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In today’s tech-based business world, having an active social media feed isn’t just an option, it’s a requirement.
This is where clients, both present and future, can see what you and your business are all about without having to dig through pages of blog posts and scroll through what seems like miles of website content.
However, when it comes to making your social media your own, there are two aspects that need to be addressed: first, the design needs to be unique, copacetic with your corporate image, and easily recognizable. Secondly, the page itself needs to be readily accessible. The first requires the services of a skilled design agency—if you’re working on a budget, Designhill is a great place to get this done—while the second requires you utilize the functionality of a number of excellent showcasing sites.
1. About.Me
This is a free service designed to serve as a central hub for all your contact avenues, from social media pages to your personal blog. Signing up isn’t required to view profiles, making it an excellent choice for promoting your social media pages all across the Internet. Solo PR Pro recommends using an About.me profile in place of icons in email signatures, allowing clients to follow a single link to see everything you do in the blogosphere.
About.me is free, easy to sign up for and easy to set up, with some useful features for businesses of all sizes, including notifications of activity related to your page, multiple pictures, and the ability to link to all your social media accounts in a single place.
2. Brand Yourself
Like About.me, Brand Yourself is a social media linking hub. Unlike About.me, it’s not designed to show off your social network feeds directly. Rather, Brand Yourself is a way to advertise your social media feeds through organic search results, boosting your search rankings over time and helping get you the exposure you need to grow your business.
The “DIY version” of Brand Yourself is free, and submitting links takes you through the process of garnering more traffic and exposure step by step with ease. Paying for service will get you a less self-service option.
3. Vizify
If it wasn’t obviously from the name, Vizify believes in powerful visuals as the main feature of any social media showcase, allowing users to create stunning infographics and maintain visual hierarchies simply by uploading photos and graphics to their current social media pages. While this is a primarily paid service, it’s attractive enough to make the $15 per month fee completely worth it for many business professionals. Vizify turns your social media feeds into a single interactive visual bio of you or your business—or both. It’s a great option for personal branding efforts, and utilizing the graphic features of this site could kick your social network presence up a notch, making it a must-have for any up-and-coming business professional.
4. Tint
This service takes multiple social feeds and brings them onto a single hub, which can then be integrated into a mobile app, Facebook page, personal blog or website. This aggregate view can be skinned out to match your business aesthetic and corporate identity, giving it a personal touch that many social media feeds and hubs lack.
5. Your Own Website
You may feel that this one goes without saying, but your own website is really the best place to showcase your social media accounts and maintain full control of the design aesthetic and presentation. Working on your own domain allows to you integrate feeds via numerous available plugins and apps, while simultaneously taking advantage of the plethora of social media templates by Designhill, Themeforest and other corporate identity design groups. This also allows you to follow the best tips for displaying your social media according to Likeable, which include such simple guidelines as focusing on sticky content and visuals over written copy, prioritize your typography choices as much as the words chosen, and be as creative as your business allows without struggling to wade through Facebook’s unspoken image upload requirements.
Keep the Aesthetic
Social Media Examiner reports that visual branding is one of the single most important aspects to maintaining a strong social media presence, so make sure that whatever showcase you choose, it lets you keep things visually appealing. Many of these aggregators, hubs and template options will allow you to maintain your corporate colors, typography and other graphical features to maintain a cohesive image across the entire Internet. This way, when a client sees one of your pages, they know at a glance that it’s 100 percent yours, rather than being just another Twitter feed.
When you set out to showcase your social media pages, make sure that you’re prepared with the graphical know how to really show things off; at the very least, try to keep a design agency waiting in the wings for your business once you’ve decided where you want to plant your social flag.
UI/UX Consultant, Photoshop, XD, SketchApp, Product Designer, Website Designer, Mobile App Designer, Expert WordPress Developer. For web/mobile design and wordpress development related projects please contact me at dibakar@themepurpose.com
