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In this article, you’ll learn the ins and outs of how to get more social media followers for your small business.
You’ve most likely seen everyone hopping aboard the social media train, from your go-to grocery store to your dental hygienist. And for good reason!
The reality is that social media has the power to drive and expand your business exponentially.
With that said, let’s find out how to get more social media followers on your business accounts.
Read more: My Top 10 Best Small Business Tools.
How To Get More Social Media Followers?
Social media marketing success takes more than posting random videos and photos on your feed.
So, how can you gain more social media followers for your small business?
Well, that’s where I step in!
I will guide you through my top tips that you can implement right away to boost your small business’s social media following.
Are you ready? Let’s go!
Engage with Your Network
My first piece of advice for attracting more followers to your social media platforms is to have genuine conversations with your current network.
That’s right; this hot tip doesn’t involve fancy tools or algorithms!
Personal interactions still carry significant weight in this day and age, even in the realm of social media.
Think about it….if you ask your friends, family, and community members to support and follow your business on social media, you’ll instantly gain a larger following.
Additionally, you can add your social media handles to your business card, email signature, and footer of your emails so people can easily find you online.
I also suggest introducing your social media presence when engaging with prospects or new clients.
Remember, the more you actively share information about your social media platforms, the more people will know who you are and what you do.
And here’s a valuable bonus tip: Don’t forget to invite all your Facebook friends, personal Instagram followers, and LinkedIn connections to like your business pages!
Read more: How To Create An Instagram Business Account.
Engage on the Right Platforms
The aim of the game is to make it as easy as possible for people to organically find you online.
Therefore, being active on the same platforms as your target audience is crucial.
This strategy involves two crucial elements:
- Understanding your target audience.
- Identifying the most popular social media platforms they use.
And in order to achieve organic growth on social media, it’s essential to have a deep understanding of both aspects.
So, first things first – if you haven’t determined your target audience yet, start there!
Once you clearly understand your target audience, you must then identify the platforms different demographics prefer.
Remember, different segments of your audience may be active on various social media sites!
Alternatively, people might follow you on multiple platforms (but may anticipate a distinct relationship on each one). Therefore, you should optimize your content for each platform.
Read more: How To Drive Leads Through TikTok Marketing Videos.
Be Consistent!
Humans love consistency. Therefore, if you regularly and consistently post on social media, your loyal audience will anticipate this new content from you!
Over time, people will understand your posting schedule and when to expect new posts from you.
This predictability also encourages fans to actively visit your profile to find your content if it doesn’t appear on their feed.
Similar to deciding where to post based on your audience’s preferences, your posting schedule should align with your target audience’s social activity.
In other words, posting when your audience increases your chance of early engagement, which is vital!
You can see which times your followers are most active by clicking the ‘Insights’ button on channels like Instagram or using a social media management tool (more on this soon).
For teams serious about staying consistent and accountable with their socials, I recommend checking out my FREE dedicated Notion Small Business Social Media Planner.
Start Creating Short-Form Videos
Short social videos, like Reels or TikTok videos, are vital for social media growth.
In fact, creating this type of short content is the easiest way to gain new followers on social platforms.
Why? Because it can reach people who don’t already follow you!
Think about all the viral TikTok’s or Instagram videos you see online…..how often is it that you actually follow those creators before watching the video?
Read more: How To Create Business Instagram Reels.
Get Involved In Social Media SEO
You may already know how crucial SEO is for website visibility. But did you know SEO for your social media accounts is just as important?
SEO becomes even more essential when your focus is on growing your social media followers.
Social SEO involves optimizing your content using SEO tactics, such as:
- Keyword research.
- Captions.
- Effective alt text and more.
This helps each social platform’s search features understand your content’s context and relevance.
By implementing social SEO, you’ll increase the likelihood of people finding and engaging with your content.
Read more: Is It Possible To Do Your Own SEO?
Engage with Your Audience
Despite what you may think, social media is more than just a platform for broadcasting content.
Don’t get me wrong, your audience wants to see your content, but often, they want to engage with you directly.
In other words, people like to know that there’s an actual human behind the screen!
