Gaining popularity on social media is a complicated task nowadays.
At the beginning of social networks influence, it was important to get bigger numbers, so people were eager to buy even bots – but as the security systems and ranking algorithms become more and more intelligent, it is much better to attract 50 real Instagram followers organically, then purchase 500 bots. The reason for that is the growing role of engagement rate. The leading position in the blogger ratings is now occupied by the entrepreneurs who may have fewer subscribers but have a more tight and active relationship with them. Here are collected top effective tactics for getting more engagement on your social media profiles, as well as gaining more followers.
Dive In The Industry
Whether you represent a brand or you are growing a lifestyle blog, you need to provide valuable and interesting information a bit beyond your niche. Embracing a more vast range of topics can help you to increase the engagement level as you attract a wider audience and keep them interested in your blog for a longer time. Infuse your basic themes with fresh industry news and insights, along with providing your experience to keep the public entertained. Pay attention to small talk as well, even if you are developing a narrow-themed blog. Sometimes it is very useful to babble about random things – such practice can significantly enhance your relations with followers, especially if you let them express their thoughts and listen to their opinions attentively.
It’s All About The Connection
To increase engagement rating on your social media you must channel the communication and maintain it constantly active. People come to social networks because they want to communicate, in other words – exchange information. In order to get more attention to your profile, you should listen to your audience, and let them talk freely. Interacting with you on the same level is what drives more people to your profile, as they find a place where the connection is dual. Along with offering topics to discuss by yourself, use what your followers are proposing.
Use Curated Content
At least sometimes. Even if you can produce original content 24/7, you should dilute your materials with something trendy and common for a wider audience. This is one of the basic techniques that help to gain more followers on social media. Look after the hottest trends and challenges that emerge on the major platforms you occupy, to drive the interest of more people to the specific content you have. Besides, you don’t have to copy these trends – you can reproduce them using special features of your niche. Thus, you stay in trend and keep the original flair of your personality.
Encourage Your Followers To Create Content Too
Technically, this technique is called user-generated content. Your task here is to offer your followers to create original materials that correspond to the topic of your blog and your personality. It can be artwork, motivating posts, rethinking of your content, or posts inspired by you. Hashtags can help – create a new hashtag that will represent a contest or challenge, to make connected posts visible for a wider public and easier to reach. Always show your subscribers how much you appreciate their creations and what feelings you have for each work you get, especially if this is some kind of artwork. Sincere gratitude and kind words will definitely produce more user-generated content, and of course, the loyalty of the audience.
Aim For High-Quality Visuals
Whatever they say about the sense and intellectual components of social media posts, the image matters a lot. Humans rely on their vision a lot – beautiful and harmonized pictures capture the attention very effectively. Luckily, modern smartphones can make this easier for you – current prominent models provide decent quality photography, which requires minimum enhancements. Also, mobile filters are easy to learn and use. The ground rules for creating incredible visuals are:
Don’t overdo it with filters
Use a similar color correction scheme to make your account look consistent
Take a few basic lessons of photography (or at least read some articles on the internet) to understand how to do a good composition
Pay attention to the details
Seek inspiration everywhere around you
Think outside of the box to find the most unusual angle for your pictures
Be Active Yourself
To attract more viewers to your content, you must reach out to your potential followers. Look through the profiles of the most popular influencers and brands in your niche and participate in their engagement efforts as well. By being proactive you can show that your profile is worth checking out. Avoid primitive and obvious phrases when you are entering someone’s conversation – your task is to represent your personality at its best. It is not a secret that people tend to follow several profiles from one niche, so you have to ensure your potential follower that in your profile they will find something interesting and new.
Don’t Rush The Process
When it comes to organic growth, one has to be patient, and even somewhat cautious. Establishing the connection with the audience and finding spots that hit the best rakes time, and deep thoughtful research. So if you see the progress is going slower than you might have expected, it isn’t a thing to be concerned about. Even totally unique content cannot impact the audience immediately.
It would be much better to use the time you have for improving and enhancing your work.
Collect The Feedback
One of the most effective ways to increase engagement and growth on social media is to watch tightly for the feedback you get. The reaction of the audience to your content is the best material for analytics and adjusting the strategy you have developed. Asking your followers directly, what they would like to see from you – is a great idea. If you have good potential, users will eagerly help you to improve the quality of your work. Just make sure that the communication is settled well.
Use All Tools Possible
Most platforms offer various kinds of content that can capture the attention of the audience. Let’s take Instagram as an illustration, as this network has probably the biggest variety of formats to choose from:
Feed posts – the best combination for text and visual support of valuable information and food for discussion. The comment section is also a great collecting tool for reactions.
Stories – considered to be the most engaging form of posts on Instagram. Here you can upload ongoing content, that takes the attention of the public on the spur of the moment
IGTV – a place to store videos that are longer than one minute
Instagram Live – perfect engagement instrument for strengthening the connection between you and your followers
Reels – a recent new form of video content that is targeted to make a competition with Tik Tok.
Conclusion
To get more engagement and grow your following base you need to put much effort into high-quality content and a decent method of communication with your audience. Nowadays, the most appreciated is the original and fresh ideas that are empowered by a positive and interesting personality.