Engagement is highly pursued and desired by those who work in digital marketing and manage social media.

We can say that it serves as a kind of “thermometer” to find out if your brand’s content and strategy are, in fact, effective.

But how do you use engagement to benefit the company in an assertive manner without compromising possible results already achieved? How do you communicate effectively with your audience and increase your brand’s value in the eyes of your audience?

Learn about engagement once and for all and find out how to use this concept to your business’ advantage.

What is engagement?

Engagement symbolizes the relationship between your business and its followers. It measures the brand’s ability to engage the audience and create a long-term commitment to them.

In other words, engaging content drives an involuntary action from the user, such as likes or clicking on a link.

Several indicators measure engagement: page views, email list subscribers, comments, shares, likes, etc. Each indicator can also be an important KPI, depending on the strategy employed at the time.

In any case, you must always keep in mind that the concept of engagement is different for each platform (website, blog, mobile, email, social media, etc.).

What is social media engagement?

On social media, engagement is used as a quantitative parameter to know if the brand’s content is in fact speaking to the followers in an appropriate manner.

This metric can be used in different ways, such as:

• Number of page likes
• Growth of followers
• Content sharing
• Number of comments per post
• Number of saved posts
• Among others

When referring specifically to the calculation, it can be done based on the average number of interactions recorded during a certain period. The result should be divided according to the page’s total reach.

Next, the decimal number found should be multiplied by the percentage rate. With this, you’ll get a sense of the engagement’s growth and the size of your social media’s importance.

The Three E’s of Engagement

We already know that this concept is very important. But what determines if a brand is engaging? To understand this better, let’s check out the three E’s of engagement:

Exclusivity

Exclusivity isn’t just about selling products or services available only to a few people. It means engaging with your audience in a completely personalized manner, offering unique content and drawing users’ attention.

Empathy

People relate to other people. In order to really connect with your customers, you have to show that you are present, listening and understanding what their needs are. Empathy is the key to winning over your audience.

Excellence

One thing that all customers like is good service. If someone has made a positive comment, respond as best you can. Have you received criticism? Absorb it and reply to the customer with empathy.

Engagement is also about relating with your audience, understanding their opinions, and constantly improving.

Why is engagement so important?

Engagement is important on social media for different reasons. With it, you can have an idea of how your followers interact with your brand and the difference your products or services make in people’s lives.

Moreover, this metric is an important thermometer for those who work with digital marketing since it helps you understand the strategies and reapply assertive actions in the short and medium term.

With this in mind, we have listed the main reasons why engagement is important for any business venture nowadays.

1. Greater brand reach

The more interactions and conversations your posts have, the more they will be displayed to your followers. This is due to the algorithm calculations of the different networks, such as Instagram and Facebook, for example.

Therefore, the larger the audience reached by a certain content, the more it will be shown to people, since these codes start to “understand” that a given post is relevant to the target audience in question.

In such cases, your post can also be suggested to people who don’t know your brand yet, depending on the platform used, such as Pinterest.

2. Your business’ authority is increased

A business with engaged customers that interact with the content creates a sense of authority and trust on a given subject. Therefore, it becomes easier to attract potential new customers.

Talking to your followers and posting topics that are relevant to them makes the conversation within social media more authentic, also adding value to the algorithm as we saw in the previous topic.

Moreover, engagement is a very important and true social proof, since real people will be talking to your business and giving different opinions. This is usually one of the main sales pitches in the digital universe.

3. Your conversion rate is increased

Within the digital environment, one of entrepreneurs’ main goals is to increase their conversion rate. Through engagement, this becomes not only possible, but also more efficient.

This makes it easier to connect with people, creating proximity and making it easier to sell with content designed in a unique and exclusive manner for your ideal customer.

How to increase audience engagement

Fostering engagement in your marketing strategies is essential in order to obtain interesting brand engagement. The question is: how can you do this in an effective manner?

That is what we’re going to explore now. Take note of our tips and start applying them to your business now!

1. Know your audience in depth

When we talk about knowing your audience, it means going beyond what you already know about your persona. It means analyzing the information provided by insights, exploring not only the demographics, but also your audience’s behavior.

Important tip: your brand can (and should!) work with a persona and a target audience. However, keep in mind that they aren’t the same thing, and you can learn more about it in this article.

You don’t have a persona for your business yet? You can start creating one now with the help of this guide. This process will be the best way to identify who your audience is, their likes and needs.

