Social Media Resources

Updated June 27, 2023

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

UTILIZING YOUR PHONE CAMERA

The following settings can change the quality of the images you create! We encourage you to try these
camera settings and resources to better the visual caliber of your content.
iPhone Camera
● In the ‘Settings’ app, select the ‘Camera’ tab.
● Set your ‘Formats’ to ‘High Efficiency.’
● Select ‘Record Video’ at ‘4k at 24 fps’. This will make your videos clearer when taking a video.
● Under ‘Preserve Settings,’ turn on ‘Live Photo.’ This is helpful for those with shaky hands to
ensure you are more likely to get a better-quality photo.
● Turn on the options for ‘Grid,’ ‘Mirror Front Camera,’ and ‘View Outside Frame.’ The grid is
especially useful in helping you find symmetry when taking a photo.
● Turn on ‘Scene Detection,’ ‘Prioritize Faster Shooting,’ ‘Lens Correction,’ and ‘Smart HDR.’
These will help your phone camera to develop a better adaptation pattern when taking
pictures more rapidly.
Android and Google Devices
● This article will help those with Androids adjust their camera settings to take higher quality
photos.
https://www.wikihow.com/Improve-Photo-Resolution-on-Android
● This article will assist any Google smart devices.
https://techwiser.com/best-google-camera-settings-to-use-it-like-a-pro/
Other Useful Phone Camera Tips
● Remember to clean/wipe off your camera lens. It is quite simple and easy to do. A dirty lens
will easily ruin the photo.
● Turn your screen brightness up so you can see as many details as possible.
Additional Phone Camera-Related Resources
● The following link is an article that lists several camera settings and user guidelines that are
applicable to almost all hand-held devices.
https://iphonephotographyschool.com/iphone-camera-settings/

MARKETING STRATEGIES
● Identify and Focus Your Target Platforms
○ Figure out which platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, etc.) are going to
market to the biggest audience and will bring in your target audience. This is dependent
on age, gender, and other similar identifiers. You’ll want to be prevalent and consistent on
those platforms. Make sure your content appeals to your desired audience.
Social Media Resources
Updated June 27, 2023
__________________________________________________________________________________________________

● Dedicate Time for Maintenance - Daily & Weekly

○ You’ll want to spend around 10 minutes daily checking all social media accounts for
messages, comments, and general interaction with your audience. You can interact by
responding to comments, liking reposts of your content, and just making sure that all of
the accounts and audience’s needs are met. Weekly, set aside time to plan what content
needs to be shared, gather the content, and prepare potential posts. This involves
gathering imagery, information, and captions related to the needed content.
● Use a Social Media Calendar
○ Using a social media calendar is the best way to organize the content you want to post.
Most will allow you to connect multiple social media accounts, create future posts, and
schedule them to be posted. The social media calendar will follow your determined
schedule and post the content for you. By using this, you can save yourself the hassle of
having to physically post daily. The most recommended social media calendar is
‘Planoly’, which is described in further detail in the ‘Free Resources’ section of this
document. However, use whichever free calendar fits your needs best.
● Encourage Employee Engagement
○ If there are multiple people working in your department, encourage them to create photos
and videos for potential social media content. This allows you to pull from a larger bank
of visual content resources, as well as find new ideas for your content through teamwork.
Also, encourage your team to like, comment, and share your content to increase the
algorithm and allow for a higher drive to your page. This will help the platform to know
what demographics it will send your content to in the future.
● Track & Evaluate Your Key Performance Indicators (KPI)
○ Your KPIs are any data collected that allows you to see how your marketing profiles or
content is performing. The easiest way to do this on social media is to go into your
account settings and make your profile a business profile. This will provide you with
analytics automatically as to how many likes, comments, and views your posts get. It
allows you to see if people are viewing your content or quickly switching to something
else, and it provides you with what types of demographics your content is reaching. You
can use this information to make sure you are achieving your goals with your social
media and content.
● Actively Search for Ways to Improve and New Content to Post
○ It is important to be proud of the work you’ve done and what you’ve achieved, but always
be on the lookout for what you can do next to take your social media to the next level.
Search for similar ministries and social media accounts and see what you could learn
from their content. What are they doing successfully that you could use to improve your
profile? Stay true to your branding and audience but leave room for growth. Below are
resources on how to improve your social media presence and how to find new content to
post.
Social Media Resources
Updated June 27, 2023
__________________________________________________________________________________________________

