Social media is part of our everyday lives, we’re constantly refreshing our feeds and seeing what is happening in the world. This blog is focusing on my findings of how opinions are shaped through and by the media. Interactivity has become a large part of social media and users are able to vote on polls and express their opinions through Instagram stories and Twitter polls.
What is microblogging?
It is defined as a short activity of writing blogs. Ultimately meaning any social media user is technically a micro blogger. For example, if you have ever posted an Instagram story, updated your friends with what you’re up to on facebook means you are essentially a blogger to some degree.
Often microblogs are short snippets rather than your traditional blog posts (like what I am writing) and usually appear as memes, or infographics taking on a more visual than written message. Although due to the 140-character limit on Twitter (now 280), a tweet would be considered a microblog.
Twitter is my most used social media of choice, and I considered a range of factors when microblogging in order to achieve the maximum amount of interaction:
- Audience
- Consistency
- Hashtags
- Timing
Probably your main place to start is your audience and who your microblog is geared towards. Personally, I was targeting my demographic and those who care about similar issues to myself. Mainly topical news stories, with a few popular culture moments for good measure as it is important to check and consider what is trending at the time.
For example, my first blog was posted around the time the Kardashians revealed they were ending their show and quote replied to a tweet revealing a lucrative deal the family were signing with Disney- whilst also promoting my forthcoming post:
Your second consideration should be consistency, as it allows you to develop a solid readership base who are aware of your schedule and therefore will keep coming back to see updates. If your posting is sporadic, it will decrease engagement and any significant and sustained growth you could achieve.
Up next Hashtags- the most iconic symbol of social media. It is common knowledge this is probably one of the easiest and quickest way to get your blog seen by more people. I’m sure most have seen twitter bots that latch on to all trending hashtags just to get more clicks and followers even though their actual content has no relevance whatsoever. The humble hashtag is great for finding out what is going on in the world, and for finding and joining discussions worldwide. Don’t be afraid to use them and promote yourself!
As you can see, I used my own, relating to some of my research into microblogging and used covid related hashtags to better and reach a potentially larger audience to respond to my poll.
Finally, timing, which is along the same sort of lines as consistency. Yet it is also important to consider your own social media habits when posting. Are you likely to be spending hours on social media on a Friday night if you’re going out? Or at 11am on a Tuesday when you’re busy working? Probably not, so instead consider 5/6pm on a weekday when people are commuting home and more active on social media, or even an afternoon at the weekend when more people might be scrolling as they’re not at work.
Overall if you use all these factors, you’re more likely to develop a stable and larger audience and have definitely helped me to some degree! Whilst you’re busy carving out your micro-blogging empire on social media give me a follow: @CWFJourno
- C
