What is the difference between Social Media Follow and Social Media Share
Social media follow and social media share are two different things. I get a lot of questions and I’m frequently asked about the difference between the two.
And I get a lot of questions about why authors should bother with either.
Let’s started by defining them first, and then we’ll move on to the topic of why bother.
Social Media Follow
Social media follow icons are branded icons for graphics that are hyperlinked to a person’s account on the various social media. For example, social media icon or graphic can be a little F for Facebook. That graphic or icon can be hyperlinked to a Facebook page. When a blog visitor clicks on the graphic or icon, they are taken to the person’s Facebook page. They are then given the opportunity to like or follow the page. The graphics or icons can be set up for any social media. Typically they appear in a grouping, either in the upper right of the sidebar, or along the menu line.
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The graphic above is what my follow icons look like. You can see them over to the right on the sidebar – near the top. Head over and click on several and see what happens. You’ll notice that the statement “Follow Me” sits above the icons. That is just a label and can change to say whatever you want – hopefully still remaining helpful.
Social media share
Let’s move on to social media share icons or buttons or graphics. These icons look the same as follow icons or graphics in many cases but are usually found in different locations.
Here are two different examples of what share buttons look like:
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Share buttons are typically found either at the top or bottom of a post (or both) and often have the label of “Share this” or “Please share” or something cute like “Sharing is caring.”
Social media share buttons are linked graphics or icons which when clicked on, result in a post (or a website) being shared in link form (and excerpt with graphic form) on the social media account of the sharer.
You’ll notice in the above definition, the sharing is done to the accounts of the person sharing, not the website or blog owner. Let’s make one thing perfectly clear here:
It is your job to create attractive, interesting content that your readers want to read and share. It isn’t your job to dictate where or to which social media platforms they are allowed to share it to. Because of this, include as many different icons as you can.
Make sure your social media sharing icons or buttons are set up properly. In the previous paragraph, I stated you should include as many different icons as available, but they should also be set up properly. Seems intimidating, but only involves two steps and one choice.
Make the share buttons or icons obvious and their purpose obvious. Use a label such as “Share This” or similar to let newbies understand their purpose.Make sure the Twitter share icon will carry your @username with the message as you can see in the screenshot below. You want your username to be embedded in the tweets sent out so that you can track or be notified of people sharing your post in this way.
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Above I said setting up sharing buttons involves two steps and one choice. The two steps have been covered – now for the choice. The choices is whether or not your share buttons or icons show the number of shares. An example of share buttons or icons displaying numbers can be seen below:
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My general rule of thumb is accentuate the positives and hide the negatives. Because of this, until you work up an active audience who regularly shares your bog posts with their friends on social media, don’t include the numbers. Share buttons or icons that advertise only one person has shared on Facebook is something I find sad.
Why to include follow and share icons or buttons
We’ve talked about what social media follow buttons or icons are and we’ve talked about what social media share buttons or icons are. Now to discuss the “Why” of this subject. Why do you want to offer these choices and why in the big picture would you do this. Let’s make a list of the “Whys.”
Not everyone will prefer to follow you or keep up to date with you on your blog – that’s just not their thing. By providing direct links to your other social media contact point, you provide options. (and hopefully regularly update your social media streams with current information)You want to be as helpful as possible. Rather than making your readers guess whether or not you have a presence of Facebook or Twitter or another social media, you are providing that information – and hopefully making it obvious.You are allowing and encouraging your readers to interact in a very powerful way. If a reader leaves a comment, they interact with you. If they share with their (possibly) thousands of followers on Twitter, the interaction is potentially much larger. As the saying goes – more bang for your buck.Although what Google finds important is somewhat of a mystery, there are a lot of educated folks on the internet who have made educated guesses. Many of these folks feel that the amount of social shares are important to Google.
Now that we are at the end – do you feel that you understand this subject a bit better? Let me know what you think.
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