Sup-Par Social Practices that Don’t Really Work

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There are many social media “gurus” who advise gaining followers and engagement through practices that, while they may increase your stats, are not going to help your bottom line. I’ve seen these tactics used by brands I am positive are spending far too much money for this nonsense, and it always surprises me.

These tactics include the “Like if you …, share if you…” posts, which for reasons beyond real explanation, attract a lot of engagement. The problem is that the engagement isn’t really interaction with your brand, and is only gaining traction from people who most likely aren’t even looking at your page. Post interesting, beautiful, or entertaining content and your true fans will be happy to share. It may take more time to bulk up your numbers, but the numbers don’t matter if they aren’t

If it looks like part of your kids’ second grade homework, it’s definitely fallen into the gimmick waters. Word scrambles, fill in the letter, and especially fill in the blank posts may (oddly) get a lot of comments, but tend to be full of sarcastic answers or crass remarks. Your insights numbers may be going up, but this isn’t profitable engagement.

Bottom line: will these posts gain you followers or engagement? Will they give you “numbers” you can use to prove that you are growing an online presence for your brand? Sure. But these numbers don’t mean anything – it’s the people behind them who matter. You’re looking for quality over quantity. A lot of folks claim that engagement amounts to quality, but that’s only the case when users are engaging with your brand in a positive way. Quality comes from honest engagement, and that takes time.