In
today’s world social media is becoming ever more important, it now plays a key
role in how businesses and brands market themselves, gain customers, and
interact with the public. For this reason increasing your social media
following is always desirable. While there is no point in chasing numbers over
genuine followers and engagement, a larger following means a wider audience and
increased opportunities. This article will outline 6 strategies which have been
shown to increase social media following dramatically, and when implemented
correctly they bring a quality following alongside an increased one.
Post top quality, shareable content
While
what is ‘top quality content’ is largely subjective, you can easily discover
what content works for you through trial and error. Keep a close eye on your
post analytics to see what content performs well and endeavour to create and
post more of that variety of content.
It
is vital to post a large quantity of shareable content as this can bring in new
followers quickly and easily. Simple yet effective posts such as inspiring
quotes or emotive pictures and videos are readily shareable content and each
time one of your current followers shares or retweets these they introduce your
page and name to their own social media circle. Shareable content is the
variety which can rapidly go viral and cause your number of followers to
explode; so it is always worth posting easily digestible content amongst the
more serious, as this can bring in the followers who stay for the bigger
picture.
Connect and Engage
Being
visible on social media is everything, modern users are inundated with options
when it comes to who or what they follow, so if you want to stand out you are
really going to have to go that extra mile.
Replying
to comments in a cheerful and conversational manner will show your followers
that you value their input and want to engage with them. “This will ensure that
you maintain your current follower base and encourage loyalty in them.
Likewise, those who are new visitors to your page will see the level of
interaction as a incentive to follow you”, – explains Mary Godley, a Social
media manager at Writemyx and 1Day2Write.
It
is also worth noting that on some platforms, such as Facebook, engaging with
followers will cause you to show up on their newsfeed, making you visible to
their friends who are likely to have similar interests.
Join the conversation
You
can find trending topics and conversation threads in your niche all over social
media, so jump in and join the conversations to show your online presence. The
beauty of social media is that with just a small amount of effort it can be
utilised as free advertising, so don’t waste an opportunity to participate in
topical threads and expose yourself to prospective new followers.
Partaking
in threads is also an ideal way to show that your brand or business is
relevant. Social media is a constantly evolving and changing organism and it
can be all too easy to fade into obscurity by not keeping up to date. Make a
conscious effort to demonstrate that you understand and have something to say
about the current issues, news, and progress in your niche and you will attract
new followers to your social media platforms.
Collaborate with other businesses and
influencers
An
influencer is a social media user with a large following and repetition and any
association with them can do wonders for your own following. Even something as
simple as a ‘shout out’ and vastly increase your following, so it is worth
reaching out to influencers whenever you can in order to gain online publicity.
An
example of how this could be done is a newly emerging cosmetics brand sending
some of their products to a YouTube personality for free, in the hopes that
they will test and review them on their channel. As many beauty channels have
millions of subscribers, being featured and endorsed on one could easily double
a small brand’s following overnight. No matter what your niche is there is
almost certainly an influencer out there who would be suitable to collaborate
with.
If
you have an established social media following yourself then it also worth
contacting influencers within your niche to collaborate on projects such
interviews or shared projects. This is a mutually beneficial exercise as it
exposes both of you to a new set of potential followers.
Reward those who follow you
The
reality is that social media users are spoilt for choice when it comes to who
to follow and gaining and retaining peoples interest is becoming increasingly
more difficult. There is no point organising and implementing a complex
marketing strategy to gain new followers if you don’t retain them. Rewards such
as giveaways and contests solve both these issues by encouraging new followers
to join and old followers to remain.
Rewards
features such as giveaways are a solid investment, when you take into
consideration the amount of publicity giving away a product such as a tablet
can generate, it is undoubtedly a lot cheaper than paying for traditional
advertising. “There are also structured rewards platforms such as Patreon,
which provide exclusive content to loyal followers. Another tactic is offer
discounts and special offers on your page, as this will encourage users to
constantly check for any updates and engage with your brand”, – says Roger
Cravens, a Marketing professional at Origin writings.
Find ways to reach new members of
your target audience
It
goes without saying that a sure fire way to begin attracting new followers to
your social media is to reach out and target them directly.
Get
to know your target demographic and become familiar with trends in their social
media behaviour; what brands they follow, their age range, occupations, and
shopping patterns. This information will make it easier to tailor your content
more directly for your target audience and will show you which type of page to
make yourself visible on and what kind of influencers could help you reach
members of your target audience who don’t follow you yet.
To
conclude, keep in mind your objectives when growing your following, there are
multiple strategies you can use to grow your social media but it is also
important to ensure you maintain your content quality and retain your new
followers. The keys to success are strong, shareable content, engagement with
followers and fellow influencers, and remaining relevant through topical
interaction and interactive reward schemes.
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