{
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    "type" : "single",
    "title" : "Social Sharing Buttons: Location, Location, Location |Digital.gov",
    "description": "Social Sharing Buttons: Location, Location, Location",
    "home_page_url" : "/preview/gsa/digitalgov.gov/bc-archive-content-3/","feed_url" : "/preview/gsa/digitalgov.gov/bc-archive-content-3/2015/04/14/social-sharing-buttons-location-location-location/index.json","item" : [
    {"title" :"Social Sharing Buttons: Location, Location, Location","summary" : "DigitalGov has seen posts from members of the community who land on opposite sides regarding social sharing buttons. There are those who find social sharing buttons useful (When Sharing Buttons","date" : "2015-04-14T10:00:19-04:00","date_modified" : "2025-01-27T19:42:55-05:00","authors" : {"sara-smith" : "Sara Smith"},"topics" : {
        
            "analytics" : "Analytics",
            "social-media" : "Social media"
            },"branch" : "bc-archive-content-3",
      "filename" :"2015-04-14-social-sharing-buttons-location-location-location.md",
      
      "filepath" :"news/2015/04/2015-04-14-social-sharing-buttons-location-location-location.md",
      "filepathURL" :"https://github.com/GSA/digitalgov.gov/blob/bc-archive-content-3/content/news/2015/04/2015-04-14-social-sharing-buttons-location-location-location.md",
      "editpathURL" :"https://github.com/GSA/digitalgov.gov/edit/bc-archive-content-3/content/news/2015/04/2015-04-14-social-sharing-buttons-location-location-location.md","slug" : "social-sharing-buttons-location-location-location","url" : "/preview/gsa/digitalgov.gov/bc-archive-content-3/2015/04/14/social-sharing-buttons-location-location-location/","content" :"\u003cdiv class=\"image\"\u003e\n  \u003cimg\n    src=\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/digitalgov/_legacy-img/2015/04/400-x-72-fb-twitter-email-plus-sign.jpg\"\n    alt=\"Four typical social share icon buttons for Facebook, Twitter, email and the plus sign for more options in a horizontal line.\"/\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\n\n\n\u003cp\u003eDigitalGov has seen posts from members of the community who land on opposite sides regarding social sharing buttons. There are those who find social sharing buttons useful (\u003ca href=\"/preview/gsa/digitalgov.gov/bc-archive-content-3/2014/04/23/when-sharing-buttons-work/\"\u003eWhen Sharing Buttons Work\u003c/a\u003e and those who’ve found the opposite (\u003ca href=\"/preview/gsa/digitalgov.gov/bc-archive-content-3/2014/04/02/to-use-social-sharing-buttons-or-not/\"\u003eTo Use Social Sharing Buttons or Not\u003c/a\u003e. I’d argue the utility can be found in adjusting how, or more specifically where, you use them. But first…\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch2 id=\"the-basics\"\u003eThe Basics\u003c/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWhat are social sharing buttons?\u003c/strong\u003e Social sharing buttons are the icons on your website that allow website visitors to click on them and share the page to their social media channels.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWhy are social sharing buttons important?\u003c/strong\u003e Social sharing buttons allow you to tap into the sharing power of the many visitors to your site. When visitors share your content on their social media accounts, members of their audience who click the link will be directed to your site.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch2 id=\"defining-the-metrics\"\u003eDefining the Metrics\u003c/h2\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSocial shares\u003c/strong\u003e: shares from the tool (clicking the share button) to social media accounts.\u003c/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSocial clicks\u003c/strong\u003e: clicks occurring on the social media shares that come back to the website.\u003c/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSocial referrals\u003c/strong\u003e: the number of visits to your site from social media channels.\u003c/li\u003e\n\u003c/ul\u003e\n\u003ch2 id=\"nidas-experiment\"\u003eNIDA’s Experiment\u003c/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSince 2011, the \u003ca href=\"http://www.drugabuse.gov/\"\u003eNational Institute on Drug Abuse\u003c/a\u003e (NIDA) has used a small orange box that says “+Share.” In June 2014, we added a scrolling toolbar (on the left, in the desktop view screenshot below) to the site for those viewing on a desktop. Then in October 2014, we enabled a scrolling toolbar for mobile visitors as well (on the bottom, in the mobile view screenshot below).\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"image\"\u003e\n  \u003cimg\n    src=\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/digitalgov/_legacy-img/2015/04/390-x-275-NIDA-Website-Screenshot.jpg\"\n    alt=\"390-x-275-NIDA-Website-Screenshot\"/\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\n\n   \u003cdiv class=\"image\"\u003e\n     \u003cimg\n       src=\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/digitalgov/_legacy-img/2015/04/155-x-275-NIDA-Mobile-Screenshot.jpg\"\n       alt=\"155-x-275-NIDA-Mobile-Screenshot\"/\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\n   \n\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMaking these adjustments involved adding pieces of code provided by \u003ca href=\"https://www.addthis.com/#gallery\"\u003eAddThis\u003c/a\u003e to our website. AddThis is the company we use for social sharing services. For the small amount of time and effort spent on the addition of the sharing toolbars, we quickly saw results. Immediately, we experienced a rapid increase in social shares. We averaged 1,000-1,500 shares until June 2014, when the toolbar was added. For the months of January and February 2015, we’ve exceeded 20,000 social shares each month.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMore importantly, we’ve also experienced a correlational growth in social referrals to the site since the implementation of the social sharing toolbars. The tool we use only gives social click data for the top 50 shared pages, providing a slightly incomplete picture of clicks back to our site based upon the social shares. However, by analyzing the social click data available, social clicks on the shares have increased from about 1,000 a month to about 2,000 a month since we added the social sharing toolbars. When you consider that our social referral traffic has been averaging 30,000 each month, another 1,000 clicks is noteworthy.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"image\"\u003e\n  \u003cimg\n    src=\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/digitalgov/_legacy-img/2015/04/600-x-429-AddThisDashboardMay14toMar15.jpg\"\n    alt=\"600-x-429-AddThisDashboardMay14toMar15\"/\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\n\n\n\u003ch2 id=\"drawing-conclusions\"\u003eDrawing Conclusions\u003c/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGiven this information, social sharing buttons are effective for NIDA’s purposes. With relatively minor effort, we’ve increased shares, clicks, and referrals.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAnother lesson learned is that the location of the toolbars played a crucial role in the increase in shares. The toolbars, which scrolled with the visitor, made it obvious and easy to share NIDA’s content. If you feel your social sharing buttons aren’t pulling their weight, consider adjusting their location and design in order to attract visitors to the sharing options on your site.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIf even a fraction of your visitors share to their accounts, you should see increased traffic driven back to your site. Once the buttons are up on your site, there is minimal effort required to keep the sharing going. Can you say the same about other social media strategies you employ?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhat are your thoughts? Is it worth it?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003chr\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003ca href=\"https://www.linkedin.com/in/saramariecrocoll\"\u003eSara Smith\u003c/a\u003e is the Social Media Strategist for the National Institute on Drug Abuse, part of the National Institutes of Health. You can reach her via \u003ca href=\"mailto:Sara.smith@nih.go\"\u003eemail\u003c/a\u003e or on Twitter, \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/CrocollSmith\"\u003e@CrocollSmith\u003c/a\u003e.\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\n"}
  ]
}