How to grow your social media followers

By Elyssa Curet

In 2021, growing social media followers requires a different strategy that emphasizes authentic engagement with your community. Instead of paying for followers, or following and unfollowing users to grow your account, individuals and brands can find success by cultivating interactions within their niche. This leads to organic engagements from real, active users, and promotes continual social media growth. If you’re interested in growing your social media followers, these tips will help. 

1. Find a niche.

While any account can gain followers by posting quality content, it is much easier to operate an account that clearly communicates your niche: a specific topic, hobby, or interest that you are particularly passionate and knowledgeable about. Especially if you have a newer account, specificity can be your best friend. For example, if you are into fitness, instead of just creating content about fitness, you can make posts and videos detailing in-home workouts that don’t require gym equipment. Similarly, if your passion is makeup, consider choosing a specific kind of makeup to review or market. That way, even if your account is not known for being the premier voice on a general topic, you can be known as the expert on a narrower, but still relevant one.

2. Identify trends.

In the age of TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, trends come and go quickly, but can reach extreme levels of popularity and virality. As a user looking to grow your social media followers, it is important to identify which trends are currently popular, and which challenges are likely to become popular. Whether it be a dance challenge or a popular meme, consider adding your own voice, humor, or moves to it. Since many users will be looking at the trend, there is a good chance they will find your content. 

3. Tap into your current network.

Did you know that many viral posts on social media become popular, not because a large number of people see the original post, but because it is strategically shared? When producing content for your social media, don’t do it alone. Asking friends—especially those with large audiences—to share your posts allows you to use their network to promote your content, and can drastically increase the number of potential users who see your posts. Make sure it’s something that they’ll want to share, meaning that it fits their brand and/or interests. If you don’t know someone who can share your content effectively, don’t be afraid to reach out to people in your niche or field whom you respect and admire. It’s always possible that a well-known or famous account with many followers will share your content, which can drive extremely high amounts of traffic to your account.

4. Encourage users to follow you.

Finally, when growing your social media following, it’s okay to ask users to follow you. After making a popular post, feel free to suggest that users consider following you for similar content. Or, add to the end of a video or post that if viewers liked what they saw, that you will be posting more in the future. The key is to be polite instead of pushy, and sincere instead of forceful. By cultivating an authentic, personable environment for your would-be followers, you might find that it’s not difficult to ask for their continued engagement.

These tips may not make your social media followers skyrocket overnight, but they will more than likely help with consistent growth and gain you high-quality followers who engage with your content simply because they enjoy doing so. 

Discover more about Adolescent services here