What is the Secret of Social Media Engagement? The Answer May Surprise You!

Honestly, I don’t think clickbait titles (yes, like the one of this article) work that well anymore. At least, not at the few-thousand-followers level I am at. I suspect the rules are different both for people with fewer than 500 followers, and those with 100,000 or more.

In my experience, the secret to getting people to engage with you on social media (which is not the same as monetizing them, or getting them to respond to call to action, though it an be an element of those things) is twofold.

First, offer more content than requests or pitches. That makes people think of your primarily as a source, rather than an ad.

Second, when you want a high level of engagement, post something that both invites response, and that causes those responses to be more content. But that isn’t too difficult.

For example: “Change one word in a movie title to ‘fart.”

Yes, it’s juvenile. So, try to make your engagement posts on-brand. But a TON of people will happily post “Fart Wars!” and “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Fart!” and be amused.

That means people are reading, and liking, and posting, and then the social media platform is more likely to show it to other people, and THEY will engage, and…

Experiment with what your audience likes, and do more of those. But not too often.

Then, try to monetize your followers separately, with things like:

ENJOYED THIS? BACK MY PATREON!

About Owen K.C. Stephens

Owen K.C. Stephens Owen Kirker Clifford Stephens is a full-time ttRPG Writer, designer, developer, publisher, and consultant. He's the publisher for Rogue Genius Games, and has served as the Starfinder Design Lead for Paizo Publishing, the Freeport and Pathfinder RPG developer for Green Ronin, a developer for Rite Publishing, and the Editor-in-Chief for Evil Genius Games. Owen has written game material for numerous other companies, including Wizards of the Coast, Kobold Press, White Wolf, Steve Jackson Games and Upper Deck. He also consults, freelances, and in the off season, sleeps. He has a Pateon which supports his online work. You can find it at https://www.patreon.com/OwenKCStephens

Posted on March 29, 2019, in Business of Games, Musings and tagged , , , . Bookmark the permalink. Leave a comment.

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