How to build a social media following (who’ll buy what you’re selling)

At Oh My Digital, we’re ALWAYS banging on about how followers and likes don’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. And we stand by that, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not still important – especially when you’re running a business.

Why? Well, put simply, followers give self-employed business owners the opportunity to make a sale.  

They also help to build networks, which gives business owners more people to chat to and connect with.  

So, if you’re interested in hearing how we, as a new business, built our social media following from zero to 10k – and want some tips so you can do the same – then buckle up and read on. 

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‍Keep it real 

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When we started sharing stories about our past struggles, how we overcame them, and also our triumphs, we noticed an instant uplift in engagement. This resulted in an influx of followers. 

Here’s a sneak peek as to how we did it: 

• we allowed our personalities to be seen by showing our faces in Instagram stories and jumped in to give our opinion on trending topics and the latest news
• we celebrated client and biz wins and milestones
• we shared fun facts about ourselves and allowed our followers to connect by establishing similarities.

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‍Provide value, inspiration and entertainment ‍

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You’ve probably heard this 1,000 times before but that’s because it’s true! We’re continually tweaking how we provide value, inspiration and entertainment. However, we never veer too far away from this list: 

• we post at least 1 x tip or trick a week (it has to be actionable or super helpful)
• we post at least 1 x inspirational quote a week (we aim to empower and motivate women in biz.)
• we post at least 1 x entertaining post or quote a week (because it encourages sharing amongst a wider network + nobody likes boring content)

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‍Engagement is key 

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We spend AT LEAST 30 mins a day engaging with our followers. So what does “engaging with our followers” even mean? Well for us, it looks a little like this:

• ​replying to EVERY comment on our posts (except the emoji’s – soz guys) with a 3-word response minimum
• replying to EVERY DM
• commenting on our follower’s posts with positive or insightful feedback or reinforcement comments
• replying to stories that we think are HILARIOUS or super insightful
• sharing followers posts to our stories that we think are super valuable (or so funny we know we need everyone to see it)
• finding new followers that fit our ideal customer to follow, and leaving them with a little positive comment from us
• following back accounts that are relevant to our ideal customer
• cheering on our fave biz accounts

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‍We love collaboration 

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We’ve been lucky enough to get involved with some amazing biz babes (Clare Wood we’re looking at you) who have featured us on their websites or had us feature on their socials to chat about all things social media. This has been BRILLIANT exposure, and we highly recommend everyone does it. 

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‍Group participation ‍

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We’re part of a lot of amazing groups like LMBDW where we have had the opportunity to share our socials, blogs and biz. This has been a FANTASTIC way to meet other like-minded biz owners and expand our reach to new potential opportunities. If you’re not already in groups like this, we could not recommend jumping on that ship highly enough.

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‍Using relevant hashtags ‍

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We’re big believers in using all 30 hashtags (because you can right, so why not use them all?) and using highly relevant ones. We recently did a big audit of our hashtags and we’re now only using the most relevant, sectioned into specific groups for the content that we post, that will appeal to the audience that the content is about. It has worked WONDERS in attracting the right audience (instead of the spammy kind).

So, there you have it. A bunch of tips and strategies around how we grew our following (without bots!) with a lot of love and a solid community behind us.

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