Hello, is anybody out there? It can sometimes feel like you go unnoticed on social media. You might be proactive in reaching out to others, but they don’t do the same to you. Or you post valuable content, but are lucky to get a like. Is it me? This is the first question many people ask themselves. They feel they are not liked for some reason, or that no one wants to hear what they have to say. Maybe. Assuming your content is appropriate for your desired audience, other factors might be affecting your social media reach:
- You have the wrong audience. For example, if you write romance books and your audience don’t read them, you’re not going to get support from them when you post about your craft or your new releases.
- The Facebook algorithm. This determines what people see in their feed, and when. It changes regularly, so if you notice a sudden shift in your engagement this may be the culprit. One thing you can do is try different types of posts: word content, video and images, and see which one works better. Posting regularly helps get your posts in front of more people, too.
- The time of day you post. If your followers are in the US and you’re in Australia, post at times your followers are likely to be online. Unsure when that is? Notice when your US Facebook friends start posting. Try a few different times – before work, morning coffee time, lunch time, hump hour (2-3pm), after work and later in the evening to see when you get more responses. Posting on weekends is not generally going to get great results judging by what I’ve read and tested myself, but give it a go and see what works. Sometimes a long weekend can mean more engagement because people have the time to be online, whereas a usual two-day weekend might be filled with shopping, kid’s sporting activities and social engagements.
- Length of posts. I’ve noticed few people like reading really long posts. One idea to overcome this is to preview the best part of the content and link to the longer post on your blog, or post the full post beneath the summary. That way people can get a quick sense of what the post is about, and decide whether to read it.
- The lurker effect. I’ve had numerous people talk to me about things I’ve posted, yet they didn’t like the post on social media. Also, people get distracted from their phones or computers, and while they might have intended to respond, the moment passes and something else takes precedence.
So if you’re not getting the engagement you seek, try tweaking your post times, amount of words versus images/videos and notice any change. Good luck on your social media journey:)
Darcy xo