How to get your audience to engage with your content

It’s never been about the amount of content you create… well for the most part.

Imagine you take the time to create thirty pieces of content every month, but no one, not even your mom ‘likes’ it.

In today’s episode of The Marketing Natives we are going to give you the exact tools you need to get more engagement out of your audience even if you have never even posted before.

1. Ask questions, we can’t help but think about an answer
2. Talk about things that matter to your audience, not you.
   

3. Use images or videos that invoke a response, stay away from stock images.
   
4. Use your user generated content for your own, if you can.
   

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Christian [00:00:00] Welcome to another episode on this episode, we're going to talk about how to get your audience to engage with your content. We're going to talk about four different things. Let's jump into it. 

[00:00:13] This is the marketing natives providing actionable ways to grow. Succeed in your business. 

[00:00:21] And now your host, Christian and Aaron.. 

Aaron [00:00:27] All right. This one is probably the easiest and most simple and it's crazy because every time that you do this, somebody is going to get an answer. 

Aaron [00:00:37] They may not give an answer like like audibly or like writing it out, but they will give an answer at least in their head. So you need to make sure that you ask questions. Just simple questions. I think yesterday and I remember when but I I've been trying to, like ask questions just kind of topical with what's going on right now. We're just asking people, hey, they're telling people it's Friday and asking them if they knew it was Friday. And there was, I don't know, 20 or 30 different comments that we're going back and forth that people were like, oh, yeah, I did know is Friday or I did. No, I didn't think it was Friday. I thought it was Saturday yesterday. So it's just a simple question that people just can't help but tancer because they're like, oh, yeah, I need it. I don't know. I just feel I feel like I need to answer that. 

Christian [00:01:23] Yeah. Yes. I would add open ended questions, not just to not just say yes or no. I really like doorbuster. Well, we want to foster conversations. And obviously we're talking about, you know, creating that engagement and creating those conversations will just sort of boost your your post. And to be honest. Aaron's talking about doing a question and that's it like is literally typing a question on Facebook and doing just a question post. And that's it. There's no image attached or video or anything fancy with it. It's just a simple question and it just generates engagement and it helps you boost your other content. Right. Because Facebook is like, oh, well, you know, they're doing really good with this. People actually engage in their liking this. They're commenting. Then there's other content that they post. Must also mean that, you know, people want to get with it. So there were also sort of push that you got to make sure that you're all the content is, you know, good and valuable and potentially ask a question to to generate that engagement as well. But these simple just single question type posts will definitely help you engage. Have your people engage with that. 

Aaron [00:02:34] Yes. And this could be on Facebook. I've seen a lot of people and it does really well from like you making a tweet and taking that tweet and putting on LinkedIn or putting it on Instagram or something like that. So literally those exact tactics of just asking a question. All those platforms, they worked for everything except for like I said on LinkedIn and Instagram, obviously, you have you can't just to text, but Facebook and Twitter, you could and people will respond there. But then just taking that same question and putting it across multiple platforms and it doesn't matter that it's going to work for you. So at the very least, just go out there and try to do some questions and provoke some some conversation. Mm hmm. 

Christian [00:03:13] So number two is talk about things that matter to your audience, not you. 

Aaron [00:03:20] And I think they could be the same. They could be the same. They could be the same. Yeah. 

Christian [00:03:24] Yeah. And that's that's part of the communication or strategy. I forget the name of the. 

Aaron [00:03:31] Content Creation Foundation. 

Christian [00:03:36] So I think it goes back to that, right, and making sure that your. What you care about is align with what your audience cares about. 

Christian [00:03:48] Your values align with, you know, your audiences values. 

Christian [00:03:53] So having that in mind will generate more engagement for you and your content. So I think this goes back to how a lot of people care about their high school friends like in their page or their Instagram, you know, just getting as many life as possible. Well, that's not the case, right? You want to make sure that the audience that you're attracting is our audience. It's that consumer base that actually aligns with your own values and your own beliefs, because the content that you post, it's going to resonate with them versus, you know, resonated with your high school buddies that you have on your Facebook. 

Aaron [00:04:34] Right. And I've seen this now. So this may be something AP depending on when you're listening to it. 

Aaron [00:04:41] I've seen this a few times on Facebook and Instagram where people are saying, hey, we're doing this follow train and it's like, hey, you go follow all these people and we'll engage with you and then you engage with us and we'll get a bunch of likes and comments and shares and stuff. That sounds amazing. You know, honestly, if we were just regular business owners like a pizza shop owners, I'd be like, oh, yes, it's great. We need more likes, comments and shares. 

