Top 5 Tactics for a Strong Organic Social Presence

Welcome to the future! It consists of a highly social, interconnected community of online consumers. The opportunities for businesses to connect with their customers are endless and can be a little overwhelming.

Most business owners recognize that having an active social media presence is essential in this day and age. Having an engaging organic social presence is a great way to attract new customers, develop a stronger connection with your current customers, and promote your products and services, and it doesn’t cost you anything but your time. However, building a strong following of brand advocates can be an exhausting process and most people don’t know where to start. What channels should you be on? What should you post? How often? We’ll point you in the right direction.

Here are the top 5 tactics for improving your organic social presence:

1. Optimize Your Profiles –

The simplest, easiest place to start improving your social media presence, regardless of what channels you’re on, is to completely and thoroughly fill out your profiles. It sounds obvious but you’d be surprised how many businesses haven’t even claimed their Facebook usernames. All social networks use algorithms to determine how relevant your profile is to your audience, which in turn determines how visible your brand is and how many people you will reach.

Fill out everything. Company descriptions, your brand story, location, hours, contact info, links to your website. The more data you can give these algorithms the more they will make your brand stand out. Try to include keywords that are relevant to your industry and the products and services that you offer.

2. Choose Your Channels Wisely –

By now you know that having an active social media presence is essential for your business. Naturally, you may think that you need to have a presence on as many social networks as possible, from Twitter, to Snapchat to Pinterest. This is not the case.

The key is to know your audience and which channels they are on. If you’re customers don’t use Pinterest, you would be wasting your time setting up and managing a profile on that particular platform. It’s better to have a strong, active presence on a few channels that your customers actively use than to spread yourself too thin and have a weak presence across 6 different platforms.

3. Balance Value With Promotion –

One of the biggest mistakes companies make online is treating organic social media like paid advertising and constantly promoting their company, products and services with post after post. Not only will this be ignored by your audience, but it will outright annoy them and create negative associations with your brand.

The trick is to provide a ton of value so your audience begins to know, like and trust you. Post news, articles and blog content that are relevant to your industry. Post tips and information about a common problem or issue in your industry. Show them a sneak peak into your company culture and your employees behind the scenes. Most of what you post should build value with your audience. Then you can sprinkle in posts that promote what you have to offer.

4. The Perfect Posting Frequency –

Unfortunately this mythical number doesn’t exist. Many think that they need to post as frequently as possible and exhaust themselves always trying to find content to post. The reality is you shouldn’t really post just for the sake of posting something. Remember those algorithms I mentioned earlier? They punish businesses that spam their audience with irrelevant content and reward businesses that post quality, relevant and engaging content.

Simply put, it’s quality over quantity. The size of your following also plays a big factor in how often you should post. Your best bet is to experiment. A few high quality posts per week or even once per day is a safe place to start. If your audience is engaging and interacting with your content you can try posting more often.

5. Engage –

It’s called SOCIAL media for a reason. Channels are meant to be a place where users can interact and socialize with each other as well as with businesses. Engaging with your followers is the best way to build trust and loyalty. Like and respond to their comments, ask them questions and answer any that they may have. The idea is to make your company profile feel like a living, breathing person. This breaks down the cold, corporate barrier between your customers and will pay off big time in the long run.

There you have it! Some simple tips you can use to crush it with organic social media.

If you’re feeling a little overwhelmed or just don’t see yourself having the time to attack organic social media the right way (you do have a business to run after all), we’re here to help! We take over posting and account management for our clients to save you time and hassle. You can get a hold of us here to discuss our management packages.