A great message can be lost in the delivery, so I’ve jotted down a few tips on how to write a good post for your social media channels.

• Keep it short & be succinct. I like to only have one sentence, two sentences max. No one comes to facebook or twitter to read a paragraph of info. That’s what books are for.

• Use everyday language & don’t be too formal. Write as you would talk to a friend. Fans want to relate to you or your brand and you want to develop a relationship with them. Let your personality shine through.

• Make it interesting & give people a reason to read, share and engage.

• Be timely. Social Media is about the ‘now’. If you’re too late, don’t post it.

• Avoid ‘txt speak’ and jargon. Only use accepted abbreviations such as incl, excl.

• Don’t be repetitive or vague. Keep posts unique from the last few you made, and explain the content, especially if you’re posting a URL.

• Watch your punctuation. Keep the !’s to a minimum and always use sentence case.

• Turn off automatic Twitter updates from Facebook. Keep the post to 140 characters or less and post to Twitter manually (even if directing to a post on Facebook).

• Avoid multiple Twitter #hashtags in a post. Keep it to one or two if you include one and make sure it’s relevant to the whole post. (Except on instagram. On Instagram you can hash-tag for your life. The more you hash-tag here, the more your photos will turn up in the search results)

Last but not least, have fun and don’t take yourself too seriously.

Do you have any other tips for writing a good post?