Aaron [00:05:03] But what you don't realize is that now Instagram is gonna be like, hey, look, not only will they penalize you later, but more importantly, they're gonna show you that, hey, all these people who you're in part of this quote unquote pod with this group with are the only ones who engage with you. So they're going to show that content to them anyway. And then you're probably missing out on other people who were actually your target audience. So don't don't create the content for them to go engage. Like you're gonna get a real response or I guess you'll see if your content is actually good because people actually engage with it. So if you put on an amazing picture one day, you'll know that it was a good picture. And you can replicate that, because if people were like, hey, that that resonated with me versus out every time I get 50 or 100 likes and it's like there's no or a thousand likes or done matter, but that's not real engagement. So you just never know. Is any of my content good or am I just putting it out there and I just get this false sense of like security for me having these numbers, like you said that to impress people that you don't really care about. I guess I don't know. Yeah, I mean. 

Christian [00:06:06] And then we talked about this before. Like on the short term, you know, purchasing followers or, you know, having these people. Yes. We'll probably help you. But it's not a long term plan for any business to sustain that. 

Christian [00:06:20] Right. So it's important to take that into consideration. Sure. It might show that you have 10000 followers, you're starting out and blah, blah. And maybe some of them are seeing a lot of great content because they just recently like your your page and they're engaging with you. 

Christian [00:06:35] But in the long term, like those who are just going to fall off cause they're not interested in you to content. And this is going to hurt you in the long run. So definitely not recommend. 

Aaron [00:06:51] Hey, guys. So this is the perfect part in a podcast where you guys get an opportunity to take action, and that's what we want you to do. 

Aaron [00:06:58] And it's something that Christian talked about this last week on one of our tip for tip shows are live video shows, was taking action. And as you're listening to this podcast, if you're having issues or maybe you're trying to figure out a way to engage with your audience, you've been trying for years, you've been struggling with this and figure out what what does my audience really want? And we just gave you a tip. Talk about things that your audience want and you just still can't figure that out. That's where you should go. And check out our lead accelerator. This is a proven system that helps you figure out your audience, create a system and content that your audience wants and then be able to actually take you to that next level to track the results. We're going to help you create content. We're going to help you find your target market. We're gonna help you track results so that you can have consistent leads and sales in your business. It's super easy. And if you will, would like to see if you're a good fit. Just go to apply dot bitbranding dot co. Fill out the form there so you can pick a time that works for you. We'll get on like a Xoom call and then we're gonna fill out a couple of questions. You're gonna fill out a couple questions. We find out more about your business and then we'll just open the next 45 minutes talking about how you can put things in place to help you grow your business. It's free. There's no obligation. There's nothing that needs to go on with it. It's a free strategy session to help you answer these questions. If you're having trouble, you're still trying to figure out who your target audience is and how to create engaging content for them. So that's apply dot bit branding dot CO. 

Christian [00:08:25] All right, so our third tip and this goes back to, you know, if you want to get a good engagement and you're content, you're gonna have to put in the work, right? It's not. There's no easy route or avenue to generate good engagement. You just had to put in the work. And so number three is use real images and videos that evoke a response and images of videos that you have created. Not necessarily stock photography or stock graphics and things like that. So this kind of brings me back to, for example, St. Patrick's Day or Valentine's, for example. A lot of business owners, they will probably go online, find a generic graphic that says Happy St. Patrick's Day or have some Valentine's, and they just post up some ark., maybe a little bit smarter and find something funny. 

Christian [00:09:19] And they say post-up that generates some engagement that may be good, but something that will do 10 times better. It's something that you are part of. It doesn't have to be necessarily that you have to dress up as Cupid and someone's taking a picture of you. So that's real hard work, right? You had to go find an outfit. Go find someone to take a picture. I find it setting. So that's real hard work. Now. A little bit easier, it will be maybe an I mean, easier for us to Photoshop or to just put it in one of our faces or can't we? You probably didn't have to use one of our faces and just dropped that on top of baby Cupid. That's just a lot easier. It's our content, right? Because it's it's it's we're showing our faces in this. And being funny at the same time. So real images and videos of you will go. I mean, leaps and bounds do so much better than having these generic stolen from Google graphics and images. So again, we want encourage you to just take a little bit of time and just think about the next holiday that's coming up when I or know what's Mother's Day. 

Aaron [00:10:34] Father's Day right after that. 

Christian [00:10:36] Just think about something that you could do. Again, it doesn't have to be in its early image. You could be a video. I know for St. Patrick's we did a little jab of all of our faces and then anybody can do that. So again. 

