By Marketing Assistant Geo Craig
Social media has opened up a whole new world for brands, and is an exciting method for them to connect with their customers with meaningful content. With 4 billion people worldwide now using the internet, and 97% of marketers using social media to reach their audiences the simple fact is that social media now plays a vital part in a marketer’s arsenal.
At 72Point, we utilise our various owned channels (415K total page likes) to generate targeted exposure for our clients with creative content that’s fit-for-purpose. Our campaigns run across multiple channels and media outlets to ensure we maximise reach, with our digital outreach process allowing us to tap into the national media whilst honing in on relevant target groups on social.
Here are our top five tips to growing a social media following:
1 – Post regularly to build up your audience with engaging content
Regularly posting engaging content is rule number one to increasing your following. Video content is essential on most social media platforms now, with 64% of consumers saying that watching a marketing video on Facebook has influenced a purchase decision in the last month. Facebook favours original content, edited and over three minutes in length. And don’t be scared to re-use content. A whopping 92% of marketers say that they repurpose existing content and assets to create videos in order to post at least 1-2 times a day; the recommended amount according to SocialBakers.
2 – Ask your audience rhetorical questions to spark debate
Using content that makes the viewer stop, think and engage is key, with slightly controversial videos that ask something or play on opinion far more likely to be shared and commented on. One of our most successful social media campaigns was a social experiment with Mama Mio that saw a Mummy Vlogger put on a baby bump and take to the tube to see if the public would give up their seat for her. It sparked conversation once shared into the right groups, as it plays on an old British etiquecy principle, and sure enough it achieved tens of thousands of views on social media.
3 – Audience management
Once you have a stream of comments on a post, it’s a good idea to interact with your community and respond. This will make your page appear more active and dynamic than one that rarely posts and doesn’t engage with it’s community. Comments are far more valuable social media currency then likes for a number of reasons. For a start, the act of ‘liking’ a post can be an unconscious response, while comments are more meaningful. What’s more, the majority of people who like your post may never actually visit your page and a tiny amount will actually view your posts (it can be as low as 2%). It’s also worth noting that Facebook is looking to create communities, not just a platform for brands to shout at their customers, because ultimately building communities is going to increase the amount of time people spend there.
4 – Set up a group/community
Setting up a group/community connected to your page creates a forum for your audience to discuss different topics and can expand your reach. This also gives your page authority, because If you have an active group running alongside your own channel it gives your following more of an opportunity to discuss, share and engage with your content. Once users recognise your brand as a hub to interact with other users, they will keep coming back for more.
5 – Seeding into groups
Joining relevant groups and sharing posts into them means that you’re putting your content in front of a targeted audience for free. The audience in these groups are then far more likely to interact with your content than the average person scrolling down their timeline. This is a quick and easy hack that is almost certainly guaranteed to expand your post reach and also can have some influence on page engagement, if you re-target those who like your post and invite them to go on and like your page.