When I see one of my clients post original content on their Facebook Fan page instead of on their Nation, you could fry an egg on the top of my head.
You have a wonderful NationBuilder site that you paid good money for. So why are posting your original content on Facebook? When you do that, your stealing people away from your Nation and sending them to Facebook! WHY? AAARRGGHHH!
This insanity needs to come to an immediate end!
You should never* post original content on a third party, social-media website. The original content should be posted on YOUR website, and then SHARED on the social media, which drives traffic back to your site.
The only exceptions to this rule are 140-character tweets, which should be posted on twitter, video files (youtube/vimeo) and audio files (SoundCloud, BandCamp). Anything else; stuff you write, images you create, stuff you receive and want to share: it belongs on your Nation FIRST and on Facebook, etc. VIA a link to your Nation.
(also, oppo research should go in its own space, well away from yours, but you knew that already)
Here is the procedure you should follow EVERY time you want to post content:
- Go to your Admin dashboard. Then, go here:
Admin dashboard > Website > [your blog] > Posts & subpages > New post. - Give it a neat Headline. Hit TAB and the slug will autofill (handy!). Change status to Published. Hit the yellow button.
- Post your neat thing in the top window ("before the flip"). If it's long, put the first paragraph in the top window, and the rest in the bottom window ("after the flip"). Hit the yellow save button.
- click on the link next to your logo - it should say, http://www.your-site.com/blog-post-title (blog-post-title is whatever the title is of your new blog post).
- Take a look at your new blog post. Revel in it's awesomeness.
- SHARE it with the Facebook button. Tweet it with the twitter button. Put it on the GooglePlus with the G+1 button.
- People will see the link and follow it back to your site! YAY!
If you have social media other than the big three (Facebook, Twitter, G+), then here are some extra steps:
- Copy the link to the new content on your Nation.
- Go to the Social Media in question.
- Post the link. Share it.
That's it. Done. See how easy that is?
PLEASE FOLLOW THIS PROCEDURE. EVERY TIME.
Tips for maintaining an active blog
- Blogs are hugely important for improving the frequency your web site will turn up on search engines like Google. The more posts you have, the more keywords you are feeding search engines which increases the likelihood your post will be offered as a result.
- The quality of your posts is important. The better your post, the more likely another web site will link to it. The more incoming links that exist for a blog post, the higher your post will rank on search results.
- Include a prominent link to the RSS feed near the top of your blog. Some people don't actually visit the blog page to check for new updates. Instead, they subscribe to RSS feeds to alert them when a new post is made.
- Be sure to promote your posts via social media, especially on your organization's Twitter account. You can automatically feed your posts to Twitter using services like Twitter Feed. Some people use Twitter instead of RSS to be updated on new posts.
- Embed pictures and videos in your blog posts whenever a possible. You want to avoid your blog turning into a wall of text, and embedding relevant pictures and videos will greatly help in spicing it up.
- Use links to other sites liberally in your posts. Other websites and blogs may return the favor in the future. Linking to sources of information contained in your blog post also increases your credibility.
Check out this recent episode of NationBuilder Live for more information on starting a blog.
