If you have a trusted brand and a large, loyal following on social media, you solve several problems most online businesses face: traffic, trust and customers. Almost any business model is made that much better when you have a strong social media following that wants to hear from you and engage with your brand. Imagine if you had an amazing app you were ready to launch. Now normally, you would probably have to send out press releases (while getting no responses), talk about it on Reddit (which would probably get you shadowbanned) and pay for advertising (which would cost the Earth). And by the end of it all, you might get maybe 100 downloads. Now imagine you have an audience of 500,000 followers through various social media channels. Most of those followers actively engage with your content, they look forward to your posts and they trust you. Now what happens when you mention that you've released a new app on Twitter? Suddenly, you get 1000's of downloads right away. 100's share that Tweet with their own followers and you get another 1,000 downloads. This then gives your app momentum and that puts it at the top of the Google Play Store charts. You see the difference? The problem though is getting to that point where you have so many followers, likes and shares. Here's the good news though: there is a way you can get there FAST without the expense and hassle of pay per click advertising. It's a tool that I recommend that can transform the way you gain loyal followers, get more likes and build momentum on social media. The Strategy to Get More Social Media Likes & Followers This strategy is how the big brands get big. It allows businesses to: Get more followers Become trusted online Have a presence across all social media platforms Manage their online presence easily Respond to customer queries faster Gain greater exposure online Gain more traffic to their websites The strategy I'm talking about involves a tool that I recommend to all my clients. The tool is called Hootsuite. Hootsuite is a social media management tool that was created by Ryan Holmes in 2008. What this means, is that it lets you manage your various social media accounts all from one dashboard, thereby removing a lot of the time and effort that normally goes into social media marketing. If you're currently running around the web setting up accounts and Tweeting, posting, sharing, liking and +1ing manually, then you're wasting a lot of time that could be put to better use. You can also monitor all these different streams at once and Hootsuite goes one step further and even lets you see multiple feeds for the same social media channel. So if you have two Facebook accounts – very likely if you're big on social media – then you can see both lots on this same single page. What's more is that Hootsuite also comes packed with a ton of different features that you can take advantage of to accelerate your growth, online presence and traffic to your site. For one, Hootsuite allows you to monitor what people are saying about your brand and will notify you when you get mentions. This is very useful as it means you can perform reputation management on a large scale – and Hootsuite allows you to respond directly to comments and mentions right through the dashboard. Hootsuite also allows you to have more than one user at once if you upgrade to pro, which is excellent if you are a large corporation with a massive social media empire to watch over. Then there are the countless other ways that Hootsuite helps you to save time and streamline your social media marketing process. For instance, it sends you updates via e-mail so you don't actually have to visit the site at all. At the same time, it provides a ton of apps that are available across all the major platforms so that you can manage your social media even when you're out and about. This makes a big difference and makes it that much easier to stay on top of it with interesting and useful updates. Hootsuite is the top social media management tool in the world and is used by over 20% of companies that have a social media account. Once you work out the best strategies for using this powerful tool, you'll be able to compete with the very top brands in your niche. So what is the most powerful way for businesses to get more likes and engagement on social media? How to Get an Influx of Likes, Shares & Followers on Social Media Once you have your account created (Click here to get setup for free), here are some tips on how to get the most out of social media. This is the good stuff we promised in the title: the fast track to get influx of shares, likes and follows. Tip 1: Be Everywhere One of the very best things about Hootsuite is the sheer number of different platforms it supports. This includes all the big ones such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+ (which is actually rare among these types of software) and more. At the same time, it also supports a ton of more obscure social media platforms and this gives you the opportunity to 'be everywhere' without putting in the work (because you can cross post). Why is being everywhere such a common recommendation when it comes to social media? Because it allows you to build a self-sustaining cycle to bring in more and more visitors. If you've ever set up a social media page or account, you'll likely have found that even without doing much work you still tend to get a few new likes and follows every month. So if you then have accounts on all the different social media sites and they're all connected, those follows on Twitter can lead to more follows on Facebook and those can lead to more follows on Google+. Meanwhile, the follows on Google+ might mean more likes on Facebook and more Twitter followers. This video shows how easy it is for businesses to be everywhere without the hassles usually associated with multiple social media accounts: In addition to these benefits, being all over social media gives you a chance to strengthen your brand, build followers and to add value to users across multiple platforms. Tip 2: Be Consistent