How to Drive Engagement on Social Media and Not be Too Pushy

Arun Pillai, February 19, 2021

“Hey, Elon Musk! Need a personal assistant? You seem pretty busy.” 

This is how Upwork’s 2018 ‘Hello World’ marketing campaign started – unabashedly bold and cleverly cheeky.

At the outset, the campaign’s premise may appear like an over-the-top attempt at brand awareness, but the idea was quite simple. Upwork wanted to hyper-target prospective customers by leveraging pop culture’s nuances and iconic names.

The campaign was so well-received that the platform witnessed a 10% increase in users from Fortune 500 companies since its launch!

A robust online presence can undoubtedly boost your brand engagement in ways no other marketing channel can. To this end, a well-designed social media campaign can be your best bet.

Why? Because social media allows soft selling – a subtle approach to marketing where you try to reach the audience via non-aggressive methods instead of a direct sales pitch. Unfortunately, many brands tend to overlook this tactic or use obnoxious ways to be social online. But pushy tactics can potentially harm your business.

Don’t Be Pushy on Social Media

Understand social media engagement rests mainly on how well you connect with your audiences. Unlike traditional ad methods, this tactic demands two-way, proactive communication. Because the interaction mostly takes place on a public platform, it allows brands to build trust, credibility, and relationships with “open” sharing and customer engagement. As such, social networks are brim with possibility.

Remember, social media is as dynamic as social media users. Behind every metric (retweets, likes, followers, comments, views, etc.), there is a pattern, behavior, or routine you need to identify and tap into to drive better engagement.

So, if you’re trying to sell on social media without being pushy, simply pay attention to the questions mentioned below.

Additional Read: Knowhow of a Successful Social Media Marketing Campaign

Where to Post?

Go where your ideal audiences are socializing. Nowadays, social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter are lucrative marketing channels to engage your prospective user base effectively. Of such social networks, identify the one(s) frequented by your target demographic and create content accordingly.

The right marketing channel can fetch your business favorable engagement rates and boost brand visibility. How? As your social media efforts result in more likes, shares, views, etc., your business inquiries will grow. This boost in audience engagement will inevitably translate into more sales. And at the same time, running a social media campaign will only cost you one time. You can reach a wider audience without any budget overheads.

When to Post?

The time your ideal audience spends online on a specific social network should be the time you post on that particular network. For this, broad industry metrics can help you outline the most effective approaches, albeit to some extent.

Take, for example: on Facebook, posts made around 1 PM receive many shares, while posts made around 3 PM receive the most likes. And for the best outcomes, you should ideally create a Facebook post on a Thursday or Friday.

On the contrary, if you look at LinkedIn, posts made during business hours are most likely to be well-received. However, in the end, the quality of your content will determine how effective your campaign truly is.

What to Post?

Finally, the most vital driver of engagement on social media: content. If we study what works on social media, your content should ideally be:

• Interactive
• Easily digestible
• Provide value
• Persuasive
• Mobile-friendly
• Informative

To create top-quality, compelling content, start by identifying what your ideal customer will find relevant. There’s no point trying to sell a computer to a cat, is there?

Understand what your target demographic enjoys, the kind of services/products they buy, social networks they frequent, etc., to craft content they will readily engage with. Based on your specific industry’s content relevancy, you can use a humorous approach for your Twitter handle or a strictly professional one for your LinkedIn company profile.

A survey conducted by Sprout Social shows consumers prefer visual content on social media. As such, you can also leverage audio-video content to increase interaction with your brand online.

But, most importantly, you should include relevant CTAs in your social posts, Ads, and other icons to direct customers from the “information stage” to the “decision-making stage.” This allows them to willingly transition from being a mere social media user to a prospective business lead.

Additional Read: Best B2B CDP Platforms: Make them Work with Lead Enrichment Powered by Lake B2B

How Frequently Should You Post?

How many posts are too many or too little? When it comes to social media, there are no correct answers. Since trends in social media networks are typically dynamic, there are no hard or fast rules here.

Put simply, understand the metrics of every primary social media channel you use. For instance, Facebook is the market leader for B2B selling. Given how impactful the network is, competition is usually cut-throat.

Thus, it would be best to focus on well-crafted copies to overcome the market saturation and not so much on the post frequency.

So, instead of deliberating how often you should post on a social network, focus on the following:

• Customize content to suit your channel audience
• Choose consistent quality content over content frequency
• Keep a track of content performance
• Adopt new tactics as trends change for the best results

Over to You

Even in 2021, social media remains one of the most potent yet cost-effective marketing channels. So, naturally, having a robust social network presence will not only help you widen your outreach but also boost engagement, which will eventually translate into sales.

As such, you must become well-versed with the nuances of different social media networks to produce better quality content and market them in a non-intrusive way. Pushy tactics will be your worst enemy. Remember, social selling demands carefully crafted content and approach your ideal audiences will readily invest time in.