You’ve probably heard about the benefits of connecting with your ‘tribe’ on Instagram and Facebook. But what exactly is a tribe and why would you bother?
A tribe is that group of people that connect Instagram and Facebook through a shared interest. Anyone can have an online tribe – whether you’re a business, provide a service, have a side-hustle or an all-consuming hobby or passion. Your tribe may not even be your customers – rather, they are the followers that you’ve built a relationship with and loyally support you. They trust what you say, and they want to hear from you.
So why is it so important to nurture a tribe when they may not even be your customers?
The answer is engagement.
Building a tribe means that you could potentially have followers all around the world that are going to like, comment, share and tag, actively engage and help drive your engagement. And the higher your engagement, the more chance your content is likely to be seen by your ALL your followers (including your potential customers).
So how do you go about finding your tribe? Here are four steps to get you on your way.
UNDERSTAND YOUR AUDIENCE
The key to finding those loyal followers is digging deeper into your target audience and audience persona to find his or her pain points, struggles, interests, humour and passions.
Take a few minutes to put together a persona of your ideal customer/client. Get specific –go into detail about why they want your services, where they take holidays, what their interests are, whether they drive or take public transport, and where they go for entertainment. For example, if you’re a beauty blogger who makes your own beauty treatments, then you might discover your audience really cares about sustainability and plastic pollution. In that case, you could cater some of your content towards how to reduce single use plastic usage in the bathroom.
CONTENT IS KING
Now you’ve thought of some content that will resonate with your tribe, you need to know how to leverage it! If you’re a hair stylist who is known for doing hyperbolic hair colour, then your tribe is going to be not only your potential customers, but other hair colourists around the world who are also passionate about brightly coloured hair. Therefore, when you share images of your own work or the wildest colour treatments on the runways, you can use this content as an opportunity to share tips and tricks or ask your tribe to weigh in and start a dialogue. Not only will you position yourself as someone who really knows their stuff, you’ll increase your ‘social equity’, get more likes and follows, and more visibility to those in your area who may want to use your services.
LEVERAGE HASHTAGS
Start by searching hashtags related to your brand or topic. In the example we used above, your hashtags might be #haircolourinspo or #unicornhair – find others that are using those hashtags and follow them, comment and like a few posts and start a dialogue. You can also find someone that looks like they’d be in your tribe, find out what hashtags they’re using and start exploring, following, and interacting with those IG users.
For more tips on how to use hashtags effectively, check out our post How to Harness the Power of Hashtags.
GO NICHE
The more niche you go, the easier it will be to find your tribe and have a successful account that people engage with.
For example, if you’re a chef, you’ll have a lot more luck finding a ‘tribe’ around raw vegan food recipes for children in New Zealand, than posting about all different kinds of food with no rhyme or reason. Not only do you have a better chance of finding an audience, but chances are, you’ll be one of a few hundred playing in that space (verses thousands in a wide category). There’s also a better chance of you finding other like-minded raw vegan food chefs that are looking for inspiration and a genuine connection – voila, you’ve just found your tribe!
BE SOCIAL
Whether you’ve got a business or you like to knit tiny unicorn beanies for cats (hey, no judging), you can be assured, that somewhere, someone in the world is doing the same thing. And they want to connect with you.
When you start finding your tribe, be generous with them. Comment, like, share, tag – offer opinions, advice, support, LOLs, give them a shout out on your Instagram stories. You will make a heap of new friends, continue to learn about what ever interests you, and you’ll also have discovered the way to get your content seen by a much wider group.
Do you need help finding your tribe? We can help!
Here at SOMO Creative, social media strategy for small business is something we love to do. We’re experts at taking your brand’s values and goals and transforming your social offering with a custom designed social media strategy that includes all the insider tools, tricks and apps you need to succeed.
We offer consultation and strategy, team training and end-to-end set up and management, so if you’re ready to leverage your social to bring in more business, talk to us today!
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