You may have noticed that your posts on social platforms have been receiving lower consumer responses over the years. Nearly every social media platform hosts an algorithm that determines the order in which posts are presented. This algorithm is determined when looking at consumers’ patterns and behaviors on their social platforms. This can sometimes feel like a roadblock for media creators wanting to reach as broad of an audience as possible. In 2020 there will be an even higher determining factor to the content-based algorithm; the content’s engagement.

Engagement in your post comes from natural, not forced or baited communication between the creator and the consumer. The number of comments, views and streaming audience (live feed) are all determiners of how much engagement your post generates. In the past, authoritative accounts were the ones with the highest number of followers and likes. That is no longer the case due to creator accounts purchasing those two factors, creating the look of popularity while having very low engagement.

Ways to boost engagement on your posts can be as simple as changing the length of a post, switching your content more heavy on the video side opposed to still images, tagging other brands in your posts and asking questions that would solicit a response from your audience. Lower text verbiage is more likely to create consumer response. It keeps them interested in your post long enough to enjoy, but not too long to where they face boredom. Tagging other accounts will create a type of invitation of that account’s followers to visit your account, this should only be done if your post is suggesting or mentioning another product.

When creating two-sided communication you want to stray away from engagement baiting, where an account will post, “like and share this post if you’re ready for spring!”. Instead of baiting engagement, you should focus more on creating questions that would solicit a natural response from your audience. This will raise the engagement in the comments section of your post, especially when you, the creator, can reply to each comment.

Why is engagement so important? High engagement is very attractive to algorithms across all social media platforms. Algorithms will reward high engagement accounts in sort of a snowball effect. The more engagement you have on your content the higher and more frequently your content will appear on consumers’ social feed.