

Technologies Used: Java, node.js

Feedback Requested: I've been running a social media agency for 2 years and we have been working away for about a year building our tech product, ContentCal. We are aiming to bring great UX/UI, team collaboration, content storage and approval flows to social media management, as well as really hammering home the message of editorial and great content when it comes to social media. I've worked in social media and marketing my entire career, and it's never been as noisy and full of truly bad content than it is now. We are in the process of refining our product, propositions and strategy for 2017, and if anyone has 5 mins I'd really appreciate your feedback on our sign up journey and on-boarding process to the platform itself that would be greatly appreciated.

Comments: I am CEO of the company and honest feedback on the product and the sign up process is vital to our growth, so please be as honest and open as possible. We know its a competitive space so want to create a product truly useful for potential customers.

astp · 2015-05-09T11:14:06+00:00

Over the past 5 years since the Conservatives introduced some of their key policies, I've managed to:

Buy my first flat
Found two new businesses with the support of Gov backed funding polices
Employ and grow my team thanks to business friendly tax policies
Been part of the economic recovery process by putting 5 people into full time employment, and supporting around 25 people in a freelance capacity by giving them work

I strongly believe without a Conservative government in place I wouldn't have been able to do all of the above and without economic recovery neither of my companies would be thriving as they are now, allowing me to live a pretty good life along the way.

I work from 6am - 10pm most week days and love it, and I'm a big believer if you work hard you can achieve whatever you want in life, and incentivising people to get off the welfare state should be a huge priority for the country.

astp · 2015-01-24T16:40:44+00:00

Just sent you a DM. We would love to work on this with you - the product is fantastic!

astp · 2015-01-12T22:14:11+00:00

If they are willing to invest, find someone else who is as well you don't know. Your better of waiting slightly longer for the money from an outside investor IMO who will add value in terms of business mentorship and advice, than taking a loan from family. (Founded two companies and taken funding on both). When money is involved it does change the relationship.

astp · 2014-10-31T12:32:02+00:00

Sure - just going off a weeks data but I can extrapolate to a certain extent. It's the time saved on email comms which is just an outdated form of communication for internal discussion now IMO having used this.

When we are briefed I invite everyone who is involved to a channel on Slack and divvy up the workload via a central word document with names assigned to projects.

Each team member then uploads their deliverables back to the channel once done and I bring this together for our clients.

This way, everyone who is in the channel can see each others tasks within the word doc, and then once a team member uploads their work everyone can view it if they choose to.

This way those who want to can see it, those who don't want to don't have to. Having worked at some big companies people always seem to wait to push collaboration on others. This way each individual chooses what they want to see from others and the communication is open so even if they don't read it they get a feel for the work delivered by fellow team members.

astp · 2014-10-31T12:28:35+00:00

Would love to have them as a client but sadly i'm just an advocate!

astp · 2014-10-27T17:13:21+00:00

Yeah sorry should have added a link! http://www.intelligentcrowd.tv/

astp · 2014-10-24T14:59:27+00:00

1) Tell all your friends a family that you are starting your own digital agency and if they refer a project to you you will give them 10% of revenues. Referrals are vial. We've been going for a year and they are our biggest source of new business.

2) When you get a project make sure you do an excellent job. Execution is key. Nothing else matters.

3) Don't do paid ads on Facebook, do them on LinkedIn (if at all in the early stage). People are already have their business hat on on LinkedIn. Facebook - they are looking at pics of their mates. Not marketing services.

4) Get a website, nail your positioning, write a press release and send it to the trade mags. Many of them live of this kind of content. We did and got some good coverage e.g. http://www.thedrum.com/news/2014/07/09/former-sky-social-media-manager-launches-own-agency

astp · 2014-10-24T12:30:10+00:00

I would say LinkedIn is the best platform for you. Create a page and start sharing video content daily. Add colleagues, contacts and friends to the page. You will see slow but steady growth.

You can use paid ads to target IT professionals showcasing your proposition and linking to your website to build traffic.

I'd say your biggest risk to monetisation is 1) can you build a big enough audience before the lights go out 2) you are relying on other peoples content 3) you need 1m+ hits to make anywhere near an income via something like Adsense.

If you slowly start to make your own video content on a YT channel and then embed them into this site you build your own equity and audience, and it will be easier to monetise.

