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Lessons
Bucking conventional wisdom
Bucking conventional wisdom
Lessons
What is something that people believe that you don’t think is true or fully true? Say why and use data and reasoned arguments to back up your points.
How-to instructions
How-to instructions
Lessons
Does the piece guide readers through any valuable tasks? Distill the core steps into a social post.
Macro-level conclusions
Macro-level conclusions
Lessons
Sum up the major insights from the piece in a thorough but concise fashion
Micro-level insights
Micro-level insights
Lessons
Highlight one detail from an individual section in the piece that might surprise, excite, or concern your community.
What you’ll learn
What you’ll learn
Lessons
Directly advertise your content and tell people what they’ll learn by clicking through and reading it.
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Post-mortem
Moving forward
Moving forward
Post-mortem
What experiences and insights will you carry from this work into your next project?
Personal feedback
Personal feedback
Post-mortem
Does the piece look different to you now that it’s been out in the world for a while? Do any of its opinions seem particularly prescient or off-base? Would you change anything about it in retrospect?
Reader feedback
Reader feedback
Post-mortem
Positive feedback is great social proof – and negative feedback can be a great conversation starter.
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Questions
Short and longview trends
Short and longview trends
Questions
How might the patterns identified in the piece evolve in the next year? How about the next ten years? Ask the question of your audience and lay out your own theories.
Solutions
Solutions
Questions
How are people in your community responding to the challenges presented in the piece?
🍏 vs. 🍎
🍏 vs. 🍎
Questions
Does your post ask a question or make a comparison (e.g., SQL vs NoSQL)? Summarize your main takeaway and then ask your readers what THEY think. Keep the conversation going in the replies.
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Quotes + stats
Charts + images
Charts + images
Quotes + stats
Did you create a compelling chart or illustration for your article? If they’re useful to readers of the blog post then they’ll probably be useful to folks in your social feed too.
Eye-catching data
Eye-catching data
Quotes + stats
Does your piece quote a compelling statistic? Consider including data that may not have made it into the article.
Quotes from source
Quotes from source
Quotes + stats
Select a quote from a source cited in your article and turn it into a social post.
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Shout-outs
Cite your sources
Cite your sources
Shout-outs
Anyone outside of your team who was consulted for the piece. This includes people you quoted but also people who helped you informally refine the content as well.
Like-minded thinkers
Like-minded thinkers
Shout-outs
Anyone who is doing interesting work around the subject that you covered in the piece. Experts, academics, writers, businesses, nonprofits, etc. They don’t have to be people you know first-hand.
Recommended resources
Recommended resources
Shout-outs
Books, reports, art… anything that informed your work on this piece or simply inspired you.
Thanks to your team
Thanks to your team
Shout-outs
Writers, editors, researchers, producers, designers. Anyone who had a hand in producing this content. Celebrate the unique contributions they made.
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Stories
A funny thing happened at work today…
A funny thing happened at work today…
Stories
Did something you think would be easy end up being hard? Document technical or procedural challenges you ran into, what made it unexpectedly hard, and document in detail how you overcame it.
Behind the scenes
Behind the scenes
Stories
What about a given production, data point, conclusion, or response was particularly difficult for you to deal with?
Now vs. then
Now vs. then
Stories
How has your own perspective changed in the course of publishing this post? This doesn’t have to be an epic tale, just a simple change of heart.
Stories from the post
Stories from the post
Stories
If you’ve interviewed people for a piece then a few human stories probably made their way in. Distill those for social posts. Focus them on the people as much as possible.
What we’ve heard
What we’ve heard
Stories
What are customers saying about the real-world challenges they face? Discuss how the content of the piece addresses that challenge.