How To Create Engaging Social Media Content: Our Best Tips

To succeed on social media platforms like Instagram, it’s not enough for people to see your posts. Your target audience should also love your content so much that they interact with it through likes, comments, and shares. For that to happen, every influencer or brand owner must know how to create engaging social media content.

A lot of thought and research goes into churning out engaging, relevant content on Instagram. You need to know what excites your followers and what will spark conversation with them. That way, they’ll feel like they’re part of a real community. Once you nail how to engage them with your social media posts, it’s easier to build a relationship with them. And in the long run, they’ll become loyal fans and customers.

Are you ready to learn how to produce engaging posts that will catch your followers’ attention? Keep scrolling to discover the best ways to get them to like and comment on your posts!

Why You Should Add Engagement Techniques to Your Social Media Marketing Strategy

Many brands on Instagram put all their attention on expanding their reach. And it’s super understandable. People need to see the social media marketing strategy you worked so hard on translating into relevant posts. It’s awesome for boosting visibility and brand awareness.

However, that’s not the only purpose of Instagram as a social media platform. Using the platform to connect with your audience and strengthen your relationship with them is just as important.

Having plenty of product-centric, brand-focused posts on your content calendar is good. But you can’t forget about engagement-driving posts that allow you to interact and converse with your followers. This is key if you want to create a community within your page.

Posts that drive engagement are those that encourage others to participate in your efforts. Whether that means liking posts, commenting on their thoughts, voting on polls, and more, it’s a way to empower your followers. It makes them feel heard and valued, consequently deepening your connection with them as a brand.

Some might think that engaging fans on Instagram is only applicable to influencers and internet personalities. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth. This kind of social media strategy is particularly important for businesses looking to drive repeat purchases. Engaging your followers boosts customer loyalty, which can potentially lead to more conversions and sales.

What Is an Engagement Rate?

When assessing engagement metrics on Instagram posts, most users just look at how many likes or comments they’ve gotten. However, this is an unreliable way to look at how well your post is performing.

Look at it like this—200 likes might sound like a lot. But if you have over 500,000 followers, it’s nothing but peanuts. On the flip side, ten comments on a post can be relatively low. But if you only have ten followers, every single person who saw your post left a comment. And that’s really good!

As you can see, it’s difficult to gauge a post’s success by looking only at the absolute number of interactions. So, instead of just looking at how many likes or comments you’ve garnered on posts, check your engagement rate. This metric measures how engaging your post is against your number of followers. That way, you get an idea of how many of your fans are actually engaging with your content.

Here’s how to compute your post’s engagement rate. Get the total number of interactions you garnered from a post. Then, simply divide it by the number of followers you have. Multiply the result by 100, and you will have the engagement rate for that piece of content. The higher the rate, the more compelling and engaging your post is.

For example, say you’re a small-scale influencer with 6,000 followers. You publish a post that got 450 likes and 80 comments. That means your post has an engagement rate of 8.83%. This is quite high, as according to Later, the average rate on Instagram is around 2.88%. That means your content was super relevant and gained tons of traction and interaction from others.

Why Is Getting High Engagement Scores Important on IG?

Getting high engagement is a must for brands that want to connect with their target audience—we’ve covered that much. But that’s not the only benefit of having stellar engagement on Instagram. It also allows you to reach more people.

The Instagram algorithm considers the engagement rate of each post to determine whether it should push it out more. That means the more engagement a post gets, the more likely it gets pushed to the top of the feed. As a result, more users see it, boosting brand visibility and awareness.

And it doesn’t stop there. The most well-performing Instagram posts are also ranked high on the Explore page. If the algorithm suggests your post there, even more people (even those who don’t follow you) will see it.

In a nutshell—more engagement means more visibility for your post. So, if your objective is to expand your reach, audience engagement posts are an awesome tactic to meet that goal.

7 Social Media Content Tips for Boosting Audience Engagement

But how exactly do you create engaging content for social media? What’s the secret to getting your target audience to interact with your brand on Instagram?

We’ve got all the tea for you. Here are some social media content tips and audience engagement strategies you might want to incorporate into your content calendar.

1. Create Stunning Visual Content That Resonates With Your Followers

The easiest, most low-maintenance way to boost engagement is to create aesthetically pleasing visual content that wows your followers consistently. Use high-quality images and clips in your posts. Play around with aesthetic styles and bold colors on your feed. Be as creative as you want in your content to grab people’s attention.

Sure, you may not be encouraging them directly to like or comment on your post. But stunning, interesting, relevant content that looks awesome will speak for itself. If you create beautiful visuals regularly, you’re bound to get tons of likes and comments of admiration.

Of course, it’s not just about how your content looks. It’s also about what you’re saying in your posts. It has to tell an interesting story about you or your business. The visuals are the hook, but your post’s key message is what will drive even more traction and engagement.

