7 Ways TUMBLR Can Improve Your Business!

We are no strangers to the world of blogging and social media. We are now living in a digital world, after all. What used to be produced in paper and purchased as books and material sources can now be published on the mighty internet. Basically, a blog (web log) is an internet medium for people to share original content. A person can publish all forms of multimedia on a blog. It can be utilized as an art or photography portfolio, a journal, and a myriad of other purposes.

Tumblr is a social networking host and a microblogging host. Compared to the likes of WordPress and Blogspot, Tumblr is very user-friendly and easy to set up. Also, the contents here are more visual in nature. Majority of Tumblr users come from a younger age group; these are people below the age of 34 who spend much of their time on the internet. Because of Tumblr’s growing number of users, businesses find the platform a good medium to market their products and services and connect to a younger target audience. With more and more companies penetrating this social networking platform, we’re starting to wonder how exactly a Tumblr-hosted business will survive.

To those who are not familiar with Tumblr, here are some screenshots that will give you some perspective.

Fig. 1 The welcome interface automatically displays a sign up form. This explains why the number of Tumblr users continues to grow.

Fig. 2 Dashboard Interface

Like Facebook and many other social networking websites, you have control in what you will see on your dashboard, which is similar to Facebook’s news feed. Your dashboard will only show posts from saved tags and Tumblr blogs that you follow. Before putting up your business on this platform, you must first decide if the site will be beneficial to your business. You have to take into consideration vital factors such as your target audience, multimedia and your relevance to the platform’s demographic. Most of Tumblr’s content involves visuals. A post that is pleasing to the eye, relevant and humorous will earn more likes and reblogs than a text post. It is also best if you already establish your goals at the very beginning. Jumping into any platform without any plans and goals in mind will most likely fail. Once you have accomplished this initial checklist, you may now proceed in building your Tumblr-hosted company blog.

In this article, we will delve into specifics; we will get to know the elements of a successful Tumblr business and from there, synthesize the information into a list of 7 ways to improve your business using this platform.

7 WAYS TUMBLR CAN IMPROVE YOUR BUSINESS

1. SET UP THE BASICS

SIGN UP

The welcome page of the microblogging platform (see fig.1) automatically displays a sign up form. All you have to do is type in your e-mail, password and desired username. It’s pretty simple and straightforward. It only takes a few minutes to do this.

USERNAME

Although signing up can be done in a few minutes, the challenge here is to think of a good username. You are going to make a company blog so make sure that the username contains your brand name. Now, this part is a little tricky if your brand name is rather common. There are more than 130 million Tumblr blogs at present and all of them have unique usernames. Chances are your desired username will no longer be available when you sign up. There are certain ways to go around this problem. You can add minor acceptable characters like underscores, hyphens and numerics. Some companies affix the abbreviation of the country they are based in. You can also affix the year your company was established.

2. ESTABLISH A STRAIGHT-FORWARD PROFILE

Your company profile should be direct and straight to the point. It must include basic information about your business and a brief summary of the products and services that your company offers. Most of the time, depending on the theme you use; the company profile doesn’t show on the home page of your blog. We’ll delve into more of this in the next number. The first thing that your visitors will see is your content and if they like what they see, they’re going to be interested to know more about you. That’s when they click the profile page. Make sure not to miss any significant detail. Also, be engaging and relevant. Bear in mind that your demographic here are teens and young adults. That’s one thing that sets this platform apart from other blog hosting websites so try not to be too formal when stating your information.

3. PICK OUT AN APPROPRIATE THEME

There are many preset themes available on Tumblr and picking the best one that will suit your blog perfectly can either be a really fun task or a nightmare. Each theme comes with a unique set of customizing options which may include the title, header, tagline and a short bio. These options depend on what the theme offers; some, for example, only display the title and the tagline. You can choose among a wide array of free themes. There is also a broad catalog of paid ones you can pick from if none of the free themes appeal to you or project the personality of your company. The preview will display what your blog will look like with sample posts and your preferences.

4. LINK YOUR PAGES

Default Tumblr blogs has more or less three pages: a homepage, an archive page and a profile page. The pages menu lets you add more should you ever need them. Your business must have other social networking platforms besides Tumblr. These include your Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn pages. To build a large and solid following, you must expand your reach and the most effective way to do that is through social media. This is where the Pages menu becomes helpful. The Pages menu also allows you to link your other websites and social networking pages to the blog. Handy, isn’t it?

5. CREATE YOUR CONTENT

Tumblr allows you to publish all forms of content. Majority of Tumblr’s content are image-based. The platform is a channel for many artists to release creative works such as paintings, photographs and images of art installments. Some users seldom create original content. Instead, they reblog. Reblogging is the Tumblr counterpart of sharing and retweeting. Reblogging is how your post becomes viral. It strengthens your content and makes it available to an audience beyond your following. It also makes for a good marketing strategy, which we will talk about in the next number.

Fig. 3 Forms of Content

On the top part of your dashboard, you will see this panel. This is how you add your content. As you can see, there are seven icons: Text, Photo, Quote, Link, Chat, Audio and Video. These are the types of content you can create. These icons make creating content very easy and straightforward. You have to be careful what to put though. The demographic are mostly interested in short and visually appealing posts. In this case, you need to provide photos and videos.

6. PLAN OUT YOUR MARKETING STRATEGY

Once again, before you build your business on Tumblr, you must think ahead. You must deliberate on ways how to make the business work and spread. You must reach out to your audience as much as possible and keep them interested. As it is in all social networking websites, it is not enough that you post content for the users that follow you alone. You must reach out to the wide audience beyond that.

7. AMPLIFY YOUR BLOG THROUGH YOUR FOLLOWERS

ALLOW INTERACTIONS

Whatever promos you have in store for your Tumblr business, you must let them spread like wildfire all over the site. One way of doing this is to let your followers market your business for you. Allow interactions by taking advantage of the reblogging action as part of the mechanics of the promo. Make your followers reblog and spread your promos in order for their entries to be valid. Through these, not only will you earn more followers, you will also gain potential customers. By following through with the mechanics, you will already be assured that these followers are interested. They want to avail of your services.

HASHTAGS

Never underestimate the power of a hashtag. Your hashtags will place your content into categories and Tumblr users who are interested in these categories will find it easier to find what they are looking for. As they explore and scroll through their feeds, they will most likely stumble upon your post and voila! More followers! More potential customers and clients!

RELEVANCE

Your content must be applicable to the lives of your demographic. It must keep up with the times and relate with what’s in. Also, human interest is encouraged. Your content must tap into the hearts and minds of your audience. Your tone must also be conversational. The last thing you want your readers to do is get bored.

There you have it… a concrete synthesis of what you should do in order to make your company a big hit in the world of Tumblr. Success is not possible without hard work. May this comprehensive article help you in achieving that.

About the Author:

Sheena Mathieson, understands the essence of making excellent content that suits the needs of every business especially when it comes online marketing.

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