It’s great that we, as a Social Media driven society are endorsing great, visually impressive sites like Pinterest but there are some networks that go almost unnoticed as a way of increasing traffic and driving sales, one of them being Slideshare.
You might think I’m crazy to focus on Slide sharing as a way of increasing traffic but this is something we overlook on a day to day basis. Have you seen Forbes ‘Richest People in America’ list? This is a slideshow. Apple has incorporated slideshow’s into their iPhoto application as a key feature. The list is endless for the businesses using Slideshow’s as a way of presenting their products.
Slideshare offers users the ability to upload and share publicly or privately PowerPoint presentations, Word documents and Adobe PDF Portfolios. I uploaded my first presentation on May 9th 2009 and have been actively using the network ever since. Now at 23,452 views, I will share with you some great tips on getting on to the front page of Slideshare.
CRM Software & Cloud Computing business Salesforce have openly said; “I see SlideShare as a virtual bookshelf, or a library in the cloud, where we can make our best content more discoverable to a diverse audience.”
For you to really utilise Slideshare and all it has to offer, you need to look at it as more than just powerpoint presentations that leave you reminiscing about school. Visually, Slideshare is now a platform that allows you to engage, entertain and inform users with effective pictures and “to the point” information. With over 60 million visitors per month alone, you are seriously missing out on the generated traffic (over 500% more from business owners than any other professional website) that Slideshare has to offer.
Think it’s going to cost you to create a visually interesting presentation? Think again. It really isn’t as hard as you think it is. I have personally created all of my presentations on my Slideshare account and have had success. Although design is important, you must focus on how you present your work and the quality of that information you are sharing.
Front page of Slideshare? It’s not as hard as you think. First you must research the kind of presentations that are successful on Slideshare. The title of a presentation should be looked at as a heading for a blog post. It must be engaging and stand out from the crowd. The use of text and images is a must. The best way to do this is to caption photos within the presentations. Keep the slides within 10-25 pages as you don’t want to lose interest.
When thinking about creating a presentation or document, you need to take into consideration the audience who is going to view it. Most likely, this will be business people. I’m not saying ‘don’t target beginners’, but keep the topic noticeable, without being predictable. The idea of Slideshare is to allow your viewers to pay forward your information to their community. Social Commerce today wrote an article which included one of my presentations. This automatically increased views and to this day, is my most viewed presentation.
To get the word out about your presentations, use your community on Social Media to do this. You have all of the free networks out there where you can promote, so make sure you utilise them. Without sharing your work, you will not make the front page of Slideshare. You need the initial views from your community to get the ball rolling inside of Slideshare. The whole idea is that you are giving your audience something of value which means they will pay it forward to their community. You can pin your presentation for Pinterest, Tweet about it, use as a Facebook post or even create a blog post around it.
It is important to Keep brand continuity when making your presentations. You may notice on my Slideshare account that I have recently altered my branding. My older presentations have my older branding and my more recent work, has my new branding.
Slideshare is first and foremost a network so treat it like one. Use a photo of yourself in your profile and include your keywords around your business in the description so people can see the message you are trying to portray.
Are you ready to make the front page of Slideshare?