The great advantage of having your persona outlined will be the creation of content that’s more assertive. This point needs to be stressed: use the real data provided by the insights, which will help in the creation of a persona that is closer to your reality.

2. Be present on the right social media

During the process of creating your persona and mapping your target audience, you’ll be able to identify by which means your audience consumes your content, and which websites and blogs are their benchmarks, as well as the social media they use the most.

There’s no point in working on LinkedIn if the vast majority of your audience is on Instagram, for example. But, if your business model is B2B, it’s worth investing more in LinkedIn.

Study your audience and understand their profile. Being present on the right social media and platforms is critical in terms of engagement.

3. Create a customized content strategy

Referring back to the three E’s of engagement, one of the pillars is Exclusivity, which involves the creation of personalized content that delivers real value to users, humanizing the brand and making the relationship closer.

One way to go beyond and create more personalized content is to encourage your followers and customers to create their own content and post it to your channels. Plus, this content will serve as social proof.

This type of content increases the sense of community and belonging, and your audience will feel that they’re truly being heard.

4. Focus on quality content

Many people and companies think that posting content several times a day will generate more engagement. Quantity doesn’t mean quality.

The first thing you need to think about when producing content, whether for your website or social media, is understanding what your audience wants.

It may sound obvious, but there are brands that make the mistake of thinking about their own interests first.

To help you create quality content, prepare an editorial calendar for each channel. This will help you not only maintain the correct posting frequency, but also give you time to think and create amazing material!

5. Be innovative

We often come across content that says the same thing, but with different words. The result is that no one’s interested, and this content won’t provide any results and is the same as doing nothing.

If you want to generate engagement with your content, it must bring something new to the audience.

When it comes to preparing your content calendar, do a lot of research on the topics, study your competitors, and find the gaps you can fill.

6. Interact with your followers and other users

Finally, one of the big secrets to generating engagement is interaction. Try to always reply to all comments, fostering discussion and conversation.

The more you engage with your followers and readers, in a natural manner, the more they will respond to it in the same way.

This interaction will also help you understand what the audience wants to see on your profile, presenting opportunities for improvement in your overall business.

7. Be present on different channels

One of the key successes of engagement is to be present on the different platforms used by your target audience.

Nowadays, it’s possible to benefit from different resources and platforms to generate this kind of buzz in your followers, such as directing them to:

• Blog content
• Videos on YouTube
• Email marketing strategy
• Institutional website
• Among others

Engagement isn’t about focusing on a single social network, but about being present and replicating successful techniques and concepts through the platform with which your persona has greater identification.

With this concept, it’s also possible to connect your company’s different communication channels and mix the engagement between them so that your marketing plan can obtain an even greater return.

8 Use social proof

One of the biggest premises of social media and engagement is having real people who can share experiences with other users about your products or services. These are the so-called social proof.

Thus, using testimonials, videos recorded by customers, positive comments on social media about your customer service, or even a fun interaction, can make the difference in the eyes of those who don’t know your brand yet.

After all, in today’s universe, people connect with other people and are inspired by true stories in order to make a decision about something. Especially when it comes to making a purchase from a business they aren’t familiar with, or an experience being offered to which they have never been exposed.

9. Encourage your audience’s participation

In order to pursue the perfect engagement, entrepreneurs often need to encourage their followers to perform certain actions.

On Instagram, for example, it’s quite common to find posts that encourage you to give your opinion, such as a battle of outfits in the case of clothing stores, or even the sharing of opinions about more profound topics.

All this makes people feel closer to the profile and motivates them to perform the indicated action. Basically, we can say that user-generated content (UGC) is quite helpful when it comes to strengthening your brand.

Therefore, the number of conversions can also be directly impacted by this procedure.

10. Measure your actions’ results

In order to understand if your methodology and marketing plan is working, it’s very important that you measure the results of your actions on social media.

After all, engagement goes far beyond merely liking photos or posting an “Up” in the comments. In fact, this kind of behavior is being banned on certain platforms.

So, write down what the company’s initial goals are regarding engagement and revisit the numbers to see if they’re being achieved.

This makes it easier to recalculate a route or replicate an action that has generated great results.

Conclusion

Let’s review. Besides identifying your audience’s preferred social media, you need to feed them with quality content, generating more interactions.

Engagement should be planned in order to build and improve your relationship with visitors and customers. Like any strategy, it needs to be measurable and help you achieve goals.

Want to check out social media tools with lots of potential? Read our article now and learn everything about it!