Another tip is to be consistent with your message. The more you can present a single vision for your company, the more people will start to trust and recognize you and the more they will come to seek you out. Being able to manage everything from one place is a big help when it comes to being consistent this way and that's another huge benefit of using Hootsuite. Tip 3: Read the Data Anyone who has done any SEO, PPC or website optimisation will know just how important data is. Getting data and feedback regarding your performance in any given domain is what allows you to see what's working and what isn't and this in turn means you can fine tune your approach and gradually improve your systems until they're working flawlessly. Those Hootsuite e-mail reports we looked at earlier include a ton of this data that you can consume at a time convenient to you. This includes: Clicks per day Geographical information Top referrers The most popular links This means that you can see which of your posts got the most shares and where your traffic is coming from. As a result, you can then enhance your performance over time until you're like a social media ninja and each message you post gets the best possible response. Tip 4: Stay in the Know If you saw the film The Watchmen then you may remember a scene where Ozymandias is watching a plethora of TV screens all at once so he can stay updated with all the news and all the latest events? Well that's a little bit like Hootsuite – as you can see feeds from across social networks and even use the 'suggested content' feature to see content that is appropriate for your niche. And all you have to do from there is then to reshare or retweet that suggested content – all from the same dashboard – this points your best foot forward to get a ton of likes and shares for all your social media accounts, particular Facebook and Twitter. Note how the 'suggested content' feature is similar to the offering you get from BuzzSumo. This is something you'll see a fair bit – Hootsuite actually makes a lot of other social media tools obsolete and puts them all in one place for you. Tip 5: Schedule Another tool that has become somewhat obsolete thanks to Hootsuite is Buffer. Buffer is a web app that lets you write a ton of Tweets of Facebook posts and then stagger them so that they'll be posted at specific times during the day. That's all good and well but seeing as Hootsuite now has a schedule function too, there's really no need to set up another account. Here's how to easily set up and schedule your account: Click here to set up your account now. Scheduling is a must have feature for most business that want to save time and avoid those awkward silences you sometimes get on social media. Being away from your social media account even for a couple of weeks is enough to make your followers wonder if your business is still running and it doesn't look very professional. In fact, it's better to have no social media than to have an account that's practically a ghost town. What you should be doing then, is to set aside a few hours every now and then, write a ton of posts, and then just let Hootsuite post them for you over time. Tip 6: Engage That said, you shouldn't completely rest on your laurels. While using scheduled posts is a great way to keep your accounts looking active, what's also important is that you respond to your followers and that you engage with their content. Again, Hootsuite makes this easier by letting you do this across every type of account all in one place. The more you answer back, the more your followers will feel as though they know you. And when they feel as though they know you, they'll be much more likely to want to share your posts, to like them and to engage on future pictures. And remember, when people discuss images, they show up in other feeds. Tip 7: Go Multimedia This is similar to the earlier point about 'being everywhere' but to reiterate and reinforce that point: you should also go cross-media. In other words, you should also be on Instagram so that you can impress people with amazing images and you should be on YouTube where your videos can engage viewers in a far more profound way. Again, Hootsuite makes this possible – even supporting YouTube Analytics. Tip 8: Carry it With You The best way to use social media is to have it ready to go on your phone so that you can pull it out whenever you have a thought related to your brand or you want to snap a picture. Combined with scheduling, this is what will really keep your account alive. If you wait until you're 'at the desk' to post, you'll find inspiration doesn't come. The kind of updates people like to hear are those that come naturally and that offer insight and information into your brand and lifestyle. Tip 9: Try Some Influencer Marketing Not convinced these tips can explode your shares, likes and follows? Then it's time to up your game with influencer marketing, which I talked in more detail here. Influencer marketing basically means reaching out to the other social media users who have large audiences so that they might retweet you or reshare and thus introduce you to their significant audience. Imagine for instance if you could get Tony Robbins to like one of your posts! This is made all the more possible with Hootsuite because it lets you filter comments by Klout score. That way, you can engage directly with the most powerful and valuable followers you already have! Tip 10: Use Geosearch One more amazing tip – try using Geosearch. This lets you see what people saying in specific regions which is an amazing tool for local businesses, allowing you to connect with users in your area. And really the list goes on! This little selection of tips and strategies should be more than enough to help you see your growth explode on social media. Click here to see more ways to improve your social media presence. While the sheer quantity of social media platforms can be exhausting to follow, having one central place to engage will enable you to build trust and increase loyal followers faster than ever before.
