The most important thing for all bloggers across social platforms is to get lots of engagement in order to keep up their rate. Whatever network you are occupying, your goal is to interact with your audience to increase it. Platforms like LinkedIn are not really easy to get many followers. So users always look for a LinkedIn bot or third party tool to get their target engagement.
The content can be the best, but it has to be enhanced by your attention to your followers, otherwise you will lose in the pursuit for top positions in your niche.

For example, each 50 Instagram likes are the link between you and your audience. Although some nuances can be different regarding a certain platform, there are still universal tips that can help you to build up the communication with your viewers, which will be fruitful for the growth of the blog. In this article are gathered seven most important points that will help to increase engagement.

Aim for synergy with your audience

To hit the biggest numbers on social media rates, you have to understand who is your target group, and what time of the day they are active most. Also, check what is the preferred type of content that they consume. Use the statistics that are embedded in your platform - usually, it is enough to create a portrait of your typical viewer.

One of the useful techniques that would help you to catch up with your followers is asking them directly. Depending on the platform, the way of communication varies, but in general, it is still an open question to your viewers. The timing of your posts is also related to the audience that you have. Besides, nowadays many people check their social networks on the go, so you will have an expanded schedule.

Dive into conversations

Communication is a basic idea of social media. So being talkative and open-hearted is a big bonus for your engagement. Here are the ground rules that will define your successful communication:

• Be polite. Rudeness never helped anybody to grow a blog
• Don’t judge people. Even if you disagree, remain objective and calm
• Don’t enter into disputes with trolls and haters. It is simply a waste of time
• Take the initiative in your hands. Starting the conversation with your audience is a great way to actually gross some rating.

Collaborate with other influencers in your industry

Competition on social media often becomes your help if you want to increase your engagement level. By showing up in collective videos, or cross-posting you can find new viewers and significantly expand your influence. Also, by monitoring other bloggers' feeds you will get some inspiration for your further posts.

Look through the profiles of the most popular influencers in your niche and see how they interact with the audiences, how they drive their engagement up. Some may call this piggybacking, but there is basically no other way to discover trends and effective methods for your growth. Besides, users catching up with your content doesn’t mean that they will leave other blogs. Usually, people who are interested in the niche, follow, and engage with several blogs.

Create compelling visual content

Visuals are almost 50% shareable. This fact is well-known to marketers, which is why getting the best photos is the number one concern for most influencers and brands. For businesses, great visual content is what drives engagement in the first place.

What users appreciate the most is authenticity and quality. For the best performance, you can even visit photography classes. This will help you to avoid basic mistakes in composition, for example. Also, you should constantly train your eye for finding ideas in the surrounding world. Being a blogger means that you can turn anything that happens to you into the topic for a new post.

Businesses should focus on demonstration of their products from all sides, along with showing how it can be useful to customers. But with these basics, in order to get more engagement on social media, brands should share their values and show “human face” as well. Users will appreciate the authentic approach and personal flair in your brand's content.

Entertain and educate

Entertainment and education are the primary reasons why people love social platforms so much. And to provide lots of engagement it would be best for you to mix both. However, you should concentrate on what you do best. Never pretend to be an expert in things you don’t know and check all the information you want to share. Nobody likes fakes, and if such a situation occurred to you, be brave to say that you were wrong.

There are many ways to lure your followers into active interaction with you. Here are the most popular methods:

• Hosting contests, giveaways, and like times. Seeing a reward for the activity is a good trigger for many people.
• Encourage your audience to follow, comment, share, and like your content directly.
• Play interactive games with your followers, and have fun yourself
• Ask opinions and collect feedback through comments and likes
• Ask your followers to suggest new content ideas, that will be interesting to them
• Create polls and surveys.

Make it personal

What people appreciate most in their favorite influencers is their sincerity and being open to the audience. Adding your personal experience and encouraging an exchange of it in your comments is a good boost for the engagement rate. Emotional content, that can be related to your followers, will certainly drive more discussions, likes, and shares.

Asking your viewers for support is also normal, as long as you don’t turn it into whining and complaints about small things. From their favorite bloggers, people want to see motivation and inspiration for themselves. So don’t overdo it with intimacy too.

Keep track of your performance

Analytics is a form of art that every blogger has to wield. To detect and prevent mistakes in your strategy, you have to dive deep into the statistics that you get. Each action that you make, has to bring you growth or at least keep your rating steady. If you notice that you lose a grip, good analytical work is there too, to find out where the wrong step occurred.

According to the data that social platforms are collecting, you will be able to adjust your tactic and win your followers’ attention back again.

And don’t forget to check out the reports that social networks reveal from time to time. It is a way to catch up with the newest trends and mood of the public, quickly introducing new features and options.

Conclusion

The engagement level can be hard to set, but rather easy to maintain. It takes time, but in fact, there is nothing better in blogging, than the connection between you and your audience. Feel free to use the seven points above to make a successful strategy, and good luck!

Image Credits: Image 2: Daniellaguips, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons