You’ve set up your social media profiles. You’ve optimised your profiles to ensure all the information is available to prospective clients/buyers. You’re posting regularly….and yet, your social media following is not growing. 

You’re not alone! As the social media pool gets bigger, it is becoming harder for individual businesses to be found, but we want to share some tips to help get your following growing. But before we do, a word of warning. Please, please, please do not be tempted to buy followers! It will NEVER benefit you – this is a whole other story (and another blog post) but please don’t be tempted!

Anyway, back to our tips! 

1. Use visuals

As human beings, we are inquisitive and drawn to visual things, so using good imagery on social media is sure to grab the attention of people by being colourful and eye-catching. HubSpot recently reported that content with relevant images rack up 94% more views than content without images and are 40x more likely to be shared. 

2. Share videos

In the last 12 months, video has become a more engaging content type on nearly all social media platforms, so by sharing video content, you are maximising your chance of engagement. We recommend uploading your video direct to your platform of choice, rather than getting people to navigate away to outside sites such as YouTube. The more views you get on your video, the increased reach, engagement and exposure for your business. 

3. Engage with your audience

In a world where we now engage with most people online, it is important that you respond to any questions on your social media platforms in a timely manner – in fact 83% of Facebook users expect a response the same day! On Twitter, 32% expect a response in just 30 minutes! The best way to engage with your audience is to be sure to thank those who comment on your posts and answer any questions asked. By acknowledging these comments you are showing your audience that you listen, which in turn can turn them into your newest fan.

4. Switch things up

Your profile photo and banner images are some of the most-viewed elements of your profile highlighting your work to those who benefit from your services/products, so it’s a good idea to change up this imagery regularly to keep people engaged. We recommend using any banner/cover photo space to highlight what you do by making it personal and human, and it doesn’t need to be the same for every channel. Consider your audience on each platform and make it relevant. Also make sure your images are the right size and don’t appear pixelated. Not sure what size they should be? Download our free image size guide here. 

5. Give people a reason to follow you

You need to strategically use each social media platform to give your target audience a good reason to connect with you. For example, Twitter is an incredibly fast-paced platform which is best used for live updates and news. Think about the reasons people use your chosen platforms and formulate a plan to consistently plan and share content that resonates with them. 

6. Encourage a tag

A really effective way to engage followers is to encourage them to tag someone who they think will find your post engaging. Hopefully those that have been tagged will check out your post, see your offering and join your social media following. This tool should be used sparingly, so as to not appear spammy. Make sure your tags are super relevant – tagging users and accounts simply for engagement purposes looks a little desperate and is irritating for the tagged accounts.

7. Use hashtags

Hashtags can sometimes feel like a minefield but there are three good ways to use them – 

a) Use popular hashtags strategically but sparingly and only those relevant to your audience and your content

b) Participate in relevant trending topics and current events

c) Use up to 30 hashtags in Instagram posts and don’t be afraid to use all 30 – after all, Instagram wouldn’t have given us the option to use 30 hashtags on posts if they didn’t want us to use them! (And that’s come straight from the horse’s mouth – Adam Mosseri!)

8. Be entertaining

Don’t be scared to show a bit of humanity and humour in your social media, but be sure that it makes sense for your audience and brand voice. 

9. Explore paid social

If you really want to elevate your social media following, it will involve allocating an advertising spend. It doesn’t need to be a huge amount – when done right, paid social ads can promote your content, increase conversions and help you reach new people. Precise audience targeting ensure your ads are focused on the right people. However, the ads platforms require some skill and training to master, so if you have tried running ads before and they didn’t give you the return you’d hoped for – don’t despair. Just get in touch with a professional ads manager (like us!) who can manage the campaigns on your behalf.

10. NEVER buy followers

We said this was a whole other blog post but we had to reiterate how important it is, no matter how tempting, to ever buy followers. Not only is this bad practice but it will largely end up being more of a problem than it’s worth. It pollutes your audience with robot profiles, which will ruin audience insights, limit your performance and restrict the organic reach of your posts. 

When used strategically and thoughtfully, social media platforms can be a great way for brands and organisations to cultivate loyal followers, and expand their reach and audience.

We hope these tips have helped. Let us know which ones you try and how you get on with them!