How To Get More From SlideShare - Super-Simple Tips For Content Marketing

SLIDESHARE
HOW
TO GET
MORE FROM
SUPER-SIMPLE TIPS FOR
CONTENT MARKETING

2 HOW TO GET MORE FROM SLIDESHARE | Introduction
Whether you are new to SlideShare or just want to get
better results from the content you publish on this
platform, consider these quick ideas that cover:
How SlideShare can contribute to your content marketing strategy
Ways to create more compelling conversations
How to use SlideShare to repurpose your content
Formats you may not have considered
How to increase the views and shares you get
How to track your performance
And much more!
While you may be familiar with some of these tips, you’ll likely pick up
a few new ideas that you can start using right now.

3 HOW TO GET MORE FROM SLIDESHARE | Start With Your Content Marketing Strategy
Who she is: What demographic group(s) does she belong to? What is her job title?
Her typical challenges: What questions might she have, or what might she be struggling
with in relation to your topic?
Her unmet needs: What guidance can you offer to help fill those gaps?
Her position in the purchase funnel: How close is she to making a decision?
Her goals and interests: What is she likely trying to accomplish, and what will she care
about most as she works toward that goal?
START WITH YOUR CONTENT
MARKETING STRATEGYBE INTENTIONAL WITH YOUR AUDIENCE AND CONTENT OBJECTIVES: Know what
audience you want to speak to, how the information you plan to share will help them,
and what action you want them to take next.
It may be helpful to keep your audience personas in mind as you craft your SlideShare deck. Make sure you keep the
following details top-of-mind:

Plan a simple discussion
Often, the best SlideShare presentations are those that create interesting conversations and do so in a way that’s easy for
viewers to understand and follow. Keep your story simple, and use images whenever possible, to show rather than tell.

Include a call to action
Insert a clickable link in your slide deck to make it easy for the user to take the next desired step. Typically, calls to
action are placed on the final slide but you can include them earlier in the presentation if you are concerned that
your viewers might not make it all the way through.

Plan your sharing strategy just as you would for any campaign
Think about ways to motivate people to share your content so that it trends on SlideShare. This can include:
Embedding your SlideShare deck in a blog post on the same topic
Posting it on your social networks
Timing your launch to coincide with relevant industry events or seasonal activities
Reaching out to thought leaders (both those included in your presentation and
also those who might simply find it useful) to get it on their radar
Including your SlideShare presentations in your
email newsletters and promotional e-blasts
Including the SlideShare link in a press release
(if it’s newsworthy or aligns with
a newsworthy event)

7 HOW TO GET MORE FROM SLIDESHARE | Create Your Content
LESSON LEARNED BY CMI: In the past, we
made the mistake of trying to use similar covers
for a series of SlideShare decks (consistency is
great, right?). But we found that if the covers
were not differentiated, people got confused and
would not view additional presentations in the
series. Now, we maintain a common element for
any series, but then make sure to differentiate
with colors, bold keywords, or other creative
elements.
CREATE YOUR CONTENTSTART WITH ONE KILLER COVER SLIDE: On the SlideShare home page, all visitors
will see is a cover thumbnail. So the more eye-catching your cover image,
the more people you are likely to
draw in to your presentation.

Grab attention with a powerful headline
A killer headline is the No. 1 way to get the attention of SlideShare’s editors and get featured on the site.
What can you do to help your headlines stand out? Try a few of these tips:
Ask, “Would my target audience want to read this?” If you don’t focus on your readers, it will be
nearly impossible to grab their attention.
Entice, but don’t exaggerate. It’s better to offer useful, honest information with real value than
risk angering readers because your presentation doesn’t deliver on the promise of its headline.
It’s OK to be a bit of a tease: If you give away all of the important information in the headline,
people won’t feel the need to read more.
Use numbers and lists: Using numbers in your headline gives the audience an idea of how quickly
they’ll get the information they came for.
Check out the competition: Get a sense for how other businesses are positioning their SlideShare offerings,
so you can identify potential opportunities to distinguish your content.
Ask and you shall receive: Use titles that take the form of a question to pique readers’ curiosity
(and ignite their desire to satisfy it).
Take advantage of headline optimization tools, like CoSchedule, or KingSumo.