To expand your social media presence, it’s crucial to actively and consistently respond to comments, tags, messages, and mentions so people stick around!
I know this sounds daunting, especially for businesses with multiple social media accounts.
So, I recommend using a handy social media management system to help you communicate with your audience from one centralized platform.
Read more: Later vs Buffer.
Gain Inspiration from Others
I’ve already talked about the importance of audience engagement. But it’s also good to take inspiration from established accounts like yours (that are killing it).
These accounts could be your competitors, but they could also be potential collaborators!
Either way, studying their social media presence can provide valuable insights into what strategies work within your specific industry.
Additionally, you can further fuel your social media growth by engaging with popular accounts that already reach your target audience.
If these accounts aren’t direct competitors, try liking and commenting on their posts in a genuine and supportive manner.
You never know; grabbing their attention may result in a ‘like’ or ‘follow’ back (or lead to other opportunities!)
Read more: How To Advertise On TikTok To Promote Your Business.
Play around with Social Ads
So far, all the tips I’ve mentioned are for organic social media growth.
And while these strategies are vital for building a strong social media presence, social ads are quicker for reaching a wider audience and accelerating growth!
In fact, many social platforms offer growth-oriented goals for social ad campaigns that can help drive up views and followers.
Planning a social ads campaign may initially seem overwhelming, but getting started is actually straightforward.
I suggest allocating a budget towards promoting organic posts that are already performing well, then boosting those posts through paid advertising.
Read more: How Does PPC Advertising Work?
Automation Tools
If you didn’t already know, streamlining your social media management can help you save time and money.
These awesome social media automation tools allow you to conveniently manage all your social media accounts from one centralized platform.
With these tools, the idea is that you can schedule posts weeks in advance so that they’re automatically posted at optimal times to maximize visibility among your target audience.
Moreover, automation tools enable you to analyze the performance of your posts, providing valuable insights into what works best for your audience!
Read more: How To Use Facebook Business Suite App.
My Top 3 Social Media Management Tools
I mentioned earlier about the importance of consistency and engagement within your social media channels.
And with social media management tools by your side, you can execute and manage effective and coordinated social media campaigns across multiple platforms.
Ultimately, these platforms can help you maintain a consistent posting frequency that helps expand your online presence and grow your follower count!
There are many social media management tools out there, but here are my top 3 choices for small businesses:
Buffer:
It comes as no surprise that Buffer ranks high on my personal recommendation list for efficient and effective social media management!
Buffer is a robust and influential tool in the realm of social media management that enables you to seamlessly schedule and publish your posts across a variety of platforms.
It has gained recognition for its intuitive interface, comprehensive analytics and reporting features, and its ability to facilitate effective collaboration among team members.
I recommend Buffer for eCommerce brands or small local businesses as it easily integrates with Shopify and Google My Business.
Later:
Later is another prominent player in the social media management tool game.
With a visual content calendar, editing tool, media library, and ‘Linkin.bio’ tool, Later is the perfect visual planning social management tool for Instagram and TikTok users.
Additionally, you can actually analyze the performance of your posts to evaluate the effectiveness of your social media strategies.
Utilizing Later guarantees enhanced brand engagement, widened reach, and improved visibility for content creators, freelancers, or creatives with a personal brand.
Hootsuite:
Hootsuite is a full-featured social media marketing suite that offers an extensive range of features to simplify the management of multiple accounts and platforms.
From content scheduling, real-time social media monitoring, in-depth audience insights, and post-performance analysis, Hootsuite is ideal for social media marketers, agencies, and large teams.
But that’s not all! Hootsuite goes beyond social media scheduling, providing dynamic team management and collaboration features.
If you’re looking for a feature-rich social media management tool to help you manage multiple complex social media campaigns, you can’t go past Hootsuite.
Check out my step-by-step tutorial here on how to use Hootsuite.
Stews Final Thoughts
And that wraps up this article on how to get more social media followers!
If you put in the hard yards and implement the strategies outlined above, I can guarantee that you will notice an increase in your social media followers over time.
Most importantly, you should continually provide value to your audience, and the followers will naturally come!
Do you have any other tips and tricks on how to get more social media followers? I’d love to know!
