4.9 billion people are active on social media. Naturally, standing out in this saturated space is a challenge many small businesses endure, but it’s not impossible to build a following from scratch.
Apps such as X, Instagram, and TikTok provide significant brand-strengthening marketing opportunities, yet building an engaged, captivated audience requires careful strategic planning.
Build a Following by Adding Value
Brand owners can’t aimlessly produce mundane content expecting to stand out from social media noise. The most effective small business social media growth strategies incorporate creative trust-building techniques to boost followers and online authenticity.
When considering your social media consumption, how regularly do you scroll hoping to make an impulsive purchase? For most of us, the answer is almost never.
So, relentless direct marketing on social media is rarely the most efficient way of building a captivated, loyal audience.
This means that to build an online following on the most popular social media apps, you’ll need to provide value beyond any monetary pursuit or other underlying motives you might have for building an audience.
Here are some social media post ideas to add value to your audience, and ultimately increase your brand’s online visibility.
Tell Your “Why” Story
Audiences are numb to content without meaning. After hours of scrolling through repetitive social media content daily, it’s inevitable that there’s a nonchalance or indifference among its consumers.
To capture the intention of a screen-bound user, you must make them feel something and evoke emotions that remove them from the bored mindless scroll.
One of the most powerful ways of evoking emotions on social media is by sharing your brand’s “why” story. Reflect on your brand’s identity and define your ‘why’.
Whether your reason is a personal story about how you built your brand as a route out of adversity, your brand’s mission to make the world a better and more inclusive place, or perhaps you’re just trying to build an online community of like-minded people, these stories resonate deeply with social media audiences.
In fact, during a 2020 survey, 32% of social media users responded that the main reason they follow brands was to gain motivation and to hear inspiring stories.
It’s a strategy deployed by small funded start-up businesses right the way through to the world’s biggest brands such as Apple and Nike, who are always eager to market their pursuit on social media.
Celebrate Your Community
It’s human nature to desire the feeling of connectivity to like-minded people. We crave community, collective identity, and freedom to transmit our tribes’ cultural connotations to the world.
Subculture-defining brands such as Supreme and Dr Martin use social media to convey what it means to consume and wear their pieces by showcasing their communities.
Your brand can tap into the human need for community and collective identity to build a following, too.
Define what it means to consume your brand and share images, testimonials, or stories of your community members who portray the underlying cultural messages effortlessly.
Several studies demonstrate that users are receptive to online community-building; we see other people participating in something, and we want to be part of it too, so we follow.
Create Platform Specific Content
Remember, when establishing trust on social media and attempting to build an engaged following, you must deploy an intentional strategy for each specific social media platform you wish to target.
As Marshall McLuhan famously claimed, ‘the medium is the message.’ His theory detailed that the platform you choose to share your content often influences its impact as much as — if not more than — the content itself.
When attempting to build a following you can’t recycle the same content across X, Instagram, and TikTok.
On text-based apps such as X, images and videos are still vital for increasing your tweet’s visibility. Yet the textual element used to provide context to the visual imagery is what will make the tweet effective in boosting your follower count.
Conversely, to get followers on Instagram or TikTok, your focus should be on creating concise videos and reels, edited to align specifically with your chosen social media platform’s algorithm, to engage potential followers.
For example, the world-renowned video game console Playstation grew its follower count by 376% between 2014 and 2019 by understanding how to use different social media platforms effectively.
Longer-form content, including trailers and game reviews with opportunities for audience discussion, were shared on X, while bite-sized versions of the same videos were shared on Instagram, perfectly aligning with the two apps’ algorithms and users’ consumption habits.
Use Questions and Polls
To further enhance the audience’s connectivity and engagement with your brand’s social media profile, ask them to share their perspective on a relevant subject in the comments, create a poll, or directly ask questions.
Human beings are sociable, conversational creatures. We don’t just want to watch or listen but actively participate in a given subject.
When social media brands offer their audience the opportunity to share their opinions through polls and questions, it often results in tons of added engagement and follower conversions, according to Forbes.
Don’t be mistaken — there are countless additional benefits to using polls beyond just increasing follower conversions.
Polls allow brands to effortlessly gather valuable market insights, enabling them to understand audience preferences, test new ideas, and refine their strategies without significant time or financial investment.
Share Brand-Related Tutorials
A 2022 study conducted among 17–29-year-olds found that 52% of participants used social media to learn, whether through video-based tutorials, infographics, or blogs.
Ask yourself: how frequently do you resort to searching “how-to.” content on social media? For most digital natives, social media-based learning and problem-solving are normal parts of 21st-century life.
