5 Ways Smart Social Marketers Drive Engagement

The face of social marketing is changing.

As usual.

The tactics that drove engagement a year ago aren’t necessarily the most effective strategies for today. Below are a few key engagement strategies you should know about, whether you’re taking a DIY approach with social media or partnering with an agency. Have a few tips of your own to add? Leave them in the comments below.

#1 If it isn’t visual, it won’t work.Content must be visual. Consider these facts in support of visual content:

Instagram engagement is 4.21%, significantly higher than Facebook (0.7%) and Twitter (0.3%), where content is not always visual.
Emojis are used in half of all Instagram uploads. (Think about it: even the caption area, traditionally reserved for text, is going visual.)

Users crave visual content. Learn more about creating visual content for each social platform in this blog post.

#2 Enrich your static images.

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Social ads with a cinemagraph instead of a static image saw 60% more engagement.
The use of animated GIFs in emails saw 26% higher click-through rates.

If photos are good, then video is great for social. Look for ways to create motion in your content. This can be as simple as moving text over a static image or shooting a video on your phone. Barriers to entry have practically disappeared; just start.

#3 Livestreaming is here.Last year, Periscope and Meerkat shook up the video world with mobile livestreaming platforms. Facebook has recently joined the livestreaming market, as well. According to a recent post from the Facebook newsroom, “People spend more than 3x more time watching a Facebook Live video on average compared to a video that’s no longer live.” The ability to be in the moment, to connect with brands and stars in real-time, is seriously driving social engagement.

#4 Mobile is eating the world.As Benedict Evans of Andreessen Horowitz likes to say, “mobile is eating the world.” It’s true. In 2015, 51% of digital media was consumed on a mobile device. In lower income demographics and many areas of the world, that percentage is much higher. Content creators who develop with a “mobile first” mindset will absolutely see better engagement than their desktop-focused counterparts.

#5 Video is king.If it sounds like we’re repeating ourselves… maybe we are. But that’s okay because you really can’t underestimate the power of video for social engagement. Video is absolutely essential. And here’s the proof: