How to Get More Followers on Social Media

(Without buying them or annoying the heck out of

people.)

What we’ll cover today

● 7 steps to growing your social accounts● Some things you DON’T want to do

○ (i.e. surefire ways to annoy people)

● Super secret hacks for Twitter and Facebook

Be social on social from Day 1

● Don’t use the “But I have no followers” excuse

Social media is like a snowball - it won’t get bigger if you don’t start rolling.

Trick out your profiles

● Make sure people can easily see who you are/what you’re about

● Include links to your site and/or other social profiles

● Use a picture of yourself for your profile pic○ Let people know you’re human!

● Create eye-catching header images

Trick out your profiles

Trick out your profiles

Trick out your profiles

Super secret tip:

Use pinned tweets to highlight a great post, your about page, or an offer.

Trick out your profiles● Super secret tip: Use pinned tweets!

Trick out your profiles● Super secret tip: Use Canva for your images!

Send traffic to your new accounts

● Mention your accounts in new blog posts● Make sure people can easily find your social

profiles on your website

Send traffic to your new accounts

● Cross promote

● Consider doing some guest posting/interviews○ Reach out to already-established sites in your industry

Share killer content

● Focus more on providing value to your followers than promoting yourself

● Post updates that will help you get shares and engagement○ Visual tweets

○ OPC / content you see getting great engagement elsewhere

Share killer content

Share killer content

Follow others

● Start with people you already like● Follow others in your industry● Follow people using hashtags you use, too● See who the big shots are following

○ Follow the people who follow them, too

Follow others

Be active and get engaged

● You know, actually BE SOCIAL on social media○ Tweet to others in your industry○ Comment on other Facebook pages○ Get involved in Twitter chats

tweetreports.com/twitter-chat-schedule/

twubs.com/twitter-chats

Be active and get engaged

● Thank people personally for shares/mentions

Be patient and consistent

Remember:

It’s a marathon, not a sprint!

Things you DON’T want to do

● Beg people to share/RT/follow you● Post links where you shouldn’t be posting them

○ i.e. whenever they are unsolicited

OK Not OK

Things you DON’T want to do

● Play the follow/unfollow “game”○ What is it?

■ Blindly following as many people as possible and then unfollowing them if they don’t follow you back

● (And then sometimes re-following and unfollowing the same

people over and over)

Things you DON’T want to do

● Play the follow/unfollow “game”○ Why not?

■ Engagement matters more than the number of followers you have

● The followers you get from “the game” may not be relevant, and

therefore your engagement will reflect this

■ People can tell when you’re playing “the game”

Making following people part of your overall

social media strategy is FINE.

But only when your “follow tactics” are targeted, and you’re being thoughtful about who you’re

following.

Automatic messages: Do or Don’t?Pros:

● People who use them say they DO work

● It’s an easy way to cross-promote your accounts

Cons: ● They are clearly automated - and

therefore extra impersonal● You can alienate parts of your

audience who hate auto-DMs● People WILL un-follow you

Automatic messages: Do or Don’t?

As of 2014, auto-DMs were the #1 reason given by Twitter users for unfollowing someone.

Super secret tip: Twitter

Embrace Twitter lists!

● Search Google for them● Use an IFTTT recipe to add people to lists

○ (Like people who use a certain hashtag)

Super secret tip: Facebook

You can invite strangers to like your Page!

● How do you find them? ○ When they like a photo/link/status of yours that they see

a friend of theirs liking or sharing

● Why would you want to do this?○ Because they’ve already liked your content! So, chances

are, they would be interested in more.

Super secret tip: Facebook

Discussion time!

1. What are some ways YOU have tried to grow your social following? What worked? What didn’t?

2. Are you going to try something you haven’t tried before thanks to this webinar?