10 Content Marketing Lessons from Social Media Examiner

Content on the Social Media Examiner site is shared substantially more than

content from similar sites.

Website No Articles Average Social SharesPer Article

Social Media Examiner

262 3,689

Copyblogger 140 1,377

Content Marketing Institute

215 935

Social Media Today 3,287 385

Period: 16 March 2014 – 16 September 2014 – Source BuzzSumo

The most shared articles on Social Media Examiner get over 10,000 social shares.

Lesson 1. Quality Posts Win Over High Volume Posts

Social Media Examiner does not produce as much content as some other sites but focuses on quality posts that are of interest to its audience.

This gives more time to promote each post and provides more focus to ensure the content is of the highest quality.

Mike Stelzner reviews and often rewrites the first paragraph of every post on Social Media Examiner. His attention to detail is legendary and all posts go through a number of sub-editors.

Lesson 2. Understand Your Audience

Social Media Examiner conducts regular surveys of its audience. The latest 2014 Social Media Trends report which surveyed over 2,800 marketers. The insights they gain helps them plan, develop and curate content that is of interest to the audience and resonates with them.

Lesson 3. Produce Long Form Content

If you know what content resonates with your audience there is evidence that they welcome and engage with long form content.

The longer the article on Social Media Examiner the more shares it gets on average.

Lesson 4. Respect Your Audience

In an interview back in 2011 Mike Stelzner was asked if the site wrote headlines and content for SEO. His response was revealing:

“No, we do not. We only get 15 percent of our 900,000 page-views per month from search. We do not try to make things that appeal to search engines. We don’t ignore search engines, but it’s not our primary focus. Our primary focus is to appeal to people.”

The respect that Social Media Examiner shows its audience appears to be rewarded by the sharing of content.

Lesson 5. Share Content Across All Networks

Social Media Examiner’s content gets heavily shared across across all social networks as seen below. In our BuzzSumo research we have found the top performing content is generally shared across multiple networks and not a single network.

Lesson 6. Use Lists, How To Articles and Infographics

Social Media Examiner makes good use of three different content types namely lists, how to posts and infographics. The site uses a good mix of content formats that appeal to its audience.

Lesson 7. Use Podcasts

Mike Stelzner’s podcast is very widely listened to. At BuzzSumo we had a single mention in one of Mike’s podcasts which drove significant traffic to our site.

Other sites such as Convince and Convert and the Content Marketing Institute have had similar success with podcasts.

Lesson 8. Publish Your Content Early In The Week

The chart below shows the total post shares by the day of the week they were published on Social Media Examiner. It is quite clear that posts published earlier in the week perform better.

Lesson 9. Use Respected and Authoritative Authors

Social Media Examiner uses respected authors that produce quality content. An author search on BuzzSumo for Social Media Examiner authors shows that their content is consistently shared. For example, below is the most shared content authored by Cindy King.

The more your content gets shared the more these social signals provide evidence of its value to readers and the more it encourages people to share.

10. Build A Virtuous Cycle

The consistent quality of Social Media Examiner content, the evidence of strong social signals plus clear headlines and introductory paragraphs will encourage people to share content .

Find The Most Shared Content and The Influencers Amplifying That Content

BuzzSumo.com