2. Experiment With Carousel Posts Instead of Single Images

According to Viralyft, carousel posts drive higher engagement than single images. Regular feed posts have an average engagement score of around 0.59%. Meanwhile, that of carousels sits over two times that average at a whopping 1.26%.

Posting one image at a time might be faster and more convenient. But if you want to boost audience engagement on your page, curating carousels with multiple images may be better.

There are many ways to go about posting a carousel on Instagram. Businesses would do well to publish carousels highlighting multiple products to make their posts more hardworking. Influencers, on the other hand, can experiment with photo dumps to share more of their life with their fans.

Remember to tell a story through the photos you share on your carousel. This makes people feel invested in your post, enticing them to swipe all the way to the last picture.

3. Pose Thought-Provoking Questions in Your Captions

Can’t seem to get your followers to comment on your posts? Take matters into your own hands and ask them a question straight up. Pose a question in your caption, whether it’s a simple one about your products or a thought-provoking query about life.

Asking your followers a question helps spark conversation within your post. Not only does it boost your post engagement, but you also get to hear from your fans and customers. It’s a terrific, strategic way to get insights into how they think and what they like about your content. Then, you can use their thoughts to shape your future posts or improve your business’s products.

Plus, when people think about their answers to your questions, it increases their dwell time on your post. This may signal to the Instagram algorithm that your post is interesting and relevant, boosting your ranking on the feed.

4. Encourage Happy Customers To Create User-Generated Content Featuring Your Brand

Engagement isn’t just about other people liking and commenting on your posts. It’s also about them publishing their content and tagging you in them. So, it’s a terrific idea to encourage user-generated content among your fans and customers.

Someone posting user-generated content featuring your brand is the ultimate sign that you have a strong relationship with them. It’s spontaneous, authentic, and organic. That means someone loves your brand so much that they went out of their way to post about it.

Invite people to post user-generated content showcasing your products through one of your posts’ captions. Then, incentivize them for these posts. Give them discount codes, exclusive vouchers, or a shoutout for every post they make. This fosters a sense of community among your fans and makes them feel valued and appreciated.

5. Partner Up With a Popular Influencer in Your Industry

Collaborate with an influencer. Your target audience loves to be excited and enticed to interact with your posts. Create content that features this creator, whether it’s a takeover on Instagram Stories or a fun, collaborative Reel. Then, ask that influencer to share it to their profile for their audience to see. A significant uptick in engagement for influencer posts like this is almost guaranteed, thanks to their loyal fans!

6. Make Funny, Shareable Video Content

Most people come up with all sorts of ways to drive likes and comments on their posts to boost engagement. However, they forget that sharing posts is another way users interact with their content. So, try to make your posts as relatable as possible to encourage people to share them with others.

One easy way to do this is by coming out with funny short-form video content. Reels are all the rage on the platform today. Users scroll endlessly on the Reels tab, looking for funny, relevant, authentic videos. Then, they share content they love with their friends through DM or on their Stories. This counts towards the Reel’s total engagement.

Experiment with all sorts of fun, innovative storytelling techniques and inject some humor and relatability into them. If it fits your brand personality, post hilarious skits and silly memes that your followers will find relatable. This is a surefire way to get more shares than your typical posts!

7. Add Interactive Stickers to Your Instagram Stories

Do you love talking to your followers through Instagram Stories? Give them a way to interact with you, too. How? You can do this by utilizing the many interactive stickers on Stories, of course!

Engagement is a two-way street. It can’t just be you yapping about on Stories. Stickers like polls, Q&A, emoji sliders, and more are fantastic ways to give your followers a voice. With these stickers, they can talk to you, ask burning questions, and even give feedback about your brand. The fact that it boosts your engagement metrics on Stories is just the cherry on top!

And That’s How To Create Engaging Social Media Content!

Creating content for social media to boost engagement isn’t an easy feat. There are tons you have to remember while conceptualizing and producing engaging social content. You need to ask the right questions, experiment with different types of content formats, and encourage community participation.

But trust us when we say that your efforts won’t be in vain. By keeping all the tips in this blog post in mind, you can build a strong relationship with your followers. Your customers and fans will feel a special affinity towards your brand, boosting long-term loyalty.

Now that you know how to create engaging social media content, strategize how to ensure that people see it. One way to ascertain that your posts reach your target market is by working with Path Social.

Our team uses AI-driven systems to find your niche target audience and push out your content to their feeds. With more eyes on your Instagram posts, you’ll garner tons of likes and comments. But that’s not all; this level of exposure to your target audience also helps increase your following. Soon, you’ll have a significantly bigger and more engaged community. Try our services today to gain followers fast!