The other day, I was out and about and met a dear friend at Harry’s lookout in Port Macquarie. Like many places, lovers have been there to place a lock on the fence showing their commitment to each other and their future.
These locks are a lot like the relationship between social media and your business, the relationship that swings, goes up and down, round and round…all whilst staying true to the end goal…a long and life-fulfilling relationship.
Social media can seem like a lot of work. It takes time to grow a following, and it’s easy to feel discouraged when you don’t see immediate results.
But if you’re committed to taking your time and building a community on social media, it will pay off in the long run.
Here are some tips for making that commitment:
Competition is fierce in social media
Social media is a crowded space. There are lots of people competing for attention, and it can be difficult to stand out from the crowd.
The good news? You don’t need to be the loudest person in the room; you just need to be consistent and persistent.
If you’re committed to building your following on social media, then here are some tips that will help:
- Be authentic and genuine–it’s hard for people who know you well (or even those who don’t) not to recognise when something isn’t right with your posts or tweets!
- If they feel like they’re reading something false or forced, they’ll likely stop following along with what you have going on in life.
Social media takes time to grow a following
Social media is not a quick fix. It takes time and effort to grow your following, but with the right strategy and plan in place, you can build a loyal audience that will help drive sales for years to come.
The key is being consistent–you’ll need at least one post per day on each platform if you want to see results.
To get started with social media marketing, follow these best practices:
- Create content that speaks directly to your target customer base–not everyone will care about what you’re selling or doing! If someone doesn’t care about their pet’s health issues then they aren’t going to buy from you just because they saw some cute pictures of dogs wearing hats (yes this actually happens).
- Know who exactly needs what is what makes up the core value proposition of your business before creating any content around those topics/products/services.
- None of us like being sold to, provide value where people want to learn more…and this may have nothing to do with what you offer!
You don’t have to post every day, but you should post regularly
As with anything, you can post too much. If you’re posting five times per day and it feels like a chore to do so, then that’s probably too much for your audience.
The goal is to find the right balance between posting enough to keep people interested but not so much that they get annoyed by it (or worse–ignore your updates completely).
The key here is to do what is doable, not what is on trend or what the big five social platforms tell you to do…whatever you choose, be consistent.
If you’re not posting regularly, you’re giving up control over your profile
If you’re not posting regularly, you’re giving up control over your profile…yes you read that right.
You can’t just post once and expect people to come back for more.
If you want to build a community around your brand or product, then it’s important that they know when they can expect new content from you, and this may not be a conscious thing.
Consistent engagement is the key to building a community on any platform
The two halves of successful social media…quality content creation
and engagement.
There are many ways to engage with your audience on social media.
One of the most important things to remember is that consistency is key.
You can’t expect people to follow you if you only post once in a while or not at all.
You should give engagement…a quick like, comment, and share to complimentary businesses, to the people who follow your account, and to your local community.
Give, give, give engagement before expecting anything in return.
It’s okay if it doesn’t seem like anything is happening at first; social media takes time and commitment and it can be hard to see results
Social media is a long game. You can’t expect to see results right away, and you definitely shouldn’t give up if it doesn’t seem like anything is happening at first.
There are lots of reasons why this might be the case:
- Your audience might not yet be ready for your content or style–you could be putting out too much or too little of it, or maybe people don’t understand what they’re supposed to do when they land on one of your posts (for example, leave comments).
- You may need more followers before people start engaging with you regularly; this takes time and effort on both sides: finding new people who would like what you have to offer, and convincing them that following/liking/commenting on your page will benefit them in some way (which could mean sharing information relevant to their interests).
- Or maybe there isn’t enough engagement because no one knows who created those posts in the first place! This happens all too often–people forget about social media accounts they’ve created over time because they weren’t able to keep up with them consistently enough when they were first starting out
One final comment
If you’re looking for a shortcut to social media success, this isn’t it.
But if you’re willing to commit to the long game and put in the work, there is no limit to what your brand can achieve on social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
