03 Sep 9 Tips to Boost Your Social Media Engagement
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9 Tips to Boost Your Social Media Engagement
It is pretty common to confuse having a large count of followers on social media with having a good engagement rate. It’s as if we measured our success with the number of followers we have. The more, the merrier, but this couldn’t be further from the truth.
What good is it to have 10,000 followers if none of them is interested in your content or even willing to make a purchase? If the end goal of any business is to sell, then it’s better to have ten followers willing to make a purchase and be interested in our content than having thousands just sitting there doing nothing.
So, let’s start by switching mentalities. Let’s drop the misconception that the number of followers is important, and let’s instead focus on generating more engagement. And how can you do this, you may be wondering? Well, this is where we come in.
After carefully studying this year’s marketing trends and consumer habits, we’ve identified the most important things you need to do to boost your social media engagement.
Are you ready to ramp up your social media game? Let’s dive in, then!
Tip 1 – content is key
Think about the reason you started following any given account on social media. There was some sort of content that sparked your attention and made you want to see more, right?
If you surfed the account a little more and found more content of interest, you were probably inclined to start following them. This action was likely prompted by the promise of more valuable content in the future.
If, however, you headed to their account after your initial discovery and found that this initial content was a clickbait, you most probably click away never to return. Well, this is probably the most valuable tip that you will find here – content is key.
High-value content not only generates awareness from new prospects and sparks interest but also gets people to start following you. So, if you don’t have a content marketing strategy so far or you were just posting other people’s stuff, you will want to reconsider your approach if you want to generate more engagement.
But what exactly is high-value content?
This question doesn’t have a one-size-fits-all kind of answer. It will depend on your niche, the platform you’re on, and the kind of audience you have. This is why you need to do a little audience research to find out who your buyer personas are. This will inform you of how you may best solve their problems by offering a particular service that only you can provide.
Once you have a better grasp of who your audience is, you can start generating content that they will derive value from.
Tip 2 – ask your audience
This is probably a no brainer, but if you want people to do a specific thing, ask them directly rather than waiting for them to figure it out for themselves.
There was once a very famous book about UX (user experience in web design) called “Don’t Make Me Think”, and you should strongly abide by this rule. People on social media don’t want to use their brains much. They’re just there to relax and consume entertaining content. So, don’t make them think too much. Be straightforward with them.
This being said, if you want them to share your post, ask them directly to share your post. If you want them to save the post, instruct them to do just that.
Social media platforms, like Instagram and Facebook, for example, even allow you to engage with your audience directly using stories. There’s a vast array of options to choose from to ask them questions or make them participate in a certain way, and people love that.
If you have a store that sells products online, for example, a clothing line, you can ask your audience what kind of t-shirt they prefer. Or you can ask if they would like free shipping or a particular discount. Make your audience feel part of your brand. This leads us to our next tip – build a community.
Tip 3 – build a community
Ultimately, you don’t want a one-time-purchase. You want new customers, yes, but you also want to earn the loyalty of your clients and have them regularly buy from you. And how do you do this? By building a community around your brand.
If you’ve been paying attention, you should now be aware of the importance of high-value content and engagement. These are the key steps to creating true ambassadors for your brand, that kind of client that recommends you to everyone they know.
So, focus on generating high-value content, interact with your audience as much as possible. Be genuine and open and ask for their opinion. Make them a part of your brand, and they will repay in kind with their loyalty.
Tip 4 – be consistent
There is nothing more off-putting than a ghost-like account that posts once every couple of months. If you have ever heard of the concept “top-of-mind”, then you know how lacking consistency with your posts can play a decisive role in your demise.
We are all aware that we live in a time of mass-information. There is an overload of news all the time, 24/7. So, the only way to maintain “top-of-mind” awareness is to remain consistent with your posts.
This can be done in multiple ways, including creating posts for your feed, stories, videos, lives, you name it. There are as many options as accounts out there, so there is no excuse to become a ghost.
“Are you ready to take your engagement skills to the next level?”
Tip 5 – collaborate
When you collaborate with similar accounts to yours or that complement your brand in a particular way, you are expanding your horizons, exposing your account to new oceans, and enriching your content. For instance, if you have a makeup business, you could collaborate with a skin-care brand.
So, find an account that goes well with your niche and start collaborating! You will both reap the benefits of this strategy. Alternatively, you could also hire an influencer!
Tip 6 – be omnipresent
This tip probably does not apply to new accounts because if you are just starting with your social media, it is best to focus all your efforts on one or two platforms. However, if you have some experience with social media or if you have a strong presence already, then this tip is right up your alley.
What does it mean to be omnipresent? It means sharing your content multi-platform so that you reach a wider audience.
Typically, you won’t find all your prospects and leads on just one or two social media platforms. People often have multiple social media accounts across a variety of platforms, such as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, etc. What tends to happen, as with many other things in life, is that social media platforms begin to lose relevancy.
New forms of media content mean new platforms. Take TikTok, for example. It has not been around for long; however, it is already stealing a huge chunk of Facebook and Instagram’s following. Why? Simply because they offer something new, something nobody thought to offer before.
If you do not want to lose followers, you need to cater to all types of audiences. The more places you push your content and the more diverse it is, the wider the audience you will have.
Tip 7 – diversify
This tip goes hand-in-hand with the previous tip and refers to you tailoring your content to different audience types. This can be in the form of text posts, white papers, videos, reels, lives, carousels, memes, gifs, infographics, and so forth.
If you just do text posts, you won’t be able to use other social media platforms like YouTube, and you will ultimately lose relevancy. Plus, people tend to get bored easily online.
So, if you post different types of content formats, you will have a higher chance of staying relevant and entertaining.
After all, let’s not forget rule one of social media – people are there to entertain themselves.
Tip 8 – create a content marketing strategy
As you have probably heard before, there is no free lunch in marketing. The same applies to your content strategy. Forget about posting just for posting, and start thinking about the goal behind that post. What do you want to get out of it? Is it more awareness? Is it driving traffic to your website? Or are you hoping to make some sales?
All of this can be easily achieved if you have an actual strategy and course of action. We call this content marketing strategy. It involves knowing your niche, your buyer personas, your KPIs, your team members and resources available for ads and actual content generation, and the execution and revision.
Suppose you’ve never heard of content marketing before, and you were just posting random content whenever inspiration struck. In that case, you may want to delegate this to an agency or an independent professional. Here at edirect, we expertly handle social media platforms and so can assist you in this capacity.
Tip 9 – trial and error
As with any strategy, nothing is fool proof. You are bound to make a mistake at some point and not hit the results you were expecting. So, what can you do? You can use your social media analytics to see what failed and adjust your approach accordingly.
You have highly valuable information provided daily by your social media platforms, which is why you need to use this tool to ramp up your game. Do not be afraid of not reaching your KPI or having some content that didn’t generate the engagement you were hoping to get.
The secret here is to try, learn, and adapt.
