Five Tips to Make Your Social Media Extra Engaging

With Christmas approaching, businesses large and small all around the country are trying their best to attract sales, in whatever ways possible.  Most companies have (by this point) figured out that giants like amazon.com are destroying smaller brick-and-mortars (and even other large corporations), and the major difference (and the way that Amazon has been able to succeed) is by having an extremely strong online presence.

While reading this post may inspire you to pop open your laptop and start lighting up your social media accounts immediately, you might want to think about that for just a minute. There’s a difference between quantity and quality of posting in the social media world, and if you’ve ever blocked or removed someone for posting excessive requests for you to buy things, or for sending too much spam e-mail, for instance, you probably realize that there’s a fine line between marketing and annoying your customer base.

So how then, do you make your social media work for you?  The clear and simple answer is to be engaging.  It’s not about the number of posts or even when or how you post, it’s about how often customers are engaging with you. To be clear, this doesn’t mean that they’re just viewing your post, but that they are liking it, commenting it, and even (the best one of all), sharing your post with others.  Engagement, or the act of interacting with content, is the holy grail of the social media marketing world.

With that said, here are five tips to make your social media extra engaging:

1. Create unique content that’s relevant   —  We all don’t have the time to write a new blog each week or several social media posts each day, and many have figured out that there’s plenty of good and relevant content available from the New York Times or even BuzzFeed to supplement your social media feed.  Tread carefully, because even though that content is available and possibly even relevant, it doesn’t mean you should share non-unique content all the time.  It’s a good rule of thumb to make every 3rd or 4th post 100% original.  Otherwise, people are just going to go elsewhere for their content and products and not even bother with you at all, and your interaction and engagement numbers (not to mention your analytics and algorithms) are going to plummet, which is the opposite of what you want.

2. Use videos wherever possible — Do you watch cooking shows?  Probably not that often anymore, and the reason for that is that recipe videos on social media have seen record trends this year. Why spend an hour watching a television show to get one recipe when you can spend two minutes and watch a funny character make the item right in front of you, and it’s edited for time. You can even mute the video and watch it at work, thanks to the text that now overlays most videos on social media for that very reason. People respond more to videos and all of the top trending sites know that.  Bonus points if you are able to go live, as Facebook and other social media platforms are pushing live videos over previously recorded ones.

3. A picture is worth a thousand words — Pictures are incredibly effective at showcasing products, feelings, quotes, and even reviews of your product. Rather than writing something in text, try to overlay the text over a beautiful graphic for your post.   Or just use a picture that states everything without words.  Just make sure that your picture is in focus, not too dark, and that it’s obvious what it’s trying to portray.  If you don’t have someone to edit and produce your graphics for you, try looking into a program like Canva or Easel.ly to help you out.

4. Games and giveaways are not to be forgotten — Last year I won a free haircut and color by guessing how many foil wrappers were in a hairstylist’s picture.  I would have never known about her if not for the post going viral because everyone kept sharing it and commenting on it, hoping to win. Additionally, she picked up a lifelong customer, because I’ve been going to that hairdresser ever since.

5. Keep posting schedules consistent — LuLaRoe is a brand that has achieved super-fast growth by using a multi-sales consultant strategy, but additionally, they’ve given their consultants amazing social media training. One of the things that LuLaRoe is famous for is by establishing schedules for when individual consultants will do things.  You know, for example, that Monday will be a live event, Tuesday will be an album shopping event, Wednesday is the day when you can request an outfit, Thursdays are for giveaways, Fridays new clothing arrives, and Saturday is for the football pool.  By keeping posts consistent, customers know to check on certain days for certain things and will check often and on a set schedule, which is perfect for you to be able to cater to them.  There’s nothing better than knowing that a particular customer will visit your website on a certain date and time.  It’s almost like having a crystal ball into your company’s future.

There’s no set way that works for one person, so definitely explore your analytics and software programs and find what works for you. It’s easy to look and see which posts are getting liked and shared and which ones aren’t, but it definitely can get confusing if you don’t know what you’re looking for. Certainly, companies like Komaya are here to help you figure out what your numbers mean and what you can do to build engagement and therefore, sales, for a better and brighter future.