The United States Marine Corps has established a strong and systematic social media presence. Across all platforms, they know their audience and are engaging with that audience. The USMC understands the functionality and purpose of each platform, and they have a consistent format tailored to each. Instead of posting the same content across them all, they post plentiful, well-planned content unique to each platform. This is no accident, but instead, the work of informed public affairs professionals, social media experts and communication strategists who have curated and maintained these platforms for many years to stay relevant with the times and their audience.
Their current structure across all platforms is to post a photograph with a short caption and post a longer description underneath that generally covers the who, what, where, why, when and how. This strategy gets users' attention and makes them want to click the link to see more.
Although their Facebook, X, Instagram, YouTube and Pinterest platforms are all updated regularly, their Flickr feed isn't as up-to-date as the others. It is unclear whether this is because Flickr's following is diminishing or due to a lack of resources, but it reflects the current social media atmosphere.
Click through to read more about each individual platform strategy.
Lessons Learned
It takes considerable human resources to populate many platforms and engage with the audience. However, the quality and level of your engagement across these platforms will ultimately drive your success. Spend some time unlocking what users want, and what they respond to. Post plentiful, well-planned content unique to each platform and your users will reward you with loyalty.