With all the talk about paid advertising on social media, it can be easy to overlook organic content as a legitimate marketing strategy. However, organic content can go a long way to increase brand relevance, build relationships with your audience, and encourage followers to share your business with others—especially on Instagram and Snapchat.
The challenge, of course, is creating content that actually attracts people to you. The biggest benefit of paid advertising is that it gets your content in front of people almost immediately with minimal effort. The downside is that it’s all pay to play. And as soon as the money stops, your content generally disappears.
With organic content, you don’t have to actually spend any money, but you do have to earn the reach and engagement. To do that, you have to create content that compels the user to act. And it’s honestly no walk in the park. Like anything else when it comes to marketing, you need a solid organic strategy built around the available user data. Who actually follows you? Do their demographics line up with your target audience? What do they respond to? How do they behave online? What technology are they using?
These are things that are going to be specific to each business. But there are some general steps you can take to create more compelling organic content and bring people to you.
1: Make Sure You’re Sending The Right Message
Your organic content should focus less on selling your product or service and more on selling your brand. With that in mind, anything you post needs to be targeted, relevant, and personalized to the people who are viewing it. Make use of current trends, topics, and news. Show your audience that you’re in tune with their lifestyle and interests, not just their buying habits.
2: Make Use Of Hashtags And Emojis
Hashtags are still a great way to bring attention to your content on Instagram and you should utilize them in every post—so long as they’re relevant to your content.
Interestingly enough, emjois have also become a great way to accent your organic content. They’re visual, so they automatically catch our attention. Not to mention, they’ve become extremely popular and are frequently used in all forms of online content.
3: Use Posts and Stories Differently
With the ability to essentially post in two different capacities on Instagram, you can use both stories and posts to boost your brand from two different directions.
Let posts be your “front of the house” strategy. Focus on the presentation and personalization of your message. Stories are your “back of the house” strategy. You can use this option to give followers a look behind the scenes (ex: people at work, office events/outings, etc), which provides a necessary human element to your business.
4: Engage for Engagement
Engagement is a two-way street, which means it’s not enough to just create great content. You have to engage with other users’ content as well. Showing attention to followers (as well as those you follow) increases brand awareness and authenticity. It also encourages people to return the favor.
Aside from posting, you should spend time every day liking, commenting, sharing, and cross promoting other users content.
Bonus Snapchat Tip
Gaining new followers on Snapchat can be a challenge. So to encourage more people to connect with you, customize your snapcode and promote it in as many areas as possible.
- Make it your Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram profile pic
- Use it as a signature at the end of blogs and emails
- Print it on business card, push cards, or other printed materials.
For the full presentation on building a strong organic content strategy, just follow this link.