Make it dynamic
SlideShare decks shouldn’t be static, one-way presentations. They can be used to draw your audience into an
ongoing conversation that takes place across all the content platforms you use.
Make it interactive — include
hashtag, ask questions...
open the door to engagement
with how you present content.
— Karen Webber.
Users can rapidly click through the slides of Salesforce’s SlideShare
to simulate a story being told with flipbook-style animation.

Visual appeal is the key
The best presentations are those that tell a story in visual form, so emphasize pictures over text — this includes video
and infographics, as well as static images.
SlideShare has partnered with Haiku Deck to help users create eye-catching visual decks.
You can access this directly in your SlideShare account by connecting to Haiku Deck in your
Account Settings under Apps.

Integrate media
SlideShare isn’t just for “slides” anymore. It has evolved into a multi-format content platform that works well with a
wide range of media.
Consider these ideas for enhancing your SlideShare content:
Insert HD video.
Embed a real-time feed of your
company’s blog.
Run live streaming video.
Add audio narration to slide decks.
Load “tall” documents like
reports or infographics.
SlideShare credit: LinkedIn Pulse.

Extend the life cycle of existing content
With 60 million unique visitors each month, SlideShare has tremendous reach that can give your existing content
the additional exposure it needs to be more successful. Try repurposing your popular blog post content, white
papers, live event presentations, videos, and more.

Consider these additional ideas from the #CMWorld community
We run regular webinar series. We upload the decks to @SlideShare
afterwards, embed the YouTube recording, and send it to all registrants.
—Crys Wiltshire
Creating a @SlideShare from
Twitter chats is definitely a great
idea! You could also repurpose a
podcast or a hangout, or curate
visual quotes along themes like
#startups, or #entrepreneurs,
or #VCFunding. —Tulip Strategies
Break down key points of a
presentation into @SlideShare,
then embed video at end. Include
a [call to action] back to [your]
website! —Cathy McPhillips

Proof it to perfection
Nothing derails your authority on any platform
like publishing sloppy, error-filled content,
and SlideShare is no exception.
To ensure that your presentations uphold
your company values and quality standards,
follow the proofing process that
Roger C. Parker recommends in
22 To-dos for SlideShare Success:
© 2012 Roger C. Parker | www.publishedandprofitable.com | 2
TOPIC
QUESTION
YES?
N
HANDOUTS
Presentation
title
Does the presentation title appear at the top
of each handout page?
Contact infor-mation
Does your firm’s name URL, and contact in-
formation appear at the bottom each page?
Page numbers Does the page number appear on each page
of your presentation handouts?
Typography Are header and footer type faces, type size,
and type style appropriate & consistent?
Alignment Does header and footer text align with the
slide thumbnails on each handout page?
Text frames Did you add slide frames, or borders, to
handouts only when necessary?
UPLOADING
Conversion Did you convert presentation files to Adobe
Acrobat PDF’s to preserve text formatting?
Links Did you check each link after uploading your
presentation to SlideShare?
Notes Did you create Notes pages to rehearse your
narration and improve SEO results?
Tags Did you double-check the tags appearing with
your SlideShare presentation?
Video Have you explored ways to use video to rein-
force key ideas in your presentation?
Promotion Did you link your SlideShare presentation to
Facebook, LinkedIn, other social media?
© 2012 Roger C. Parker | www.publishedandprofitable.com
Roger C. Parker’s Published & Profitable
SlideShare Proofing Checklist
PROJECT DATE
TOPIC QUESTION YES? NO? SEE SLIDE #
SLIDES
Layout Are slide titles and text consistently aligned
and placed on each slide?
Slide number Does the slide number appear on each slide,
except the title slide?
Typeface
choices
Are typeface choices consistent with the type-
faces used elsewhere in your marketing?
Fonts Unless you converted your visuals to PDFs,
did you limit your typeface choices to those
SlideShare supports?
Type size Is the type size used in slide titles and lists
consistent from slide to slide?
Line spacing Is text line spacing consistent from slide to
slide?
List spacing Did you add extra space between items in
bullet or text lists?
Proper nouns Did you double-check the spelling of proper
nouns, industry-specific terms, and jargon?
Graphic Are graphics properly aligned with adjacent
text and graphics?
Borders Have you been consistent in your use of bor-
ders around graphics?

