Do want to grow your social following without running an expensive ad campaign? We’ll tell you how!

Social media has never been a more valuable marketing tool for businesses to gain exposure and build long-lasting relationships with customers.

In today’s digital world, consumers are increasingly using social media to discover, research, and engage with brands. Having a strong social media presence allows businesses to reach their target audience, establish a good reputation within their industry, and boost their SEO rankings.

Social media also offers insights into consumer behaviour, which can be used to inform marketing strategies and improve the customer experience. Additionally, social media can help drive traffic to a business’s website and increase sales.

To benefit from these opportunities, brands have been investing time and resources into their social media presence through organic growth or paid social.

➡️ Want to make your SMM work? Get in touch and learn how we can help your business achieve organic growth – saving you time, money, and stress!

What is the Difference Between Organic Social Media and Paid Social?

The answer is simple – it’s all about how the content is distributed.

‘Organic’ refers to content that is not promoted through paid advertising. This content is shown to a user’s/company’s followers and other users through the platform’s algorithm. 

On the flip side, paid social involves growth with the help of an effective advertising campaign.

There are many advantages to the organic option – aside from the obvious – it’s free! An organic following represents genuine loyalty and trust between business and customer, as well as encouraging collaboration with allied businesses.

So how can your business achieve organic growth?

Yay!Starter is here to navigate you through the challenges and help crack the social media code! Follow the 6 hacks below to find out how you can increase your social media following organically.

1. Establish Your Brand And Aesthetic

Your company branding is one of the first things you establish when you start a business. This should also be the case when beginning your social media journey.

It is crucial to maintain consistency between your website branding and your social media. For example, your social media content should all be guided by your existing colour schemes, fonts, graphics and logos. The aesthetic of your business is essential if you want to become a recognised brand that customers can easily identify.

As well as a clear visual identity, you must also define your brand. The content you post should communicate the mission, values, and target audience of your company. This will help to guide your social media strategy and ensure that your content is consistent and resonates with your audience.

2. Take Advantage Of Online Tools

Managing social media across different platforms can be challenging.

We recommend using third-party software to help you monitor and optimise your social media accounts. A few of our favourites are:

• Awario
• Sprout Social 
• Agorapulse
• Crowdfire
• Hootsuite

You should use software to your advantage. Firstly, these tools automate the process of posting content across multiple platforms, saving you valuable time. In addition, you can build and manage a long-term content creation plan and schedule.

Secondly, you should find software to analyse your social media performance. Data is your best friend when it comes to assessing organic growth. With the right information, brands can know what works and what doesn’t, as well as what to focus on and what to discard. Furthermore, you should pay attention to the data-driven insights on times of peak traffic – which time of day is most of your audience online?

By @kmuza

3. Choose The Right Platforms

Each social media platform exists for a different purpose and your content should reflect this.

This may seem obvious, but Instagram users are unwilling to hear about opportunities you may have for business collaboration. Likewise, LinkedIn users might not want to see videos of your co-worker’s pet. Different kinds of content can bring something different to the table, but they should reflect the tone of the platform.

The following summary will help inform your strategy for each channel:

• LinkedIn: An effective marketplace for finding employees and clients. Here, you should post news, insights and events relating to your company or industry. It is also a great space to share B2B opportunities and hiring announcements. Any business that is serious about its growth needs to be actively present on LinkedIn.

• Twitter: Ideal for short-form blog content, company news, PR coverage, industry insights, product launches, events, and general commentary. Twitter is not for everyone – you either love it or hate it. If you love it, you need to become an avid user, develop an authentic voice and tweet regularly (think Elon Musk).
• Instagram: With over 1 billion monthly users, you should look to take advantage of this platform for major organic growth. It’s a visual platform which will work well for businesses that consistently produce high-quality visual content – still imagery and video. It’s a great space for creative agencies, interior decorators, fashion brands or make-up artists to build their presence.

• Facebook: There are no rights or wrongs for the type of content you should post here, but prioritise people-focused content, as this often performs the best. Think of how to showcase your team members, events, and company culture. However, with ever-decreasing reach, Facebook is best geared towards paid promotion these days. Its advertising capabilities can serve pretty much any type of business.

• YouTube: A great platform for sharing educational content like tutorials, lectures, and webinars. This is a perfect place for businesses in the EdTech niche to showcase their content, such as eLearning providers, educational apps, and coaching businesses.

Remember: Platforms like Instagram and TikTok are best for B2C marketing, whereas LinkedIn or Twitter present much better opportunities for B2B.

4. Use Other Accounts To Your Advantage

It may be useful to follow accounts in your industry or niche. This will allow you to take inspiration from their content and social strategy.

For example, if you are in the FinTech industry, you can follow other FinTech-focussed accounts, news channels, promising start-ups, and industry-specific hashtags.

Building a network of similar accounts can offer good opportunities for collaboration and like-for-like engagement. The benefits of B2B interaction across your network should not be overlooked and can build your online presence and reputation within your field.

It should also be emphasised that, as a creator, not all your content must be made from scratch. You should look to repurpose existing content or reshare posts from other users that are relevant to your audience. Good examples are communicating your opinions of news stories and posting different accounts of the same event.

5.  Engage, Engage, Engage

Firstly, engaging with your existing followers can help build rapport with them, making them more likely to become your clients/customers in the future. Those who feel engaged with your socials will feel more inclined to share your content – granting you exposure to new audiences.

Secondly, when it comes to growing your presence on social media, the algorithm is your best friend. It pushes content that it decides is interesting and relevant, and one key measure of this is follower engagement. So, exchanging likes, comments, shares and mentions will encourage algorithms to boost your position on socials.

Posting frequency is also an important metric – the algorithm rewards high activity. This approach will help you stay on top of your audience’s minds.

Lastly, new visitors to your social media pages quickly pick up on engagement levels. This is the key push/pull factor when your page is first viewed. A highly engaged channel is likely to attract the attention of these visitors leading to more organic followers.

By @MarvinMeyer

6. Use Platform Features

With the above point in mind, try leveraging platform features to engage your audience. The best way to keep your content interesting is by offering your followers diverse content.

Instagram and Twitter offer some great features to do this. Think about how you can incorporate polls, surveys, music, and third-party content into your stories and feed posts.

Hashtags are a feature you can take advantage of on any social media platform. To use hashtags effectively, you should:

1. Make sure they are relevant to the post.
2. Don’t overdo it – too many hashtags can crowd your post and steer attention away from your caption.
3. Use niche hashtags – this is a great way to stand out, as your post will appear higher under the less popular keywords.

By @juneaye

Summary

Social media has become an important tool for businesses to connect with their customers and grow their online presence. Growing social media presence organically can be challenging, but it’s an important part of building a successful brand.

Follow the 6 steps we’ve outlined in this blog and you’ll be on the right path to social media success!

1. Establish your brand and be consistent with your visual branding as well as your company messaging and ethos.

2. Take advantage of online tools to build a content creation plan and track performance analytics.

3. Choose the right platforms for the type of posts you want to share – make sure the tone and content match the platform.
4. Use other accounts to your advantage. Make connections within your niche and repurpose and reshare relevant posts from your followers.

5. Engage with your followers to build up a good reputation and brand loyalty.

6. Use platform features to engage with your audience in creative ways.

➡️ Need help growing your business social media channels effectively? Contact Yay!Starter and we can help you make the most of your social media marketing & scale your business to new heights!