Tip for Tuesday – How to boost engagement on Tik Tok and Instagram

Over the course of three days last week, I had the opportunity to virtually attend the Chandler Chamber Marketing Summit.  While most of us have probably attended our fair share of webinars over the past year, I have to say this was one for my favorites to date.

The speakers represented a variety of ages groups,  the PowerPoints were engaging and not overly cluttered, the sessions were broken up throughout the day to allow the attendees to get a break, the speakers were well prepared and rehearsed so the sessions had basically no technology issues, and they covered their topic thoroughly in 30-45 minutes, leaving enough time for questions.

I’ll be summarizing the sessions over the coming weeks.

The first session I attended was “Grasping the Power of Social Media: Rules of Engagement for Instagram and Tik Tok” by Chelsey Hauston of Let Them Eat This.

As we all know, Instagram and Tik Tok are the most popular apps among Generation Z and Millennials, but they should both be a part of all of our communication plans. At HMA, when developing a communications plan for our clients, we always tell them to think about social media as another channel to get your messages or story in front of your audience. In the same way we think about being on TV or in a print story, social media has the added benefit that you get full control of the narrative.

With Tik Tok and Instagram being platforms that rely heavily on visuals with limited text, Chelsey shared some of her insider tips on how to boost engagement on these platforms and also how she grew her Tik Tok followers to 100,000 in just eight months.

Here are some of those tips to gain followers:

Instagram

• Plan your content out in advance.
  • In addition to planning your content, I would also add to that using an Instagram feed planner app can help you visualize and create the perfect aesthetically pleasing Instagram feed. We all have those accounts we follow because all the photos are visually appealing and look uniform when viewed together on the feed.
• Take well-lit and engaging photos.
  • All you need is your smart phone!
• Post to stories at least once a day.
  • As Instagram continues to change its algorithm, you have probably seen users begin to share their newest feed post to their stories to make sure that their followers have seen it and didn’t get overshadowed by the likes of Beyoncé or Kylie Jenner.
• Engage with your audience.
  • This can be in your comments by simply responding to their stories, etc. Your followers want to talk to you.
• Write captions with a call to action.
  • Chelsey recommends to create a little bit of a ruckus in your captions but nothing too crazy. An example would be saying “Pineapple belongs on all pizza.” You are bound to have a friendly debate in the comments that creates and opportunity to engage with your followers.

Tik Tok

• Use the editing app on Tik Tok to create your videos
• Keep clips short and engaging
  • And when Chelsey says short, she means really short. She explained videos clips should only be one second
    • What can I say? My generation has a short attention span. You have one second to engage us.
  • Shoot content vertically and not horizontally
    • Tik Tok is designed for vertical videos, so horizontally shot video will not look right and will most likely get skipped over.
  • Choose viral music and use trending hashtags
    • Have you’ve seen the viral dance challenges or wondered why feta cheese is suddenly sold out? Even my local Trader Joe’s is labeling items in the store that are popular because of Tik Tok. With more than 500,000+ trending hashtags, there is a place for you and your client.
  • Model your content after successful content.
  • Have friends and family watch your content and give feedback
    • This tip can be applied to many things outside of social media. A second opinion is always a good idea.

And the biggest tip of them all: interact and be active with similar content and potential clientele. Don’t be afraid to leave comments on other users’ content, ask to collaborate with like-minded businesses and be sure to continue to post consistently.