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While conducting a recent workshop at the AAMA Summer Conference, a member asked a great, but tough, question: What’s the best social media platform? I had to think about it, because there’s no one answer, and the rationale behind this is complicated. For example, I could tell this member that, for AAMA, LinkedIn is a great way to reach most our membership, or that for me personally, I get the most value out of Twitter and find Instagram the most fun. Still, none of those points answer the question, because the platform that works best for each company is always going to be different.

Angela Dickson, Marketing and Communications Director, was in the session and added an excellent point: You reach different people by communicating on different platforms, and it’s up to marketing teams to find creative ways to disperse information across platforms in the best ways possible. This is an important thing to remember, especially if you’re sometimes tempted to shut down your Twitter and Instagram accounts in favor of updating just a Facebook business page.

So how do you tailor one message to multiple platforms? Think about what each channel does best. If you’re launching a new product and you’ve created a landing page for it on your company’s website, here’s a breakdown of what you might put out on social media:

Instagram Business Account

Since the platform is heavily image-based, make that new product shine on Instagram. You can also run an Instagram Story, linking users to the landing page on your website.

Facebook Business Page

Since Facebook owns Instagram and the two play well together, you can connect your Instagram Business account to your Facebook Business page and seamlessly post to Facebook at the same time as Instagram. Plus, if you have a bigger Facebook audience than you do on Instagram, you can take that beautiful Instagram image and turn it into a targeted Facebook ad.

Twitter

Twitter is less about images and more about short, clear written communication. Write a tagline for your new product or share a customer testimonial, and link folks to the landing page for it.

Pinterest

Pick a great image to lead with, and turn it into a Pinterest pin, linking to that landing page. The text of the pin can give a description of your product and make use of terms customers are searching Pinterest for, like color names and project types.

LinkedIn

Post an update about your new product to your company page so those following your company will see it in their feeds. Direct them to – you guessed it – your product landing page.

In all cases, except for LinkedIn, use hashtags that make sense. Make a hashtag for your new product and tag any relevant accounts that have a stake in your product’s success. Pro tip: To find out how visitors found your site, meaning from which platform, create a unique campaign tag for each to see where your audience lives online!

Cross-platform messaging takes time, but it’s the best way to reach your audience where they live, whether it’s Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or elsewhere. Remembering those platforms’ strengths will help guide how you communicate via each.