Importance of Increased Social Media Engagement

It's important to have a strong social media presence. Getting your word out to followers and potential followers about what you have to offer is a must for any business. However, you must not rest on those laurels. You don't simply want an audience. You want an engaged audience. You want an audience that feels connected with your organization and that interacts with you. Think of it this way. You want your social media to serve as a conversation conduit, not as a broadcasting one. Devoting the cost, time and effort necessary will be worth it.

How to Measure Social Media Engagement

Many ways to measure social media engagement are readily visible. For example, with your Twitter profile, you can readily see how many replies, retweets and likes have been posted to any given tweet. Plus, of course, followers is a significant measure as, at a minimum, every follower that you have at least engaged with you in the act of following your account. Similar measures are readily available for other social media outlets. However, you'll want to dive deeper than that to see more clearly where you stand. One way to do that is through Twitter's own Twitter Analytics.

Regardless of the specific tools that you use to measure this, you want to most focus on the metrics that are related to replies, comments, likes, shares/retweets, mentions and the number of people who are interacting with you and with each other in connection with your business and its offerings. If you use any hashtags related to your brand, which is recommended, you want to measure its success as well. And – this is an important step – monitor how these change over the following weeks, months and years.

Your Voice

You want to settle on a voice. This refers to the personality that is portrayed through your social media outlets. For example, a local pizza delivery shop should have a very different voice than a multinational bank. The former would be more homey and personable while the latter will want to have a more professional tone. However, exceptions always exist. If your multinational bank wants to portray a more fun image than many of your competitors, your social media outlets are a great way to show that personality.

Simply put, know your audience or your desired audience, and appeal to that. Once you know that, you will also have a much clearer picture as far as which social media outlets to focus more time on, what times of the day to focus your interactions towards and the type of content that you want to disseminate.

Being Interesting and Engaging

No matter what voice you use, ensure that you are interesting and engaging in your own way. Sharing valuable content is one way to do that. However, make sure that you're doing this with your customers and prospective customers at the forefront of your mind. How will this help them? Also keep in mind that posting dresses that you're selling is great, but also posting fashion tips for what to wear to an outdoor wedding when rain is in the forecast takes it to the next level. That latter post would be more apt to intrigue others and cause them to talk about what you're posting. Another example would be to simply ask your followers what they think of a product, particularly if it's one that you're considering launching.

Note that one of the best ways to be interesting and engaging is by interacting with others in a timely manner. You could use a tool that provides automated responses to questions in a manner similar to what Slackbot offers. This is particularly recommended if you receive a significant number of inquiries.

Think of your social media as you in a brick-and-mortar shop interacting with customers and prospective customers, not necessarily always about what you have to offer them. You want to be human, and you want to be warm. Be a part of the community. Share user-generated content. Be active.