- Contest Factory
- April 9, 2018
10 Ways to Engage Your Audience on Social Media
For many brands, social media success will ultimately be dictated by the level of engagement they’re able to create with their audience. What benefit is there to having a million Twitter followers if they never retweet your posts, contact you, or make a purchase? Luckily, generating higher levels of engagement on social media is a lot more straightforward than you may think. You just need to keep a few key things in mind when building your social media engagement strategy. Here are ten proven ways to successfully engage your social media audience and increase the buzz around your brand.
- Quizzes
A quiz is an easy way to not only start a new conversation, but also encourage the contributions of as many people as possible, all centered around a specific topic or idea. You can add another level of gamification by creating a leaderboard for the quizzes. People LOVE being recognized, especially for being number one.
- Polls
Much like a quiz, online polls are also a terrific way to engage people because they naturally get them thinking. People are also more likely to come back for more because they want to see how the end results of the poll play out. Provide inroads to your website by adding links with supporting information on the poll. Be sure your landing page is decked out with lots of options of cool places to go that will keep them clicking and engaged with your website.
- Challenges
Remember how widespread the Ice Bucket Challenge was a few years ago? Not only is this a fun way to create engagement, but when centered around a social cause challenges make people feel like they’re doing their part to help make the world a better place. Research resounds this greatly showing that brands with purpose outperform the stock market by 120%.
- Solicit Tips from Your Audience
Simply asking your most loyal customers to talk about how they use your product or service will generate more relevant content and positive reviews, and can also spark some creative ideas that you may not have thought of yourself. Relevant, timely and FREE.
- “Like If…”
This is a great call-to-action for social posts because it plays directly into someone’s emotions. If you create a thought provoking post with “Like if you agree” at the end of it, people are naturally more inclined to do just that. This pulls upon the basics of call-to-action marketing, as customers often do exactly what you ask them to.
- “Share If…”
This is another variant on a call-to-action that encourages people to share your content if they found it particularly relevant or helpful. “Share if you agree” is a mantra of online viral popularity, because it appeals to people’s desire to express their opinions and connect with their friends and networks, all while putting your brand on display before new audiences with every share they make.
- Sweepstakes
A sweepstakes is a fantastic way to instantly increase engagement because people will ALWAYS love winning prizes – especially if they can do so right from the comfort of their own computer or mobile device. Sweepstakes also enable contestants to dream, much like the lottery. When you encourage your prospects to imagine themselves winning a wonderful prize, it uses their emotions to heighten engagement and brand affinity.
- Games
Even if there is no tangible prize at the end, social media games are still an effective way to increase engagement because they’re naturally exciting and active by their very design. You can have a scavenger hunt right on social media. You can keep it all on your single social media page or extend to different platforms and brand ambassador pages.
- Shout Outs
If there are a few particularly active social media users that engage with your brand, don’t be afraid to single them out in a positive way. Not only will this make them feel like you really appreciate them, but it will encourage other people to be more active too.
- The Art of Tagging
Don’t wait for someone to find your post – if you think it’s relevant to their life, tag them in it and take the conversation to them. You’d really be surprised by just how effective this can be. Specifically, Instagram users really use hashtags to discover new content. The metrics show you exactly how many people found your post using tags.
A big part of the reason why these techniques work so well is because they tap into the way the human brain works in the first place. People don’t just like to feel that they’ve achieved something, they also want to be challenged. This is a large part of the reason why creating a social media contest platform through gamification is so effective – it plays directly into the ego, the super-ego and the id in a way that creates a more enjoyable, engaging experience when executed properly.
These techniques also help shift social media towards a more active experience instead of a passive one. Passive marketing is incredibly easy to ignore, while active marketing like games and sweepstakes entice with excitement and fun. It’s a powerful tool that can absolutely be leveraged to your advantage when done effectively.
These are a few tips you can use to engage with your audience on social media today. If you’d like to explore any of these tips further and learn how to harness the full power of social media and gamification marketing to your advantage, contact us today. Our Chief Promotion Strategist will be happy to sit down with you to discuss the benefits of custom strategies and more organic contest administration built with your brand in mind.
