Author: Adam Rogers
Improving Social Media
September 10, 2022
17 minute read
What Are Engaging Social Media Posts?
Engaging social media posts are the content you publish to promote your brand, strengthen customer relationships, and foster deeper connections that will ultimately lead to sales. These posts have the secondary goal of conversions and sales, while the primary goal is to increase engagement – likes, comments, shares, follows, subscriptions, and so on.
Why Is Engagement on Social Media So Important for E-commerce Stores?
There is a good reason why over 90% of businesses in the U.S. use social media in some way. When used effectively, social media can provide significant benefits for your business. To use it effectively, it’s important to maintain a healthy balance between engaging content aimed at building and nurturing relationships and content aimed at driving conversions.
Increasing engagement with your posts is also a signal to the algorithm that people like your content, so it’s more likely that this content will receive visibility to other users as well. The algorithm not only looks at how many followers you have, but also at how those followers engage with your social media posts.
In addition to helping businesses increase visibility, engaging posts allow brands to interact with consumers in a two-way direction. This provides valuable feedback about your brand, products, industry, and even competitors. Additionally, they serve as a great testing ground for new ideas.
How to Choose the Right Social Media Platform for Your Business
There are many popular social media platforms to consider. These include well-known channels that most people recognize, such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter. However, there are also niche social media sites that are known and specialized in particular industries that can be leveraged. Choosing the right platform for your brand depends on what you sell, who you are selling to, and your overall business goals.
Here are some resources to help you get started:
There are over 2.7 billion Facebook users you can reach with your page. It’s a great platform for engaging with new and existing customers, and you can also use Facebook as a direct sales channel.
Keep in mind, however, that it takes a lot of effort for your engaging posts to gain visibility. Facebook is a “pay to play” channel for promoting your brand. In other words, you won’t reach many people, even if they subscribe by liking your page, without paying for Facebook ads.
Instagram is another social media platform where you can sell directly, so it’s a great place to maintain a strong organic presence with engaging posts. While you can pay for Instagram ads, organic posts – especially videos in the form of Reels – have the potential to gain traction.
Instagram is also a perfect platform to reach Millennials and Generation Z – the ones who make up the majority of its user base. However, the number of users across all age groups continues to grow, making it an increasingly relevant place to connect with consumers of all ages.
Twitter is the least visual, most text-focused social media platform for posting engaging content. Unlike most other channels, the Twitter user base tends to tilt male. It also lacks the e-commerce capabilities that Facebook and Instagram have. However, that makes it a great platform to focus on engaging posts, as selling is not usually the primary objective. Brands typically tweet between four and five times a week.
TikTok
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TikTok has gained popularity in recent years, especially among Millennial consumers. This video-based social channel favors authentic individuals, but it also allows brands to join in on the fun. For example, the e-commerce company SendAFriend achieved significant success thanks to its marketing strategy on TikTok, managing to generate $5 million in sales within two years.
20 Interactive Social Media Post Ideas to Boost Online Sales
1. Regularly Post Engaging Content
To grow your social media followers over time, it’s important to post content regularly. Audiences may have different responses depending on your posting frequency, so make sure to test the optimal frequency for your brand. You can also compare your posting frequency and engagement rates with your competitors.
Additionally, your interactive posts depend on the platform’s algorithm. Consistent posting frequencies are likely to signal to the platform that you’re a committed user – and hopefully, the algorithm will reward you for that.
However, remember that your daily or weekly posting frequency is a small detail compared to having a plan and process for creating truly engaging posts regularly. There are no “neutral” reactions, so if it’s not good, don’t post it.
It can be boring to post content all the time. For this reason, using a tool like Hootsuite or Buffer is helpful for planning and scheduling posts in advance. These tools can help you save time spent executing social media marketing strategies.
2. Showcase Customer Reviews and Testimonials
Using product reviews to build trust and gain insights about your products is a great way to increase online sales.
Yotpo is a review app available for Shopify sites that encourages customers to leave reviews after making a purchase. The process is automated, so there’s no need to manually reach out to customers yourself.
Link your business social accounts and post reviews directly to your pages. These reviews provide fresh content and help enhance engagement.
