Another Twenty One Ways You Can Up Your Social Media Game

Think you are a social media pro? I'm sure you can still learn a thing or two here...

Many people apparently think the best way to engage people on social media, is to post videos of themselves talking to the camera while they are on the way to work.

I'll be honest, when I see videos like that, I quickly move past that.

Here are 21 tips that you can use to post engaging and thoughtful content on social media.

Messy behind-the-scenes posts

Be Authentic. The quickest way to get people to zone out is to show them exactly what they see on everyone else’s accounts. You’re not keeping up a robust posting schedule and all that goes with it to blend in! Users are quick to notice when someone isn’t being real. When faced with an endless scroll of pretty, polished, manicured personas, offering an authentic picture of who you really are as a person (or as a brand) can be a breath of fresh air. Brands and influencers alike shouldn’t be afraid to put themselves out there; I’ve found that the messy behind-the-scenes posts usually generate the most engagement. If you’re hesitant to post anything less than perfect to your grid, that’s what Stories are for! You can be silly, speak directly to your followers, play with fun features like gifs, polls or questions and still maintain the picture perfect main profile we all strive for. - Kristine Neil

Get Offline

One of my favorite benefits of Instagram is getting offline and meeting people I follow or who follow me in real life. It is always eye opening to have coffee with other brands and to learn more about their process and ideas. Every time I meet in real life I learn something new and I make a new connection. I recently had coffee with an influencer who is very close to 10,000 followers. We discussed her posts and stories about reaching for that magic number and about how she connects with followers to grow her brand. - Stephanie Lucas

Kindness

Our social team is often engaging with students at a time in their life where there’s a lot of uncertainty about life, college, work, and more. We’ve seen firsthand how a moment of real kindness online can affect students; as a result, whenever I see a brand whose identity consists of insults to their prospective customers, it makes me want to scream. You never know where someone is at emotionally when you hit ‘reply’ to that direct message, so I’d love to see more brands think about the way they interact with students online and the opportunity they have to form a real — if brief — connection with someone. - Matthew Monagle

Make People Laugh

Make People Laugh. Humor is one of the most undervalued promotional tactics for businesses. Memes, hyper fresh content, bloopers, reaction videos, and silly quotes are a great way to attract new followers and show off your brand’s personality. Funny posts attract reshares, comments, press coverage, and engagement, and it also gives you the opportunity to relate to your target customers. - Julia Enthoven

Be the show, not the commercial

Be the show, not the commercial. No one likes commercials. If your content resembles typical clickbaity TV infomercials, users will instinctively skip it. Be intentional about creating content that is aesthetic, entertaining and valuable to the consumer. If you’re lost on how to start, identify the content you personally enjoy and reverse engineer a fit. This will create a significantly more engaged audience. - Umar Brimah

Tell a story in a different way

Tell a story in a different way— people learn and consume information in different ways, sometimes a photograph can clarify a message more than repeating the same words. -Charlie Whyman

The Goldilocks Rule

Never underestimate the power of a hashtag. With the algorithm constantly changing, hashtags have consistently remained a best practice to expand the reach of your posts. But like everything else related to social, hashtags must be used strategically. Keep on topic and be selective using the “Goldilocks Rule” of hashtags: not too broad (#TGIF) and not too unique (#SparkYeahItsFriday). Same with phototags and geotags. This boosts visibility and gives users another resource to click through to see how others are using your product — not just the brand. - Martin Stoll

Never ask for trades

Avoid statements like “shout-out for shout-out”, “like for like”, or “follow for follow”. Never ask for trades. It’s rude and most likely you’ll get blocked by the other party. Simply be generous with your likes and be gracious with your comments on other profiles. Read Bob Berg’s book called the “Go Giver”. You’ll understand these steps after you read the book. - Armen Ghazarians

Proactive

Connect with people on Instagram proactively. Most companies using social media are focused solely on their own profile — publishing content, and sometimes engaging with their existing audience. Instead, search Instagram for people you’d like to connect with and engage with them proactively. Rather than waiting for their audience to find their profiles, businesses should actively go after potential customers, partners, and collaborators on social media.

That said, it’s important to note the difference between what we’re suggesting and spamming others. We don’t blast messages to thousands of unrelated accounts; we manually message specific accounts that could be a great fit for a specific project with tailored content. -Gabriel Bianconi

Algorithm

Understand the Instagram algorithm. Social media algorithms play a very important role in the ability for marketers and business owners to make an impact online. And although the Instagram algorithm is often difficult to understand, businesses need to learn to work with it and not against it if they want to find success. In hundreds of conversations with marketers around the world, we’ve found that something as simple as posting consistently can dramatically improve your business results. - Brian Peters

Repurpose

Repurpose content to reach new audiences. We’re continually improving on our content repurposing. We currently use videos on YouTube, Facebook and IGTV. We turn them into blog posts and announce those blog posts as stories on Instagram. We also have plans to turn all of that content into bite-sized videos and posts for Instagram and Instagram Stories in the future. Your audience is diverse, and they each prefer specific types of content, so diversify to reach everyone! -Frank Kerner

Repost

Repost, repost, repost. Reposting our customer’s content is a big thing we do. We’ve found that the more interaction and exposure we give to our customers and influencers, the more they want to share their experience at Woops! with others. It gives them a chance to be creative and become a part of our brand story. - Tal Avivi

Two-way communication

Listen to Your Customers: Provide an open channel for feedback. We have learned first-hand that when you engage in two-way communication with your customers, you open the door to receiving unique insight into your customer preferences of the brand, product and overall experience. - Kevin Hsu

Get to know your audience

Use your social media to get to know your audience. Interact with them. Ask them questions and engage with them. This is quick and easy market research as well! - Samia Gore

Once per day

Instagram enables a brand to target its customer not only by demographics but also psychographics, making it one of the most efficient way to finding the right customer. But it’s essential for brands to post regularly and consistently. The most effective frequency is once per day. This volume may be daunting for companies that are struggling to produce content, but to establish a strong relationship with your customers, consistency in the frequency of communication is vital. -

Michelle Chuang

Use professional photos

Use professional photos. The power of high quality product images is essential to any business. Instagram’s visual platform helps to showcase products that are valuable toward impressing consumers and making purchases than just delivering the product information or even other customers ratings. - Alexandra Zelenko

They want to have a conversation with you!

Respond to your followers, they want to have a conversation with you! - Gabe Ortiz

Fakes

STOP using fake likes, bots etc: I get it, if you appear to be larger, you assume more will be attracted. While in theory, this makes sense, in (bad) practice this leaves you vulnerable to just how savvy people are becoming as well as the upcoming Instagram bot purge. Oh and Instagram throttles your reach when they catch you faking your engagement, meaning less of your real audience actually sees your stuff. - Katriel Sarfati

Hashtags

Use (but don’t overuse) hashtags — Hashtags are becoming less important with each new Instagram update, but they’re still somewhat useful for when someone wants to search for that tag. While the # symbol isn’t necessary if you can work the words into your post, they can be helpful for variations. Place them as a comment rather than crowding your post. - Joe Delbridge

Your niche

Engage with others in your niche. Whether it’s other businesses or individual influencers, commenting on another account’s post shows the Instagram algorithm that you are looking to build meaningful relationships on the platform, which results in the algorithm amplifying your account’s reach. Not to mention, if your comment on a popular account attracts a lot of comments or likes, that’s increased exposure for you! - Taylor Moran

Have a strong bio

Want to make a great first impression? Have a strong bio - Adria D. Hookes