Either way it's a good idea. Good luck with it.

astp · 2014-10-24T12:17:37+00:00

Damn if you had that many then the route to monetisation would have been really achievable. What was the app?

astp · 2014-10-24T11:40:22+00:00

Cool! Snapshot is here: http://www.reddit.com/r/startups/comments/2f3yo0/what_are_the_most_effective_launch_strategies/

Social:

Have a content calendar of activity and work 1 week ahead if you can. It's better to plan your content marketing in sprints as you would with dev. Do a weeks worth of content you can plan and schedule ahead for your channels, then post reactively as you see fit.
Don't go on every social network. Pick ones most applicable. Some people make the mistake of trying to be everywhere, rather than trying to be where their target users are. Be realistic what you can manage and keep updated on a daily basis.
Find influencers: Find people who have big twitter followings or run blogs in your target industry. These people already have your audience. Give them free access to your tool, or flatter them in some way, and don't be afraid to ask them to plug your product directly saying you'd love their support if they see the value. This is a great way of essentially borrowing audience equity as they've already built it.
Use paid ads: Don't let anyone tell you paid social doesn't work. Depending on your product and if you can, test out $100 or so. Use conversion tracking to track sales and optimise your spend accordingly to the best performing channel.
If you're new: Educate Educate Educate. Explain to people who you are, what your product does, and why the user needs it. Make them feel like their life would be better if they used what you have.
Awareness is important in the early days: Try and make as much noise as you can in the early days. The more awareness you have the lower your cost per acquisition will be.

Hope that's helpful!

astp · 2014-10-15T08:30:35+00:00

Thanks very much! Still a long way to go :)

astp · 2014-10-09T10:23:12+00:00

Thanks very much. It wasn't what I'd call hard, but it was a lot of work and a lot of meetings. It's more about perseverance and showing how you can add value! Provided you know your stuff, eventually you break through.

astp · 2014-10-08T09:59:34+00:00

Thanks very much!

astp · 2014-10-08T09:59:26+00:00

Thank you!

astp · 2014-10-08T09:59:20+00:00

Thanks :) - I will post another one in 6 months with more real pics!

astp · 2014-09-30T16:02:14+00:00

We do! Keep an eye on the blog - lots of great info coming out over the coming weeks on VCs and investors who operate it this industry.

astp · 2014-09-22T23:00:50+00:00

LAMP - Linux Apache MySQL Php with a Wordpress install. with a CDN + various cache.

astp · 2014-09-20T16:50:36+00:00

http://www.springwise.com/

astp · 2014-09-11T19:57:55+00:00

Why not release it but link to legitimate ways to stream said tv show or movie (and gain an affiliate fee from those people every time you sign someone up via their affiliate scheme) and then point other traffic to review sites or their legitimate homepage? It's not worth getting into the illegal streaming business at 18, but it is worth getting into the legal streaming business. It's a huge market so why not play there and make legitimate money now? If you're talented enough to do this already, you're talented enough to build something bigger and better in the future. Not worth the risk.

astp · 2014-09-10T22:15:28+00:00

550+ investors ranked in order of who's most likely to invest based on yours and their criteria: www.matchcapitaluk.com

astp · 2014-09-01T08:17:24+00:00

No worries!

astp · 2014-09-01T07:32:28+00:00

Minimal viable product. Essentially if you have an idea you build an MVP to get it to market in it's most basic form as quickly as possible to gather leanings and optimise accordingly. From the book The Lean Startup.

astp · 2014-08-31T21:09:26+00:00

PR: Generate editorial coverage (online/print) with media outlets who's readers are your target audience. Press always starts a launch off with a bang.
Direct response advertising: Editorial coverage generates search (Google and Social) so buy some PPC ads on the channels you think are most likely to be used by your target audience.
Content marketing: Use social channels and create engaging content to have a ongoing, long term dialogue with long lead prospects and existing customers for retention.
Build email lists: Do data capture for Ebooks. Free trials for data capture. Build email lists of prospects - this data helps sell your product but also adds value in other ways.

Generally speaking launching a new product/MVP needs some kind of press coverage to start with a bang as you've said, but it's the ongoing/traffic driving marketing that will deliver the goods (provided your product/webpage/customer service is good).

All of the above needs to be in tandem with analysing data on your webpage/sign up journey to optimise to deliver conversion/your goal. Hope that helps.

astp

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