Whether you’re online for personal or professional reasons, social media is among the most powerful and popular platforms today. In recent global social media reports from DataReportal, it’s even estimated that approximately 58.7% of the global population is currently active on social platforms. What’s more, an average of 10 new users sign up every second. As such, social media can become a great vehicle for personal branding and other endeavors. However, to do so, one must have to focus on ways to organically increase social media following.
While high follower numbers can be achieved through bots or bought followers, a more ethical approach is to simply organically increase social media following through smart and effective strategies.
Here are a few examples on how to organically increase your social media following:
Follow similar accounts
Although you don’t want to seem like a copycat, following similar niche accounts is very helpful. As it’s explained in our post about making your Pinterest account go viral, following similar accounts helps you gain inspiration and exposure to audiences you already know like your type of content. Similar accounts are also likely to follow you back, so you’re cultivating an initial audience of like-minded accounts whose native followers will be happy to see you. On top of this, by having a well-curated following list you’re also adding legitimacy to your account because some audiences prefer to follow accounts that are already connected and “approved” by other accounts they follow.
Encourage the “tag a friend strategy”
Most accounts encourage users to tag their friends on their posts during giveaways or contests. But according to a guide on increasing your Instagram followers by AskMoney, this strategy can be equally effective in your everyday casual posts. To practice this, try to encourage your existing followers to simply share and/or tag their other friends on your posts. This increases your post’s visibility and encourages interaction. Since new followers are tagged by their friends, it also gives your account a sense of legitimacy since you were technically recommended by somebody they trust. If your post goes viral because of the tags and shares, it can end up on random recommendations like the Explore page of For You or Reddit, which can immediately expose other people outside of your followers to your content. Just make sure not to ask your followers to tag a friend too often and to actually present share-worthy content. This way, followers will not feel like they’re just promoting empty content.
Be clever with hashtagging
Hashtags have become such a popular buzzword that it’s even used colloquially outside of social media. But hashtags and hashtagging are more than just a way to stay hip or to keep up with everyone else. When used properly, hashtagging can dramatically enhance the scope and efficacy of your posts. To best utilize hashtags without going overboard, Forbes’ introduction to hashtagging suggests using tags that are relevant to your content and to current affairs. This way, your posts are more likely to be seen by audiences who actually care about what you’re covering. This type focuses on your target market, so you’re speaking to an online pool that’s naturally already drawn to your type of content. It’s also important to use hashtags in accordance with specific platforms. For instance, on Instagram longer blocks of hashtags are the norm. Meanwhile, Twitter prefers short and punchy hashtags. By keeping this in mind, your hashtags can make your content more impactful with the right people.
Diversify your posted content
Sure, you may have a specific uniform look that you’re going for online, but if it’s all presented the same way it can get boring for followers. To keep audiences engaged, and organically increase your social media following, it’s important that you give them content that allows their eyes and their mind to travel. A diverse catalog of content, even if it’s basically about the same topics or with the same aesthetic, is much more effective at drawing attention rather than totally similar content. Aside from beautiful still images, some of the most popular content right now are videos. SmallBizGenius’ video marketing statistics show that video content has become some of the most viewed today. Every day, over 500 million hours of YouTube content is viewed. Meanwhile, Instagram Stories get almost 600 million unique views daily. Thus, if you’re not sure how else to diversify your content, uploading or even reposting some short videos is a great place to start.
Gaining a large and strong social media following doesn’t happen overnight. However, with consistency and effort, creating an account with a steady audience is absolutely doable. Over time, these efforts can even create a social media presence that can bring you bigger and better personal and business opportunities.
