Getting your brand active on social media is a must in the digital marketing sphere. In fact, the average person spends around 135 minutes a day on these platforms, proving brands can’t afford to miss engagement opportunities in this space.

So what are some guaranteed ways you can connect and grow an audience effectively?

1. Offer value

Offering value to your followers (and customers) is crucial for any business to gain traction. If you don’t create a sense of benefit for your social community, it’s likely they won’t remain in it for long at all. Understand what your followers are looking for and how you can answer their biggest concerns. Incorporate tips and tricks, how-to videos and articles, and special offers to those who are taking the time to invest interest in your brand online. You can get the help of a social media agency to help you get started.

2. Understand the psychology

As heavily amplified by renowned digital marketer Gary Vaynerchuk, getting truly embedded in your social media strategy means committing to fully understanding the psychology behind it. That means knowing and analysing how different platforms work, but more importantly, how your target audiences are engaging with certain content on those platforms. Gaining the attention of social followers won’t happen if you don’t allocate the time towards understanding how each platform is different and applies varied, separate psychological strategies. Tailor your tactics on each and assess how your methods are performing as you go.

3. Post daily

Simply put, posting regularly enough (but not overdoing it) means you’re being seen on a consistent basis. You’re more likely to be front-of-mind to audiences that have the potential to remain relevant long-term. if The key to publishing on social media is consistency. Establishing a strong schedule and planning out your content is key. This in time will allow audiences to start to visual you as an authority, and an actual personality, rather than just another brand.

4. Respond to audiences

Would you expect others to respond to your brand if you weren’t responding to them? Allocate time to getting back to those who have shown any form of engagement in your brand. Respectfully get in touch with those that liked or shared your blog posts, reply to Instagram comments on your posts, and give engagement to the content others are sharing too. What goes around comes around.

5. Keep current

Social media is a buzzing hub of content. Things quickly get out of date. If a celebrity has a baby you know about it. If there’s an epic viral cat video going around, you won’t be able to avoid it. But these things come and go. At some point in time (usually quickly), it will do its rounds and become irrelevant.

As a business, it’s important you’re not losing traction by not posting frequently enough, or even worse, posting about things that are completely untimely. Take advantage of what’s going on in the news (carefully), what trends are rocking your industry and how certain content is already garnering the interest of your target audience. Then, tailor your content strategy to apply this head start. Imperial Leisure is a creative agency in London. A great way to do this is by keeping up with what competitors are talking about, as well as employing effective hashtag research to get a sense of ‘what’s hot’ in your field.

Executing these five tips into your social media marketing plan will allow your business to power up engagement with audiences across the board. Become an authority, not just another voice.