As an Internet marketing agency, social media is the heart of many of our clients' campaigns. Here are three ways we are spreading the love by successfully incorporating Valentine's Day into our social media marketing campaigns.

1. 1. Create custom images. Payoff: increased engagement

Because users are drawn to visual content on social media sites, it's important to create images that capture readers' attention. Otherwise, they will scroll right through their Facebook News Feeds or Pinterest categories without even noticing the messages. As part of our social media campaigns, we create custom images for clients that are reflective of their brand and that relate to holidays, pop culture, major sporting events, and current events. Here's an image we created for one of our clients, the State of NJ Division of Highway Traffic Safety, that we'll use on Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram this Friday. Notice the logo in the bottom right corner – a best practice is to make sure the images are branded for maximum exposure.

1. 2. Run a contest. Payoff: boost brand awareness

The possibilities are endless when it comes to creating a social media contest for Valentine's Day. One of our clients, HaveYouSeenTheRing.com was a perfect fit because they sell new and pre-owned diamonds and jewelry. Facebook users are being asked to upload photos of their engagement rings, in honor of the upcoming holiday, and person with the most votes will win. By creating a custom hashtag and posting custom branded images to their social channels, the contest has already received over 250 entries and the Facebook page has received over 1,000 new "Likes." The winner will be announced on, you guessed it, Valentine's Day.

1. 3. Write blog posts and promote them with paid ads. Payoff: website referral traffic

If you read our latest press release, you know we are focusing on organic and referral traffic as indicators of a successful SEO campaign over ranking reports. So, what's one way to get referral traffic numbers up? One tactic is to write engaging blog posts and promote them through social media. For one of our clients, Berlitz, we are writing a blog post about how to say "I Love You" in different languages. We created a custom image to visually represent the blog post and we will be promoting it along with the corresponding link through their social channels on February 14^th. We also plan on "boosting" the image on Facebook for maximum results.

 
What are some of your marketing ideas for leveraging social media this Valentine's Day?