So you have a social media account. You are pretty active on it, but for whatever reason it does not really seem to be growing a following. What do you need to do to see your audience really grow? Here are nine tips for building up your content that will draw a larger follower reach.
Table of Contents
1. Develop a Theme
What do you want your accounts to be about? Are you a comedian presenting skits? Are you promoting a certain type of lifestyle? Do you have an amazing dog you want the world to know about? Every successful social media account has a theme surrounding it when it begins. As influencers become successful, they sometimes create new accounts or segments that explore topics outside of that theme. However, when you are just beginning to build your audience, give them what they are expecting.
Jellie Bee’s channel is a good example of creating a theme and developing it. You can immediately tell that her channel is about art.
2. Create a Schedule
Find the days and times during the week that work best for posting your content and stick to it! This is especially important for video platforms that generally post less content than platforms that focus on short text or photo uploads. You want to keep your posting schedule as consistent as possible. If your uploads are less frequent, let your audience know when you post new content.
3. Quality Over Quantity
While posting frequently is important, it is more important to retain high-quality uploads on all of your platforms. Audiences tend to prefer one well-crafted post over five uploads that were poorly put together. Poor editing in a video on YouTube or a load of spelling errors on a blog will not impress your audience.
4. Engage With Your Audience
Talk with your followers! As you are growing, it is important to engage with them. Thank them for their support, reply to their comments, and answer their questions. Communication is an absolute must.
Instagrammer kensadork often answers his followers’ comments to his delicious creations.
5. Connect With Others
You want to connect with other people who are doing the same thing as you. While it may be tempting to reach out only to the people who are the most well-known in your niche, you want to connect to a wide range of influencers! Reach out to fellow influencers with similar audiences as yours and cross-post each other’s content on occasion (with their permission, of course). Give each other mutual shout outs. If you connect with someone that not only posts in the same genre as you, but has a similarly-sized audience, you are both likely to benefit from this cross-promotional relationship.
6. Cross Promote Your Social Media Accounts
Let your audience know where you are! If possible, mention all of your social media accounts mentioned in the ‘about’ or ‘bio’ section of every social media site you are on.
7. Don’t Spread Yourself Too Thin
It is important to be on a few social media sites to help establish your presence, but you do not want to spread yourself out so thinly that you cannot keep up with all of them. Focus on frequent activity on a few of platforms rather than little activity on dozens of platforms.
8. Be Positive!
People generally like to read upbeat things from social media influencers. Studies have shown that social media posts that tend to have a more positive vibe end up with more engagement than those leaning towards the negative side. Does this mean you cannot post anything negative, ever? Definitely not. But most people don’t want to read or hear the thoughts of a constant Debbie Downer.
Even when the topics are about failed expectations and disappointments, BeautyByKat08 keeps an upbeat, positive tone in her videos.
9. Consistency Is Key
Overall, being consistent in the theme of your posts, your social media usernames, your posting schedules, your responses to your fans, and so on is key in both growing and maintaining an audience for your platforms. Becoming a large social media influencer changes your lifestyle and maintaining a consistent schedule early on is an ideal way to begin growing into that.
Have any thoughts on attracting an audience on social media platforms? Leave a comment below!