15 HOW TO GET MORE FROM SLIDESHARE | Optimize Your Content’s Viral and Engagement Potential
OPTIMIZE YOUR CONTENT’S VIRAL
AND ENGAGEMENT POTENTIALINCREASE YOUR CONTENT’S REACH:
While the SlideShare platform has
universal appeal, it’s particularly
well-suited to business users. This is
a place where people are genuinely
going to search, ask questions, and
look for solutions to their problems
— making it the perfect launchpad
for the content you want
to spread virally.

Take advantage of SlideShare’s unique features
SlideShare has a wide range of settings, tools, features, and options that make it one of the most customizable
platforms for content marketing. For example:
Get featured: SlideShare rewards presentations that are recently created and uploaded by featuring them
on its home page and relevant category pages (such as Leadership, Marketing, and Technology). The more
often you post, the greater your chances of making it onto one of these leaderboards.

Follow SlideShare’s Upload Campaigns calendar
Time your content to take advantage of the hot topics SlideShare will be highlighting each month. This will help if
you’re looking to get your presentation featured. (Download SlideShare’s Upload Campaigns calendar.)

Access free analytics tools
Anyone with a SlideShare account can get important viewing and sharing stats, as well as insights about their
audience — including demographics and traffic sources — by accessing SlideShare’s free analytics tools. These
tools can provide a more in-depth understanding of how your SlideShare presentations perform, including:
Geographical distribution:
Measure and analyze user
engagement by understanding
where your users are.
Traffic sources: Understand
how your audience is discovering
your content, and evaluate which
channels work best for extending
the reach of your presentations.
Timing: Understand seasonal
variations in your view count and
whether certain days of the week
and month perform better than
others when posting content.

Distribute your presentations whenever and however you want
Flexible settings enable you to make SlideShare decks private, set a schedule for a private deck to go public automatically
at a certain time, share them only with selected people, and/or make them viewable only when embedded on certain sites.
We use private @SlideShares for our event presentations, where people have
paid for an event. At some point we make all our private presentations public,
so it’s good to already have them on @SlideShare. —Cathy McPhillips

Use SEO to maximize findability
Naturally, you will want to build your SlideShare content around the search terms your business dominates. And the
more places you embed, share, and post about your presentations, the more authority they’ll receive organically on
search engine results pages (SERPs). But SlideShare also provides some basic SEO tools that you should be using to
give your presentations an extra boost.
Once you’ve logged in to your account, click Edit
on any of your uploaded SlideShare presentations
to access your Settings and adjust your metadata.
Here, you can:
Create your SEO title: This will become
part of your URL, so make sure it includes
the exact presentation title. (Tip: SlideShare
creates the URL based on the file name of
your presentation document, so it should be
named strategically before you upload
it to the SlideShare platform.)
Optimize your presentation description: Make sure it’s accurate, catchy, and includes your target
keywords. Give a good description to your readers as to why they should continue reading.
Add tags: Though they aren’t as powerful as meta-keywords, SlideShare tags will help your presentations
show up in more onsite searches.

Link to your social media profiles
Connecting to your profiles on Facebook, Google Plus, and LinkedIn makes it easier for you to share your
SlideShare content and get your followers to interact with it where it’s most convenient for them.
To do this:
Log in to SlideShare and
go to Account Settings.
Select the Social tab,
and next to each of
your accounts, click on
Connect.
Enter your log-in ID and
password, and click on
Allow Access.
In the dialog box that
pops up, check the
options you would like
to enable, and save
your settings.

Maximize the benefits of LinkedIn + SlideShare
SlideShare was purchased by LinkedIn in 2012. Now that the companies are connected, linking your profiles can give
you a boost in credibility and visibility on people’s feeds on both platforms.
In his presentation at Content Marketing World 2014, Todd Wheatland shared a few recommendations for
cross-posting SlideShare content on LinkedIn:
Customize your messages when you post into
LinkedIn Groups: Don’t just spam groups with
a generic message — and don’t repost the page
description, since it will be automatically included
already. Instead, target a few key groups for any of your
presentations, and begin a conversation with your
post, rather than just blasting out a link in hopes of
some views and shares.
Go beyond Groups posts: Send your SlideShare
content to individuals with whom you are connected —
but do so sparingly.
Post to Twitter, too: If your Twitter account is linked
to SlideShare, you can tweet about your content right
from the share form. In addition, by doing this, any
retweets you receive will be counted as an additional LinkedIn share.