Your brand’s process, product development, and application presumably entail a high level of skill and insight to be performed successfully.
Glossier–a skincare brand among the most reputable in its market–regularly shares Instagram reels detailing how to apply their products to experience the most impactful results.
Alternatively, Austin Kleon–an NYTimes bestselling author–uses his social media platform to share experience-based tips with aspiring writers and artists attempting to replicate his success.
Consider your brand’s unique expertise which could add value to your target audience and create insightful social media content about it.
Produce Behind-the-Scenes-Content
Gaining followers on social media requires presenting your brand as authentic, trustworthy, and insightful. One method regularly used to enhance the audience’s feeling of trust is behind-the-scenes content.
Behind-the-scenes content humanises your brand by showcasing the relatable, hard-working people behind your product or service.
England’s behind-the-scenes social media content during the 2018 FIFA World Cup transformed negative stereotypes of what an international footballer represents.
England’s meme-worthy, behind-the-scenes content displayed a down-to-earth, relatable side to its team’s star players, developing a supporter-player relationship that would help drive the team to unprecedented heights.
Your brand could replicate this strategy by using behind-the-scenes content to change potentially limiting perceptions of your service or market. After all, social media users are wary about potential scams online, particularly when it’s transactional.
Find opportunities to deliver behind-the-scenes content, whether it’s during product development, a day in the life, or something else, to showcase your trustworthiness to potential followers.
Take Advantage of Viral Trends
Centring your social media growth strategy across all platforms around viral trends isn’t conducive to sustainable engagement. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a place for incorporating trends into your content.
For example, TikTok is synonymous with trends, and several content styles will engage TikTok audiences which might perform less successfully elsewhere.
If you’re looking for reel ideas to increase followers, look no further than #GRWM (get ready with me). It’s a TikTok trend used by internet personalities and brands alike to showcase how they prepare for a day at work or get ready for a certain event to entice followers.
If your brand is attending an event with significant public interest, consider detailing how you prepared for it on TikTok, keeping in mind earlier alluded to editing and presentation styles and you’ll be surprised by the number of interactions your post receives.
Engaging content for TikTok growth contrasts dramatically with posts that go viral on X, where brands must keep up to date with viral memes, contemporary cultural references, and timely news events to incorporate viral trends successfully.
Share Throwback Content
Irrespective of your market, product, or service, there’s a high probability that your audience is immersed in nostalgia.
Oasis’ reunion tour spectacularly sold out in seconds, football commercials feature Zinedine Zidane and Eric Cantona, while baggy jeans reminiscent of the 1990s dominate contemporary fashion.
Has society run out of ideas? Or are our brains hardwired to yearn for a romanticised version of the past? Who knows, but taking advantage of nostalgia in your brand’s social media posts could be effective.
Adobe–a 43-year-old digital design platform–regularly pays homage to earlier editions of its software and tools on social media to a warm reception from nostalgic designers.
This style of content doesn’t just entice new followers; it strengthens Adobe’s brand identity by showcasing its evolution through societal and technological change, resulting in users feeling a deeper sense of loyalty to the design platform and its journey.
Does your brand have a long, storied history?
If the answer’s yes, ensure you market it on social media through old photos, videos, and tales using the #TBT (throwback Thursday) hashtag.
Highlight Social Responsibility
A 2023 Gallup study found that 77% of those aged 18 to 29 believed it’s “extremely important” for a brand they’re shopping with or consuming to operate in an environmentally sustainable way.
So, to build a social media profile that attracts new followers and generates leads, it’s imperative that your posts, at least occasionally, demonstrate your brand’s corporate social responsibility.
Brands such as Ben & Jerry’s use social media to highlight societal injustices and discuss climate action.
Essentially, brands with successful social media strategies don’t just post about themselves, but also the issues that are important to their target audience.
Remember, all social media brands have different audiences, with contrasting belief systems and varying emphasis on societal issues. Ensuring you understand your audience’s beliefs prevents a disconnection between the issue you’re raising awareness for and the views of the intended receptor.
Post Consistently
As discussed earlier, successful social media strategies rely not only on knowing what to post but also understanding where and when to post. Equally important is determining the persistence and frequency required to build a loyal following.
Social media is shaping marketing in the music industry, fashion, and everything in between. Your brand cannot afford to be discouraged by initially underwhelming results — consistency is key.
Research suggests that to get followers on Instagram, you should publish several stories and posts weekly.
The extent to which you post online depends on the application you’re using and the type of follower you’re hoping to entice. But it’s vital for your growth that you’re able to stay consistent and try several different strategies to work out what posts get the most followers for your brand.