Social media can be a highly effective tool for developing your brand’s identity and reputation and building a loyal following. However, you need to create relevant and interesting content.
Suppose you’re posting content online, and your audience isn’t doing anything more than scrolling past it without engaging.
In that case, you need to evaluate your content and consider how you can craft a strategy that grows your audience and increases your social media engagement.
If you’re looking for better engagement on your social platforms, there are several reasons why your content is landing like a stone in the ocean.
The algorithms of the major platforms, whether Instagram and Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), YouTube, or TikTok, are all saturated with content. This makes it much less engaging to stand out and be seen.
Another factor is the increased usage of shorter videos, such as stories and reels, which has shifted audience expectations and interests. Attention spans are getting shorter and less patient with content.
Finally, most content on these platforms could be more varied. It either mirrors what others are doing or goes too far, going over the top and turning audiences off.
These are just some reasons that growing social media engagement has become more challenging.
Look, there are still a ton of influencers and brands on social that have huge and loyal followings, so what separates those people and brands from your own?
They’ve unlocked the secret sauce necessary to grow social media engagement.
This article will discuss how social media marketing that builds relationships encourages organic growth, such as word-of-mouth referrals and shares.
This means that to grow your social media, you’ll need to focus on what is important to your audience and increase your engagement with them.
Sounds simple, right? You bet!
So, let’s discuss how to grow your social media engagement regardless of your industry and outcome objectives.
What are the Keys to Grow Your Social Media Engagement
When considering growing your social media impact and increasing your content engagement, you must understand your audience’s interests, preferences, needs, and behaviors.
Focus on what benefits your audience. Creating content around those concepts will help draw interest and make your content more engaging.
To do this effectively, there are a few things to focus on, including:
- Understand What Content Your Audience Wants
- Knowing When, And How Often, To Post
- Trending Events And Industry News
- Be The First To Engage
- Respond to Comments
- Memes and Relatable Content
- User-Generated Content (UGC)
So, let’s look at these areas that can build your social media engagement – and better yet, they won’t cost you a ton of resources to make them happen.
Understand What Content Your Audience Wants
The key to gaining better engagement from your audience is providing them with better content.
You may be tired of hearing that providing value to your audience is key, but the reality is that people want what is in their best interest.
So, understand what content your audience is craving and make content that is customer-focused and helpful for them your focus.
You don’t need to provide hours upon hours of video or create 30,000-word eBooks every week.
You can provide value to your audience through content shared from other industries or trending news.
Again, the key is to provide value.
When you’re searching for answers on how to grow your social media engagement, here are some tips to keep in mind:
- Create better content: If your content isn’t generating the type of buzz and engagement that you’d hoped for, analyze and review your content for what seems to be working by others similar to your content and try to adopt some of the same things.
- If you’re creating data-driven content but your peers are creating more personalized content and getting better traction, consider how you present your material to your audience.
- Share top news: Share what’s important to your audience from reliable sources that will benefit them.
- Inspirational quotes: Find a motivating quote you can share with your audience. Ask for comments and replies, including your audience, to share their inspirational quotes with you.
- Share content from other leaders in your niche: Sharing content from others is a good way to generate interest and provide you with a valued source of content your audience can benefit from.
- For example, if you’re in the personal development niche, sharing content and tips from industry leaders is a good way to share important content with your audience. Include a comment reply section to see how that works for you.
- Have great visuals: Quickly digesting content through a visual is 10,000 easier than reading a lot of content. As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words.
Knowing When, and How Often, to Post
Getting better engagement is a combination of strategy and timing focused on content that benefits your audience.
Knowing when to post your content around your audience’s behaviors is an important part of your strategy to grow your engagement. You could post at midnight every day of the week, but if your audience consumes content at 1 in the afternoon, it probably won’t get in front of as many people as you’d hoped.
The other side is knowing how often to post your content.
Every platform has different times when people look for content and how much it promotes.
Track your posting schedule and see how much attention you get on each platform and what times peak attention is.
Trending Events and Industry News
Another key way to get your audience to start conversations is by following trendy news (including important industry updates) and creating relevant, timely content around it.
You want to position your content to benefit your audience and make them feel that they have an inside source of important information they can use to benefit from.
Be the First to Engage
You have to engage to get better engagement. So be the first to start and join conversations and be willing to reply when someone responds to your comments.
Also, don’t be afraid to change how you write your content. You can take an open-ended approach to your content, such as:
- Ask Questions: Asking questions in your content or concluding with a question will motivate your audience to engage.
- Respond to Comments: Similar to being the first to engage, respond to comments by others on your content and other people’s comments on a different page or platform.
- Hold Contests: Contests are fun and easily engaging for people looking to win a prize. Craft your contest around content and promotions that you’re trying to generate interest.
- Host AMAs and Q&As: Live AMA (Ask Me Anything) and Q&A (Question and Answer) sessions greatly boost engagement in real time. Adding a contact card beforehand lets you capture your audience’s information before they “join” the conversation.
Memes and Relatable Content
People love sharing memes and relatable content, so consider part of your strategy to include sharable memes and other types of things your audience finds enjoyable or useful.
Humor and light-hearted content can differentiate your content from others and better resonate with your audience.
For example, brands like Wendy’s and Netflix have mastered being able to post humorous and relevant content that aligns with their brands to stand out in a saturated market.
User-Generated Content (UGC)
Using content generated by others is a great way to increase engagement. Users like and trust content from other audience members, and it helps you create authenticity and trust in your brand.
The bonus is that by sharing user-generated content (UGC), you can fill your content calendar without having to do the heavy lifting—your audience is doing it for you!
Share Instagram Stories, Facebook posts, TikTok, and other content to encourage your audience to create and share their own on your platform!
When strategizing how to grow your social media engagement, you need the right combination of frequency, creativity, and authenticity.
Tailor your posts to match the platform you’re posting to, and always focus on creating (and delivering) beneficial and valuable content to your audience.
By focusing on your audience, you can turn passive followers into a passionate, engaged community of loyal fans who can’t wait to interact with your brand on the platform.
Social media engagement isn’t about creating the next viral sensation; it’s about making lasting connections with your audience members for long-term growth.
Don’t be transactional or stale. Instead, focus your content on others, their wants and needs, and provide content that answers and entertains their problems. You’ll see incredible growth in your engagement.