Christian [00:10:50] Yeah, I mean, that's that's that's available free. So just think about it. Just be a little bit more creative on on your your content, especially when it comes to images and videos. And please, please try not to use any stock images or stock graphics that you see. 

Aaron [00:11:06] Oh yeah. I was going to say out of any event like the last thing and Christian said just reiterating it. 

Aaron [00:11:12] Is that just don't use the stock stuff. You're gonna it's gonna get better over time. So you're probably not gonna go from zero to 100, let's be honest or real here, but you can go from zero to fifty by just not using the stock images and using yourselves like we could take a pig or you could take a picture of yourself and just both wearing green and for St. Patrick's Day and say Happy St. Patrick's Day. And I promise you I will do 10 times better than the graphic you found on Google. 

Christian [00:11:39] Yeah. I was just thinking, like, if if you don't for something like that, like a major holiday, like you didn't have time to take a picture. Something that would probably do better if you type just like one or two paragraphs of something that happened that day, you were like an interesting story. 

Christian [00:11:56] Or maybe you're relating to something that's happening currently or whatever it may be, but just to honest like story would also do 10 times better than a graphic saying Happy St. Patrick's Day or something like that. 

Christian [00:12:10] But that's related to the holiday. I mean, again, leaps and bounds. It would do way better engagement than going back to those graphics. Just because you want to do a graphic and it's that particular. Yes. 

Aaron [00:12:24] Yes. Okay. No, please take it out of any of these four. Please use this one to help your audience. All right. The last one we have here is to use user generated content. If you can't so restaurants, you have a perfect opportunity. Tell people to tag you on Instagram, tell them to, you know, message you on Facebook, leave or review anything like that. It reviews using a generated content, somebody with their family who said that they're out to dinner for an anniversary. That's a good user generated content. 

Aaron [00:12:54] If you own a clothing boutique, if somebody is in their outfit and they posted like post that on your page, anything that's user generated is going to do really well because you can see how amazing you are all you want. But it does you no good if or doesn't do you as good as if somebody else was saying it. So I can tell Christian aka tell somebody else. Christian is the nicest Puerto Rican you'll ever meet. And I like what those people are nice and I like no Christian is. I promise you he is. He's nice and they're like, OK, I believe that. But if Christian goes and tells them that, it's like, okay, obviously you have your best interests at heart. So it doesn't really matter, you know? 

Aaron [00:13:35] User generated content. 

Christian [00:13:38] Is using generic content, which I mean complex, that we don't have that luxury of, you know, a lot of user generated content. Obviously, you know, sometimes you will tag us on on posts and different things like that, networking events and we can use that. But for the most part, like we don't have a lot of that. So anyways, that's the last tip right there. Use user generated content. Just to recap, number one. Ask questions. Number two. Talk about things that matter to your audience. Number three, use real images and videos. Stay away from stock. And number four, use some of your easer ordinary content because that will generate more engagement with your audience. 

Aaron [00:14:20] And actually, as Christian was saying, that if you're listening to this podcast, take a screenshot of you listening to this podcast and then go to Instagram and tag us at bitbranding and we will share that we want. Just let us know what you're thinking at this point. Yes. Hey, I was listening, guys. Take a screenshot super easy. Uploaded to Instagram stories tag us. I don't know what I'll do, but we'll do something special for you. That's a good way that we could use user generated content and also put you in front of our audience too. So I think that's something easy you could do and be beneficial for both. 

Christian [00:14:51] Yeah, good to that. 

Aaron [00:14:52] That's all. All right. Thank you guys so much for listening to another episode of The Marketing Natives. I really hope that when this comes out, we are on the backside of this pandemic, or at least on the other side of it. Over the apex. And hopefully you guys have listened to our work from home episode and helped you. And we're out there creating content in you're you know, we've somewhat gotten back to a sense of normalcy. Let's hope. I don't know. We'll see. Predicting the future here. We're looking at four or five weeks out at this point. But if not or if so, doesn't matter. Make sure that if this is your first time listening, that you subscribe to the podcast, because we come out with new episodes every single week, even if it's during a pandemic. There's new content every single week. And if you've been listening for a while and you love the podcast, you're like, Hey, or I just loved this episode. Please make sure to go to Apple podcast. Leave an honest rating and review. This helps us create better content and also helps reach more people. And it should be a better experience for you. Overall, we really appreciate it. If you do that and we'll talk to you guys next week. 

[00:15:52] The Marketing Natives podcast is a production of BitBranding.