You've already been monitoring conversations on social media and contributing where you had something to add. Now it's time to start growing the number of people paying attention to you.

1. Consistently Add Fresh Content to Social Profiles

Social media doesn’t have to be a time consuming endeavor, but you should make sure that you have fresh content on your site to hold people’s attention. Use HubSpot's social media tool to auto-publish your blog posts to your social media profiles (Settings > Social Media Settings).





You can also post a new update about anything you'd like from the social media publishing tool. Click here to learn how to use the social media publishing tool.




Use HubSpot’s social media prospects tool to keep tabs on relevant social media conversations. This way when you’re having your morning coffee, you can scan your feed of conversations and interact with 2-3 posts. (Social Media > Social Prospects).




This way, even if you didn’t have time to create a new blog post, or post a new video to YouTube, you’ve at least contributed something valuable to your social media profiles for that day.  

2. Don't be Overly Self-Promotional

If you’re only sharing self-promotional content on your social media profiles, people aren’t going to want to follow you. People will want to follow you because they think your updates are interesting. “Interesting updates” doesn’t just includes your latest product releases or discount offerings. They include breaking industry news, insightful or instructional blog posts, humorous videos, etc. You have the opportunity to create this type of content by having a company blog.  You should also share blog entries published on other relevant blogs.  Doing so shows you’re a participant in a bigger community and a greater authority!

3. Develop a Personality Worth Following

How often do you follow someone on Twitter whose profile avatar doesn’t include an image of a person? I’d bet not often. Social media sites are just that: social! People want to connect with other people, not just brand logos and stuffy corporate updates. If you create a voice that people can identify with people will be more likely to pay attention to you. If you're a bigger company, select someone like a CEO or Marketing Director/Specialist/Guru to be the representative of your brand. Remember: people want to connect with other people.

4. Have a Two-Way Conversation with Your Audience

In addition to sharing interesting content, you should also make sure to interact with others in social media. This can include replying or retweeting people on Twitter, commenting on a post someone writes on your Facebook wall, or answering a question in LinkedIn Answers. People want to be heard, and you can make potential customers happy by showing that you’re listening.

5. Focus on the Most Relevant Social Networks

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Flickr, SlideShare, Vimeo, Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit, Delicious… seems pretty overwhelming, right? The truth is, you don’t need to have a presence on every social media site out there. Focus on the sites that are more relevant to your business. If you’re a tech B2B company, perhaps focus your efforts on LinkedIn, Twitter, and SlideShare. If you’re a consumer B2C company, you may find Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube a better fit. Or try all of them for a couple months, and only continue using the sites that bring in the most traffic/leads.

6. Promote your Social Media Channels on Your Website

You can set up your social media channels, publish a few updates, and cross your fingers and hope to get found, but you’ll probably get very few followers that way. You website is a great place to start promoting your social media channels because visitors to your website are likely already interested in what you have to offer, and would be more inclined to follow your social media presence. The viral nature of these sites will allow their friends to see their interactions with your company, potentially leading to even more followers.

Struggling with your social media strategy? Contact a HubSpot Service Marketplace Provider to help or download a Social Media App in our App Marketplace.