3. Create Short Content for Social Media
Consider the context that most users are in when browsing social media. They might be on their mobile devices while on the go, taking a quick break at their office, or spending time waiting for their show to return after commercial breaks.
One thing that these scenarios have in common: social media users are often browsing amidst other tasks. Therefore, short-form content is an effective way to capture your audience’s attention.
For example, let’s say you sell products for soccer players. In your blog, you wrote an article titled “7 Training Exercises to Improve Your Soccer Skills.” You can repurpose this content into seven small pieces for social media use – one for each exercise. These snippets will be much more effective than trying to cram a full article into the much smaller social media experience.
4. Educate Your Audience
You can showcase your expertise in your field by educating your audience on a relevant topic, such as how fabrics are made in your designs, how to care for your sunglasses, or a recipe using your kitchen products.
Mysa Natural Wine created an Instagram Reels video to educate its audience on whether natural wine contains sulfites. This video has garnered over 400 likes, 28 comments, 12,000 views, 80 shares, and 36 saves so far. The brand has also received numerous direct messages, allowing for intimate conversations with potential customers.
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Also educate your audience on how to use your products, such as the Manukora Manuka Honey brand. The brand published a video showing how to use its product in herbal coffee or tea. This video garnered over 9,600 views on Instagram.
5. Share Animated Images
Many social media platforms have searchable animated libraries you can use to enrich your content feed. These animations are a great source of content with limited effort and resources. Additionally, they are considered engaging posts.
The skincare brand Frank Body does this often on Twitter. A quick scroll through their feed will show how the brand engages with followers through animated tweets.
6. Go Behind the Scenes
No matter what channel you use, you can give customers a peek behind the scenes. Show how your product is made, give a tour of your offices or warehouse, or take followers through the steps of setting up your pop-up shop.
The sustainable swimwear brand Seea shares some behind-the-scenes moments from their warehouse via Instagram Reels. This also gives a human touch to the brand and showcases the people behind the team.
Designer Terry de Ciano showcases the creative process behind her handmade clothing. Engaging social media posts often provide an insider look at how products are designed, allowing followers to feel invested and involved in the process.
7. Be Active in Relevant Hashtags
Hashtags have organized a large part of the social web around conversations, making it easy to join discussions and events by posting under hashtags relevant to your brand.
Make sure not to treat hashtags the same way across every channel. Here are some best practices we’ve gleaned from various studies:
- Twitter: Tweets with one hashtag tend to receive more engagement than tweets with three or more
- Instagram: Posts achieve the highest engagement rates when using multiple hashtags, up to 10+ in a single post
- Facebook: Posts perform best without hashtags
If you know an important event is coming up, you can prepare engagement posts in advance to ensure you’re ready to join the event. The more targeted your approach, the better. For instance, if you run a fashion label, consider tweeting directly or covering high-profile events and commenting on what celebrities are wearing.
Most events come with hashtags you can join. But the key to seizing a hashtag isn’t to grab it at all. Instead, you should aim to contribute to the conversation in a meaningful and organic way.
8. Align Your Posts with Trending Topics
You can also increase engagement on social media by aligning your posts with trending and relevant topics. If you’re following hashtags and news cycles, you’re likely to find opportunities to add your voice to a conversation or mimic what’s happening in the world.
Some trending topics are predictable. For example, holidays and events are great trending topics for brands to join in. The sustainable fashion brand Kūla decided to celebrate Mother’s Day with an engaging post on its Instagram page.
9. Use Trending Songs
When creating Instagram Reels and videos, you can add music to your content. This music library is shared with all Instagram users, and this music acts as a hashtag of sorts. When a user clicks on the song, they can browse a feed of all videos featuring the same sound. This can increase visibility and enhance engagement on your social media posts.
10.Be Personal
Consumers are increasingly interested in seeing the human side behind the companies they support. Social media is an excellent channel to showcase that. It’s not only acceptable to be personal here, but many welcome it.
“Our customers love seeing what our day-to-day work looks like, even the things we do when we’re not at work. Be authentic and let your customers get to know you. This way, you can build trust in your brand, and increased sales will be the natural result.” – Jane Greenlees, Owner/CEO of Sydney So Sweet
For example, the children’s clothing brand Sydney So Sweet isn’t afraid to be personal on Instagram. The brand typically sees more engagement with Reels on the platform, so they create content to meet this trend. “We post videos where we laugh at ourselves or are very honest, like this video with our office manager always trying to match her daughter,” says owner/CEO Jane Greenlees.
11. Post Content That Aligns with Your Brand Mission
Your brand’s mission should shine through in every interaction you have. This includes your social media posts as well. Therefore, topics related to your brand’s mission make excellent content for engagement posts.
Natty Belle posted this stunning image of artwork by an African artist. The brand itself aims to reconnect with its founder’s roots, and this interactive post is an extension of that.
12. Focus on Complementary Products
A great way to provide added value to your customers is by offering them information and deals on complementary products that you don’t necessarily sell. This idea works particularly well for Pinterest, where you can create a dedicated board for complementary products.
If your store sells hiking boots, for example, your Pinterest board could include related items like backpacks, water bottles, and sunscreen. You’ll notice other brands and sites promoting their products on your board. If they don’t, make sure to reach out and let them know. They may adopt the same strategy and drive traffic to your site.
With the Pinterest Shopify app, you can boost organic reach, quickly publish product posts, and automatically update your catalog to streamline the process of discovering, saving, and purchasing products from your website.
13. Showcase Your Space
If you have a business presence in physical stores, whether through wholesale or your own shop, you can post content about your locations in engagement posts. Showcase images and videos of the outside and inside of your store, product displays, staff, and other interesting elements to attract shoppers.
The sustainable clothing brand Kotn showcases its offices and stores on TikTok. This reminds shoppers that they can try products and purchase them in person, and that the brand is run by people like them.
14. Implement an Influencer Campaign
Influencer marketing has become one of the most common online marketing strategies used today. If you can identify influencers who have an audience that represents your target market, you can suggest they share a sponsored post featuring your brand and products.
Some influencers may request free products in exchange for sharing posts, while others may require direct payment, depending on their reach and how extensive the collaboration is. Remember: look for influencers who share a similar set of values with your brand.
The athletic wear brand Girlfriend Collective collaborated with a micro-influencer for its interactive Instagram post. The Reel features the influencer dancing in the brand’s clothing.
15.Publish a Survey or Poll
You can use social media to effectively engage with your audience through polls or surveys. Additionally, these ideas can be an excellent source of information about your audience and your business.
You can ask your followers questions about an upcoming product release or design, or something unrelated to the product – perhaps ask about their favorite TV shows or seasonal activities or other interests relevant to your business.
16. Create Quizzes and Other Interactive Content
In school, the idea of testing might have raised complaints from all sides. But thanks to BuzzFeed, quizzes are back with a vengeance.
These types of interactive content perform really well on social media – as long as they can motivate quiz participants to share their results publicly. To do this, you need to create a quiz that tells people something about themselves or how knowledgeable they are, so they have a reason to share it to reflect themselves.
If you want to try creating your own quiz, check out Playbuzz, which is a free and easy-to-use tool for creating interactive content.
17. Host a Twitter or Instagram Live Chat with Your Audience
Engagement is crucial for keeping any brand relevant and visible. A great tactic to increase followers and boost interaction is to host an engaging Twitter chat or Instagram Live.
You can either participate in an existing chat or live broadcast, or start your own. Collaborating on hosting allows you to leverage an existing audience, while you’ll need to put in more effort to promote it if you host it alone. Over time, others in the industry will join in, and you’ll gradually establish your brand as an authority in the field.
Tip: Choose a hashtag related to the event and ask your community to use it in their posts. This helps promote the brand and makes the practice familiar to those who choose to participate, allowing you to later search the chat for content and summaries.
18. Pin Your Best Posts to the Top of Your Profile
Whenever users interact with you through a social post, you’re not just building your online presence. There’s also a chance that those people will quickly check your social media profile and click on your site or content.
Be sure to utilize all the features available to you so that your profile expresses what you want and directs clicks where you want: update your cover photo to something eye-catching like a product image or a banner promoting a sale, include links to your site in your bio or profile, and highlight a prominent post at the top of your feed.
While you may be tempted to pin a post about one of your products or a sale promotion, also consider pinning posts that have performed well.
Source: https://www.shopify.com/blog/7900695-12-social-marketing-strategies-to-grow-your-online-sales
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