Social media engagement is an art form that is constantly evolving with time. However, there are fundamental tactics that when implemented consistently, continue to show promising results. This article is a reminder of the engagement tactics that work, currently, and which you should be leveraging for increased engagement.
If you’re not making the most of your social media marketing, these tactics are for you:
1. Sharing content that’s fresh
Most people attempting to grow their followings on social media make the mistake of exclusively sharing trending content.
Yes, trends matter, but only when a business creates content around the trend to attract more traffic to its online presence. By incessantly sharing tending content on social media you are only sharing with people what they’ve already seen and adding yourself to the long list of search results for the trend.
To really capture the attention of social media users, you must share the latest high-quality content useful to them.
To source that content you could use a content aggregator like Feedly, content curation app like DrumUp or a news aggregator like Flipboard.
2. Including super-appealing visuals
The number of write-ups focused on visual content, and how powerful it is are innumerable. I have lost count of how many times I have come across the 60,000 times faster statistic (the human brain processes an image that much faster than it does visuals).
Visuals shouldn’t be looked at as optional anymore.
There are several sites with high-quality stock images for use. Alternatively, you could also quickly patch together a concept on one of the many easy-to-use image editors out there.
3. Asking thought-provoking questions
What I find absent from my Twitter feed on most days is questions. What happens when you ask someone something? They instantly drop what they’re doing and pay attention to what you’re asking them.
Questions have also been reiterated as one of the best ways to create engagement online. The most fun part is that you could incorporate questions into any content form, an inforgraphics, polls or even the conclusion of a blog post that you write.
4. Tagging relevant people
This tactic is highly underrated. The general approach to social media marketing leaves little room for personal interactions, it is in most cases a conversation between a brand and all of its followers.
One-to-many communication is rarely successful in initiating relationships which are key for any business that hopes to have return customers or word of mouth referrals.
A great way to initiate relationships is by consistently sharing content written by people and letting them know that you have. You could also conduct an interview series and involve industry experts or do a perspectives piece with industry professionals.
5. Participating in communities
Just as marketers offline attend events and conferences to network, marketers on the internet can network on social media groups and communities.
There are several communities online discussing specific industries and topics. By identifying the ones that are the best fit for your industry, you are essentially narrowing down to your high-potential target audience.
Participation in communities isn’t very demanding. You could ear mark 10 minutes of each day every week or so to engage with people and their posts. Assisting people with technical queries is also a great way to reach out and position yourself as a reliable source for information. You could also build a community around your brand, but that tactic takes a considerable amount of effort.
6. Hosting or participating in Twitter chats
Yet another means to focus your audience, Twitter chats are excellent in creating engagement. The people who participate in a Twitter chat are very specific, and are usually very interested in the topic being discussed.
You could either create and host your own chat, or participate in chats that discuss your area of expertise.
Twitter chats are quick, intense and also eye opening as you are exposed to multiple perspectives. Chats are also a great source of inspiration for blog post topics and content ideas in general.
Have you found an engagement tactic worth exploring? If you have, please comment for an inclusion.
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