Free Resources
● Planoly
○ Choose their ‘Free Account’ option! It is available for download on iPhones, laptops,
and is accessible from their website.
○ This resource allows you to have a calendar plan set for your future posts. You can
create Instagram/Facebook posts and set a schedule for the app to post to your
accounts for you. This allows you to keep a consistent posting schedule to help your
algorithm. It’s recommended to schedule that time to sit down and plan the next
weeks' worth of posts. Then you do not have to try to remember to post for the rest
of that period.
○ This is their website link.
https://www.planoly.com/
○ This is Planoly’s YouTube channel. They post videos answering any questions you
may have about how to use Planoly. It’s the perfect tool to optimize your experience.
https://www.youtube.com/@Planoly
● This link will take you to a website that lists different programs that will help you with posting
schedules, which all offer a free subscription option. Be careful when choosing some. Be sure
that whatever program you choose supports all social media accounts you need to run. It is
recommended that you just use one program for scheduling posts for your social media
accounts.
https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2018/01/17/best-free-social-media-management-tools
● This resource provides tips on how to improve your social media presence and increase your
audience.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnrampton/2014/09/29/25-ways-to-grow-your-social-media-presence/?s
h=687549dd62fb
● This resource provides tips on how to find new and relevant social media content to enhance your
audience’s experience.
https://mollymarshallmarketing.com/2016/10/find-social-media-content/
● Molly Marshall is a marketing strategist that shares a lot of her strategies through free blogs and
booklets. Do not feel the need to pay for any of her services or classes. Her free resources are
very useful and enough information to project you forward.
https://mollymarshallmarketing.com/
Social Media Resources
Updated June 27, 2023
__________________________________________________________________________________________________

Tools for Content Editing

Photos
● Canva
○ You can create a free profile that will allow you to create any digital content you want! It
offers suggestions if you aren’t sure which direction to take artistically, or you can create
from a blank canvas.
○ Canva offers measurements, so be sure to use these to ensure what you create is
formatted correctly for your social media platform. For example, the format for an
Instagram story is different from a post, and Canva has these measurements for you to
make creating and editing your content easier.

Videos
● CapCut
○ This app has many free editing options to include photos, cutouts, music, filters, and
layers within a video. This will make creating reels and videos for your social media
easier for those who are not familiar with different editing applications.
○ Be aware that CapCut places its logo at the end of videos, so you would need to save the
video to your device and trim this out before uploading it to social media.
○ CapCut provides tutorials on how to optimize your experience while using the program
through their YouTube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/@CapCutofficial

CornerBooks Social Media Tips

There are so many great things you are doing for CornerBooks’ social media that you should continue.

● The use of people in your content, such as volunteers and workers, is great! Nothing will get more
people to check out CornerBooks than seeing other people enjoy it.
● Showcasing your ministry partners is wonderful. Do even more of it! This is a unique asset that
our bookstore has that most bookstores do not, so make these wonderful products known!
● You’re doing a great job posting photos when CornerBooks holds a big event or has a booth at a
big church event.
● Whoever has been taking book photos is doing a great job! There is a lot of color and variety from
post to post. The way you have a focus in the foreground and a blurred background is very
creative! Try for some new higher angles on the books for some variety, but what you are doing is
great.
Social Media Resources
Updated June 27, 2023
__________________________________________________________________________________________________

There are many other things you could slowly implement to take CornerBooks’ social media to the next
level!

● Post more candids of customers enjoying the store, and volunteers enjoying their job.
A photo of people posing is nice if you want to spotlight a volunteer, but people like to see others
in the act of enjoying something. This will help to show more aspects of the bookstore and what
it would look like to volunteer or browse through.
● Post more reels.
You do a great job of creating reels and videos of your large events. Try to create reels that
showcase what books you have. This could be categorized by genres, topics, author showcases,
or even potential audience demographics. You could create a timelapse video of the coffee area
on a Sunday to advertise that, or of CornerBooks in general.
● Organizing your highlights would give you a direction to point your page visitors.
This can look different on Instagram versus Facebook. On Instagram, all highlights on your profile
should be labeled, updated, and serve a purpose. The purpose can be to show different books,
past events, volunteers, CornerBooks related information, or any other topic you deem as
important! If anyone is interested in one of those topics, it gives them an easier time finding the
information.
● Your bio does not have to have your title in it.
Your title is already seen in your user handle at the top of your page and directly below your profile
picture. You can take it out of your bio for ease of formatting and viewing.
● Showcase more items that are in the back or sides of your store.
People walking by are very likely to see what is on the front table. While it’s important to advertise
these featured items on your social media, be sure to advertise the rest of your merchandise.
There may be other books or items that people are not aware of because they do not always have
the chance to check the back of the store, whether it be due to time or a Sunday crowd. Think of
your social media posts as a front table showcase for some of the items that are not seen from
the physical front of the store.
● Refer to some of the photo and video editing resources above.
When you are trying to add words onto a photo or video, these can help to make it look much
cleaner and clearer.
● Posting stories is a good way of appearing very active, even if you are posting less frequently.
There is so much more freedom in posting stories versus posts. It can be something small, big, a
quick update that only affects that day - such as a temporary change in coffee flavors, or you can
even feature a ‘Book of the Day’ daily or weekly for readers. You can also repost your most recent
post here. This gives you a space to notify as many people as possible, and a way to save
Social Media Resources
Updated June 27, 2023
__________________________________________________________________________________________________

important information to your highlights. Posting stories will also give you content to keep your
highlights updated.

● Feel free to reference any Houston’s First content.

If you are ever curious about ideal ways to format things, how to phrase captions, or what posting
patterns pull more viewers, scroll through other Houston’s First social media pages! There are
many on each campus advertising different ministries or campus as a whole. These can give you
a direction to follow if you are ever in a rut.