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Why Most Social Media Writing Sucks and How to Fix It

Authors: Jay Baer Josh Bernoff
Posted Under: Social Pros Podcast
Hosted By
Jay Baer

Daniel Lemin

Convince & Convert
Jay Baer

Hannah Tooker

LaneTerralever
Jay Baer

Leanna Pham

Convince & Convert
About Social Pros Podcast:

Social Pros is one of the longest-running marketing podcasts in existence (10 YEARS and counting), and was recently recognized as the #1 Audio/Podcast Series by the Content Marketing Awards.

Our purpose? Making sure that we speak to real people doing real work in social media.

Listeners get inside stories and behind-the-scenes secrets about how teams at companies like Google, Reddit, Glossier, Zillow, Lyft, Marvel, and dozens more, staff, operate, and measure their social media programs.  With 600+ episodes, the Social Pros Podcast brings the humanity of social media to the forefront, while providing incredibly useful marketing strategies that listeners can immediately implement.

Follow Social Pros on LinkedIn.

To inquire about becoming a guest or show sponsor, please email our Executive Producer, Leanna Pham, at leanna@convinceandconvert.com.

Apple Podcast Reviews:

The Social Pros podcast has quickly become a favorite in my feed! I'm consistently impressed by the engaging conversations, insightful content, and actionable ideas. I truly learn something every time I listen!

@Arlie K

This is absolutely an awesome listen for anyone in communications or social media!!

@Will31C

This podcast has become one of my staple weekly podcasts for learning about marketing! Love the conversations that they have and it's always enjoyable and educational!

@Simonstone95

Love the podcast - informative, in depth and spot on for any business size.

@MissTriathlon

Josh Bernoff, Chief Troublemaker at Without Bullshit, joins the Social Pros Podcast to share his approach to boosting your social marketing by cutting the crap from your writing.

Josh Bernoff - InstagramForget What You Think You Know

Many people consider themselves great writers, especially when it comes to social. However, Josh knows for a fact that this is not the case. The sad truth of the matter is that many people have held on to the writing methods they were taught in school, which are great for term papers but terrible for marketing.
Having spent 20 years as a Senior VP in Idea Development and as an author at Forrester Researcher, Josh is a veritable expert on the art of writing. He is a strong proponent of reducing writing to the minimum of what is needed to have the most powerful impact on the audience. This goes directly against the scholastic composition many of us were taught, which rewards length and technical jargon.
By cutting out the fluff and making content extremely direct and to the point, it can break through the noise online and capture a few precious seconds of attention with meaningful and motivating information before the reader loses interest.
The more you can convey with fewer words, the better.

In This Episode

  • Why successful blogging means writing content every single day
  • How the shift to mobile content consumption leads to the need for brevity in writing
  • Why proliferating content across many platforms means compromises in messaging
  • How being authentic without editing leads to low quality, ineffective content
  • The allure and pitfalls of SEO
  • How long-form content leads to a decrease in your social media success

 

Quotes From This Episode

“The average person reading a news article spends 36 seconds on it.” —@jbernoff
“In school we were rewarded for writing long papers, but you have to leave all that training behind and learn a completely different way of writing.” —@jbernoff
“Brevity focuses people.” —@jbernoff
You need to have something to say every day. If you’re only going to create content when you really feel the mojo, you’re not going to create enough to develop an audience that stays with you on a regular basis.” —@jaybaer
“Most of the text that goes by your face has never been seen by anyone other than the person who wrote it, so it’s completely unedited.” —@jbernoff
“Public Relations is an entire industry that’s dedicated to creating irrelevant, padded out, unbelievable content. That has to change.” —@jbernoff
“When you’re posting on Facebook, you’re in somebody else’s space. And they can make any change they want at any time they want and screw you over.” —@jbernoff
“While it’s a great idea to try and get your content everywhere, you also have to make compromises when you go into these different places. It becomes a challenge to manage all of that.” —@jbernoff
“SEO should be an afterthought.” —@jbernoff

Resources


See you next week!

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