Social media is one of the best tools that any marketer can have for boosting brand recognition, community engagement and product promotion. While millions of brands and causes now are active on social media, many fail to properly engage their customers and fans in ways that produce true, long-term value. Simply making a post here and there will not cut it, as most social media networks will marginalize the reach of pages and accounts that do not proactively and consistently provide updates. When it comes to Facebook, you not only have access to an unprecedented scope of potential customers and fans, but the format is ideal for boosting engagement. Below, we’ll talk about how you increase fan and customer loyalty through Facebook by using a few simple tips.

Reward Top Followers

When people engage with your brand, you win – even in cases where the publicity might not be so friendly. As pinging users with information usually leads to even more users discovering you, it makes sense to make investments in those who would help facilitate this trend. Your most engaged followers and customers can be of great use, but you may need to cultivate their tendencies. By offering promotions and rewards to those who would share your brand’s updates consistently, you can increase the value of your social media efforts and actually make money/gain followers in the process. Think about it as an alternative form of paid social media advertising, and suddenly it all makes sense. Be sure to use some analytics tool to monitor the shares and interactions of your fans, so that you can be sure to reward those who have truly demonstrated the most value.

Encourage Direct Interactions

Shares and retweets are great for spreading the word to others who are not connected to your brand, but did you know that there is also immense value in stimulating conversations and interactions between those who already follow you? Facebook’s algorithms will propagate your most popular posts and updates to your fans when more engagement occurs, so encouraging people to comment on your posts makes sense. You can do this in a variety of ways. You can follow the option offered above (rewarding those who do the most with some sort of tangible product or reward), or you can indirectly encourage the behavior by stimulating conversations with controversial topics. Newspapers and other news agencies use the latter method consistently to drive conversations and bring more followers into the debate, which ultimately will lead to more shares, likes and comments.

Respond Quickly

Last but not least, you want to be sure that any commentary – whether it be questions, concerns or criticisms – are addressed promptly. By doing so, you will not only fulfil the second method above in regards to stimulating more conversation, but you will also help build loyalty with fans by showing them that you truly care. When their thoughts are viewed as having merit (both by you and by them after you have responded), they are more likely to return, engage and provide positive feedback about your brand.