Social Sharing: How to Get More People to Share Your Content

Do you publish content online?

Want more people to share your content?

To learn how to get more people to share your content, I interview Mark Schaefer.
More About This Show
The Social Media Marketing podcast is an on-demand talk radio show from Social Media Examiner. It's designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

In this episode I interview Mark Schaefer, author of The Tao of Twitter and Social Media Explained. His blog Grow was awarded #2 on our top 10 blogs of 2015.

Mark also co-hosts the Marketing Companion podcast. His latest book is called The Content Code: Six Essential Strategies for Igniting Your Content, Your Marketing, and Your Business.

In this episode Mark will explore why people share via social media.

You'll discover what you can do to improve your chances that people will share your content.

Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below.
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Here are some of the things you'll discover in this show:
Social Sharing
How Mark got into content and blogging

Around 2008, Mark started his own business doing consulting and teaching. He realized if he was going to talk about Twitter, blogging and Facebook, he had to use them. So he started a blog as an experiment. It took him about 9 months to find his voice, Mark recalls. It dawned on him that all of his contacts and business were coming through his blog, so he needed to pay attention to it. The blog really started kicking in around 2010, and has been building ever since.

The turning point happened when Mark started to write posts that were more authentic and had personality. Instead of finding his audience, Mark's audience found him. Mark tells new bloggers "To stand out, you need to be original. And to be original, you need to have the courage to tell your own story and have your own voice."

In 2009 Mark wrote a post that was a little bit controversial, called The Social Media Country Club. As a new blogger, Mark felt like an outsider. He says it seemed like all of the influential bloggers were in this club, where they never said anything negative about each other. Mark was thinking, "How are we going to grow if we don't challenge each other?" Coming from 27 years of marketing experience, Mark expected any channel used for business to be measurable, while others felt it was all about the conversation. Though nervous, Mark started speaking his mind. The reaction was supportive and positive. His audience was grateful somebody finally said it.

Listen to the show to discover what Mark blogged about at first and how he felt about it.

Why marketing with content is so difficult today

Whether you're an individual blogger, working in a business or working for a brand, many niches are getting crowded with content and social media activity. This makes it very difficult to compete.

Mark feels this was predictable. He says when the Internet first started, everyone needed a website. If you were the first one with a website, you had an advantage. Then you needed to be found. If you were the first one to figure out search engine optimization, you had an advantage, because you're going to be at the top of the search rankings. However, after your competitors figured it out, it got harder and more expensive to be in marketing.

He says it's the same thing with blogging. It's hard to be seen, because people are figuring it out. People are trying to stand out, but creating more or better content isn't necessarily the answer.

For the last year, Mark has been obsessed with figuring out how to maneuver in this very crowded world. And that's why he wrote The Content Code.

Listen to the show to hear my Times Square analogy.

Mark's code for success

Mark explains how all conversations are about content: creating more,