23 HOW TO GET MORE FROM SLIDESHARE | Configure Access and Lead Generation
CONFIGURE ACCESS AND
LEAD GENERATIONSET YOUR ACCESS LEVELS: Depending on marketing goals, you can choose to make your
presentations private, grant unrestricted access by making them public, or restrict
access by gating the presentation and requiring viewers to fill out a lead form.
Most of ours are public and ungated. We want to be a thought
leader and provide help. Sometimes we gate @ download.
—Cathy McPhillips

Decide whether or not to gate
While gating your SlideShare presentations can provide your business with valuable information on your audience,
do so sparingly, and only in cases where you’re giving your customers something of value in return. If sharing is more
essential to your marketing goals than lead generation, it may be helpful for you to give control to the audience and
allow them to bypass the lead form, if they so desire.
If you are looking for
thought leadership and
brand awareness as
well as lead generation,
mix it up with your
presentations by
gating your meatier
presentations, and
leaving others ungated.
Determine the goal of
each presentation
upon creation.

Gather the specific information you need
If you are a pro user, you can also access tools for customizing the placement of your lead forms and the information
you require in order to enable viewing. (These features will soon be available for all users.)
To do this:
Open your SlideShare presentation and
click on Connect Leads.
Under Campaigns, set up your lead form,
and then click Advanced Options.
Select the “Get in Touch” button to enable viewers
to contact you through your presentation.
Select the position in which you would like
to place your lead form.
Select whether you would like to collect a
mailing address and/or phone number.
Click on Add Question to capture additional
information in your lead forms.

26 HOW TO GET MORE FROM SLIDESHARE | Measure Your Results
MEASURE YOUR RESULTSTRACK HOW YOUR CONTENT IS
PERFORMING: A pro account will
enable you to access a suite of
analytics tools, which do a great job of
breaking out the typical actions that
take place on the platform, such as
views, downloads, and social shares.
You can quantify actions that take place
on embedded SlideShare content,
making it easy to ensure that no views
are left uncounted.

Here are a few different types of reports you can pull
Top content report: This provides a basic snapshot view of how your content is tracking over a selected time period.

Uploads report: This is like a status shot of SlideShare actions, which can be anything from commenting, “liking,”
emailing, or downloading, to social actions that relate to specific social channels like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Latest views report: This snapshot of the latest 1,000 views of all of your content provides a real sense of where people
are coming to your presentations from, including the keywords they were searching on, the referring URL, and their
organizations/ISPs.

30 HOW TO GET MORE FROM SLIDESHARE | Get Inspired
Page 21
Maximize the benefits of LinkedIn + SlideShare
GET INSPIREDTHINK OUTSIDE THE BOX: The sky’s the limit when it comes to how you can use
SlideShare for your content marketing. If you need some additional ideas,
check out these examples from the #CMWorld community:
We embed @SlideShare presentations
into blog posts & e-blasts, as well as
use them for social media content.
—Crys Wiltshire

I’ve been talking to my clients about using SlideShare to publish collections
of the branded cartoons we’ve created. An anthology.
—The Cartoon Agency
Velocity Partners

You can use creative content that doesn’t just inform — you can ask questions,
driving engagement and feedback.
—Tyler Narducci
Velocity Partners

MORE SLIDESHARE RESOURCES
ABOUT CONTENT MARKETING INSTITUTE (CMI)
Visit Content Marketing Institute’s SlideShare channel to get more ideas and
examples of successful content marketing. And, for helpful tips on other
content marketing topics, don’t miss our weekly #CMWorld Twitter Chats.
Content Marketing Institute is the leading global content marketing education
and training organization, teaching enterprise brands how to attract and retain
customers through compelling, multi-channel storytelling. CMI also runs the
Intelligent Content platform focusing on content strategists, and the Content Inc
brand platform on entrepreneurs and startups. CMI’s Content Marketing World
event, the largest content marketing-focused event, is held every September
in Cleveland, Ohio, USA, and the Intelligent Content Conference event is held
every spring. CMI publishes the bi-monthly magazine Chief Content Officer, and
provides strategic consulting and content marketing research for some of the
best-known brands in the world. CMI is a 2012, 2013 and 2014 Inc. 500 company.

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