When I started, I wasn’t getting engagement on social media. I was frustrated with my audience because they weren’t responding to my message. There was no one responding to my posts never mind filling my inbox with requests for my services that I expected them to. Why? Because I was giving my audience what I “knew” they needed, not what they wanted.
That’s Not How Engagement Works
You have to make people want to be in your audience. Ask what your audience needs and address it. Don’t ever make assumptions about what your audience wants. You will waste your time creating content that doesn’t build engagement if nobody cares. I don’t want you to waste that time. I want you to be able to create content right away that invites engagement.
Use my 3-step framework to create an engaged audience.
- Do Your Market Research – I’m probably not the first person to tell you this but EVERYONE skips this step, and it’s always disastrous. I’m speaking from experience. I skipped this step and wasted a lot of time and energy. Ask your audience what they are struggling with, why and how they see your product or service fitting into their struggle.
- Deliver Content – This is the part where you show up. Don’t get the info, and fall off the face of the earth. Create content around all of those elements that your ideal client needs help with. Show them how you understand their needs and are there to help. Market research doesn’t do you any good at all if you don’t use it to create great content.Don’t be afraid of trial and error in the beginning. Just make sure you are paying attention to your trial and error so that you are doing it in a strategic way instead of spray and pray. Pay attention to what works and what doesn’t and build on that.
- Tell A Success Story – Now that your content is speaking directly to your audience’s problems show how you are solving them. Tell a client story about how you took someone from A to Z. Talk about the before and the after to show that you are actually solving these problems you claim to know so much about.
Now the grunt work starts. You have to do this AGAIN and AGAIN and AGAIN to build an engaged audience that buys from you regularly. You have to continue to do market research and pivot your content as your audience grows and changes. You have to show up consistently and show your audience that it’s safe to engage and fun to engage with you.
Building an engaged social media following for your equestrian business is not going to happen overnight, and it’s not going to happen on accident, but if you follow this three-step framework consistently, you will be amazed at what can happen in the next 180 days.
If you need support with your social media and content creation, check out my free Facebook group. We would love to have you. Also, don’t forget to download the action items for this post 10 Things to Do to Boost Your Engagement in the sidebar.
