Curious about what to do with that PowerPoint presentation you’ve just given and no longer have use for? SlideShare is one of social media’s biggest secrets, it has the power to generate more quality views and potential leads than the content did in its original format.
If you are unfamiliar, SlideShare is the world’s largest community for sharing presentations. With 60 million monthly visitors and 130 million page views, it is amongst the top visited websites in the world. More importantly, these visitors tend to be highly influential business executives who are seeking to engage with relevant content.
So how do you take advantage of SlideShare’s power to garner new business leads and sales? As with any other social media platform, consider your business goals–specifically your online content marketing objectives first. If you’re looking to make your presentations more shareable, here are several helpful tips:
Define your target audience
Like other social media platforms, SlideShare is an effective way to share targeted content to specific audiences.
Diversify your content
Limiting your SlideShare content to only PowerPoint presentations reduces its potential value for your business. The site can host any content format: documents, PDFs, videos, infographics and webinars.
Broaden your reach by using hashtags
Add relevant hashtags to your presentation to attract a large amount of spectators. Â Three of the most utilized hashtags on SlideShare are #business, #socialmedia and #research. Like other social media venues, it’s not good practice to utilize too many hashtags. Limit your use to no more than two.
Generate leads
Include quick and easy sign-ups for newsletters or events to incite recurring activity.
Optimize your presentation for search
The goal is to attract your target audience to your presentation, by using the appropriate keyword; your audience is more likely to be able to locate your document.
Promote your presence
Raise visibility for your presentations by sharing a link to your Slide Share account via your website, email, blog, and/or other social media accounts.
Track results
As with any marketing initiative, it’s imperative to measure your results back to your goals. Use Slide Share’s analytics (Note: monthly fee required) to identify where the traffic is coming from and then produce more targeted content for that demographic.
S. Lynn Cooper is a Washington, DC-based digital strategist and communications expert. Cooper is the founder and director of Socially Ahead, a strategic communications agency that specializes in the creation of social and digital strategies and campaign management. Follow her on Twitter at @sociallyahead .