Building a social media presence for your company or brand is increasingly an essential part of doing business in the modern corporate world. Chances are good that you have already taken the plunge and started building your brand in the social channel of your choice. However, you may not be getting the results you had anticipated. If customer and employee engagement is down on your social media accounts, the problem may not be with your customers or clients. There are several steps you can take to boost social media engagement, most of which can be done with relatively minor adjustments to your regular posting routine.
Include Pictures and Other Media
Pictures, video and other visual media are an essential part of the social media experience on virtually every platform. Not only can you convey more with a a picture than with a long text post that people are less like to read, you can also use images as a clever way to get around character limits on platforms like Twitter. Just remember that including too much information in an image can cause access issues for customers who use screen readers.
Blog at the Right Times
Make social media posts when your customers are most likely to read them and don’t hesitate to repost content a couple of times to reach a larger audience. The ideal time to post varies between industries and customer demographics, so analyze the data you have before working out a posting schedule. A social media consultant can help you make sense of a large amount of data.
Let Your Personality Shine Through
Social media posts aren’t meant to be stiff and formal like press releases. Use humor and personality to engage your readers and make them feel like they are interacting with a real human being rather than a corporate-branded robot. Make your followers laugh, think, or even just smile and they will be much more likely to keep coming back.
Engage with Your Audience
If you want your audience to engage with your posts, consider just asking them. While asking for followers to like or share content may seem a little desperate, it works more often than you might think. However, make sure to take control of your intellectual property. If you create an image to share, watermark it or sign it with your company name so that it doesn’t become lost once it has been released into the social media wilds.
Respond to Comments and Blogs
Always make your customers and followers feel valued. Respond to posts on your social media pages, even if it’s just to say a quick thanks. Longer comments or questions may require longer responses, so make sure to carve out a little time each day for responding to posts. While you may get a little tired of typing out the same response multiple times, remember that each response is unique to the person who receives it.
