Quick fixes: Your five-point checklist for instant comms wins

 Cut through comms chaos with five of my top comms quick fixes.

It’s estimated that up to a whopping 95% of people use mobile devices to access social media, so if you link to a website via a QR code on a graphic, they can’t use their phone to scan it.

Sure, some phones let you screenshot and click through, but most people may not know that or be bothered enough to try it.

Save QR codes for printed materials such as posters and flyers, where they really shine. They’re also good for presentations where you need your audience to interact by completing a poll or prompting people to visit your website or connect with you on LinkedIn at the end.

On the subject of thinking mobile first, if your graphic is packed with tiny text, people will just scroll on. Got lots to say? Consider dividing your post up into a series, using a carousel with more than one graphic or (even better) explaining all in a video.

That brings me nicely to point number three – captions! It’s estimated that over 85% of people watch videos with the sound off, so if they can’t read what is being said, they’ll keep scrolling.

It may seem tempting to cross-post content from one platform to another, but please tweak your posts as you go. Links don’t work on Instagram posts, so there’s no point in including them if you’re copying your text from Facebook. You’ll likely need to change your tone of voice too if you’re posting the same news from Facebook and Instagram to, say, LinkedIn, as the audiences are different.

Hashtag best practices vary for each platform too, so don’t be tempted to copy a bunch from Instagram and paste them on Facebook or LinkedIn. I’ll come back to hashtags another day. They deserve a blog of their own.

Last but not least, if you’re promoting an event, please, please, please put the day, not just the date.

If I spot a charity fundraiser at 3pm on a Saturday, I instantly know if I can make it. Same for an evening networking event – with the day included it’s easy to see if it clashes with Zumba, yoga, or pub night - no calendar checking needed.

If your event only lists the date, some people won’t bother to check whether they can make it unless they’re super-invested in your cause.