Quick Tips On How To Increase Online User Engagement

Vikram Kumar Jun 02, 2020

The web comprises websites, social media accounts (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and others), blogs, e-mailers, online forums and other digital channels where one has a digital presence and reach out to one's followers, subscribers or customers. The beauty of web presence is that it lends brand visibility, recognition and credibility to your organization. The effectiveness of one's web presence is driven by two key factors:

Show up on the web – actively and consistently post content every day or at least a few times a week.
Indulge the audience – speak, listen and respond to the audience

Now, audience engagement is more challenging than showing up. The reason is simple – showing up is one-way communication while engagement is a two-way relationship. It is comparatively easier to control what you want to write, when to schedule and when to publish content. But, when it comes to engaging the audience, you need to build and maintain the constant interest of the audience so that they like, share and comment on your content and at the same time, you have to be quick enough to start conversations, seek feedback and give responses to every comment.

Let’s take a look at a few tips and tricks that any organization can leverage to increase audience indulgence or engagement on the web.

Share Blogs/Articles

One can publish own blogs, articles, white papers and case studies on your official or affiliate website and share them on your social media accounts and other online channels. It is also a good idea to source and share external content related to the latest trends and news as long as it is relevant to your industry, brand and target audience.

Ask Questions

When you publish any content on social media, caption it with questions which urge the audience to respond, express their opinions or give their feedback.

It could be a simple question such as ‘what do you think’, ‘what will you do in this situation’, ‘what is your favourite food/movie/hobby’, ‘which was your favourite subject in college’, etc.

One can even ask questions through the fill in the blanks. For example, ________ always makes me smile, my favourite holiday memory is_________, etc.

Create Polls and Surveys

Polls and surveys are quite popular tricks to engage the audience and learn about their personality and preferences. An online quiz is also a good option. The questions of polls and surveys should be such that they easily allow people to vote ‘yes and no’ or select from short-worded multiple answers.

For example, the question ‘what is the most important parameter you look for in a college’ can be followed by choices such as a) reputation b) faculty c) curriculum d) placements

Post Powerful Visual Content

A picture is worth a thousand words and a video is worth 1.8 million words. Statistics highlight that social media posts which include images produce 650 per cent higher engagement than text-only posts while posts with videos attract 3 folds more links than text-only posts. The takeaway from these statistics is that visuals increase brand association, awareness, engagement and retention. So, make sure to include high-quality, original (preferably) and vibrant visuals such as images, videos, infographics, GIFs, illustrations, emojis, etc in your content.

Go Live sessions on Facebook and Instagram also fall under visual content.

Host Contests and Giveaways

One can run contests on Facebook and Instagram and give away prizes in the form of goodies, discount offers, freebies, sponsored holidays, incentives, vouchers, coupons, etc. Contests and giveaways are a great form of user-generated content and lead generation. Just ensure that the contest runs only for a limited period or else the audience will lose interest.

Add a Call to Action Caption

Whenever one put up a post, he/she make sure to add a call to action caption asking users to comment, like, share, buy or subscribe. This will prompt users to take the action you want.

Now that you know the tips and tricks to increase audience engagement, it is also equally important to measure their effectiveness. This can be done by posting SEO-rich content based on extensive keyword research so that it optimizes your web page ranking in search engines. One should also leverage web analytics tools that give detailed insight into the behaviour of your visitors in terms of how much time they are spending on your webpage, whether they click on your content to share further, how your content is performing on different digital platforms etc.