How to Grow Your Following

You’ve established your social media platforms. Great! You have strong branding. Fantastic! You have a strong campaign crafted and ready to roll out for your followers to engage with. Sounds like a sound plan. However, before there is a high level of engagement, there needs to be an audience to engage with.

The most fundamental part of having social media accounts for your brand is to have followers to interact with. How would you go about gathering those followers? Thankfully, there are a few easy steps that you can take in order to jumpstart that growth.

Use Your Existing Channels

If you already have some sort of following for your brand, whether it takes the form of an email list, visitors to a website, or even some friends that know about your product, then you can shift that over to your social media. Promote your handles and a specialized hashtag if you have it to your current audience and encourage them to spread the word.

Encourage Your Followers to Share Your Content

Now, we’re not saying beg your followers to promote your content, but craft it to be shared. With your posts, create a call to action that encourages your audience to share it to their feeds. On blog entries, include buttons that share to social media. Your audience is a valuable one, but the beauty of social media’s structure is that everyone has their own audience. Make your content relevant to your target and compelling enough for them to share.

Engage with Influencers and Followers

A key part of building a loyal following is ensuring they feel invested in. Sprout Social even reports that the majority of consumers - nearly 91% - believe that social media connects them to brands. Take the time to publicly thank followers that recognize your brand or suggest any sort of improvement. It’s crucial that your audience feels heard and recognized as a valuable part of your brand’s success.

Use Hashtags

There’s a seemingly fine line as to when hashtags are appropriate and when they can be overused. However, they can be a great way to enter your brand into already-existing online conversations and garner interest from new customers. Hashtags aren’t just exclusive to Twitter. They can be used on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn - virtually any social media channel can utilize hashtags. Keep them simple and relevant, and you have a powerful tool to boost your social media following.

Keep Your Brand Relevant

The primary focus of utilizing social media is to connect with your audience to promote your brand or service, but there are so many other conversations that your brand can enter. By showing that you have more concerns beyond just making an income, consumers can establish an emotional connection that contributes to loyalty. Post regularly on your platforms and tastefully address current events to present your brand as socially conscious and purposeful.