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How can I improve my social media following?

Published in Social Media Growth 4 mins read

To improve your social media following, you must implement a strategic and consistent approach focused on brand building, content optimization, and active engagement across relevant platforms.

How Can I Improve My Social Media Following?

Growing your social media following organically involves a multi-faceted strategy that enhances your visibility, engages your audience, and builds a strong online presence. Here's how you can effectively boost your social media reach:

1. Establish Your Brand and Aesthetic

Before you even begin posting, it's crucial to establish your brand and aesthetic. This means defining your unique visual style, voice, and the core message you want to convey.

  • Visual Consistency: Use a consistent color palette, font styles, and image filters across all platforms. This makes your content instantly recognizable.
  • Brand Voice: Determine if your brand voice is formal, casual, humorous, informative, or inspiring. Maintain this tone in all your captions and interactions.
  • Niche Definition: Clearly define your niche or expertise. This helps attract a specific, engaged audience interested in what you offer.

2. Designate Content for Each Channel

Not all content performs equally well on every platform. Designate content for each channel by understanding the nuances of different social media sites.

  • Instagram: Focus on high-quality visuals, short videos (Reels), and engaging Stories.
  • TikTok: Prioritize short, entertaining, trending, and highly shareable video content.
  • LinkedIn: Share professional insights, industry news, career advice, and thought leadership articles.
  • Facebook: Good for community building, longer-form text posts, events, and group discussions.
  • X (formerly Twitter): Ideal for real-time updates, short bursts of information, and quick engagement.

3. Follow the Right Accounts & Unfollow Where Needed

Strategic following and unfollowing can significantly impact your feed's quality and your content's discoverability.

Follow the Right Accounts

Follow the right accounts that align with your niche, industry, or target audience. This includes:

  • Industry Leaders: Stay updated on trends and insights.
  • Competitors: Understand their strategies and identify gaps.
  • Potential Collaborators: Open doors for partnerships.
  • Your Target Audience: Engage with their content and understand their interests.

Unfollow Where Needed

Periodically, you should unfollow where needed to maintain a clean and relevant feed. This means removing accounts that:

  • Are inactive or post irrelevant content.
  • Don't align with your brand's current direction.
  • Are spammers or bots.

A focused feed helps you stay informed and makes it easier to engage with valuable content.

4. Create and Share Content

The backbone of social media growth is consistent, high-quality content. Create and share content that resonates with your audience.

  • Original Content: Develop unique posts, images, videos, and articles that showcase your expertise or personality.
  • Value-Driven: Ensure your content provides value, whether it's educational, entertaining, inspiring, or problem-solving.
  • Consistency: Maintain a regular posting schedule. This keeps your audience engaged and signals to algorithms that you're an active user.
  • Variety: Mix up your content types—photos, videos, carousels, text-only posts, infographics, etc.—to keep your feed dynamic.

5. Reshare Valuable Content

Beyond creating your own content, reshare valuable content from other reputable sources. This practice offers several benefits:

  • Curated Resource: Positions you as a valuable resource for your audience.
  • Community Building: Shows appreciation for other creators and can foster reciprocal engagement.
  • Content Calendar Boost: Helps fill gaps in your content schedule.
  • Always credit the original creator when resharing to maintain good social media etiquette.

6. Use Platform Features

Each social media platform offers unique features designed to boost engagement and reach. Use platform features to your advantage.

  • Stories: Utilize interactive stickers like polls, Q&As, quizzes, and countdowns on Instagram and Facebook Stories.
  • Reels/Short-form Video: Leverage trending audio and effects on Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts for wide discoverability.
  • Live Streams: Go live to interact directly with your audience, answer questions, and build a stronger connection.
  • Carousels: Create multi-image or video carousels on Instagram and LinkedIn for deeper dives into topics.
  • DM/Messaging: Engage directly with followers through direct messages.

7. Hashtag Wisely

Hashtags are powerful tools for discoverability. Hashtag wisely by researching and implementing a strategic approach.

  • Relevance: Use hashtags directly related to your content, niche, and target audience.
  • Mix of Popularity: Combine broad, popular hashtags with more niche-specific ones to reach both wide and targeted audiences.
  • Trending Hashtags: Incorporate relevant trending hashtags when appropriate to tap into current conversations.
  • Hashtag Limits: Adhere to platform-specific hashtag limits (e.g., Instagram allows up to 30, X suggests 1-2).
  • Branded Hashtags: Create a unique hashtag for your brand to encourage user-generated content and community building.

By consistently applying these strategies, you can significantly enhance your social media presence, attract a larger and more engaged following, and achieve your growth objectives.