How to Connect With Your Audience
You’re nothing without your audience. Without support, you don’t accomplish your goals, don’t meet your financial needs, and other potential supporters don’t know who you are. It’s a real competition to get people to spend their time on your business or organization.
How do you energize your audience so they stay engaged with your mission and become part of your community?
Make it personal
Show your audience what’s in it for them. Otherwise they’ll say, “So what?”
Your business makes the world a greener place. That affects everyone, whether they’re the kind of people who love to cuddle all the animals or not. In today’s day and age, it’s easy for people to forget the impact they have on the planet, because they don’t always see it in person. Trash is a great example – once something goes in the trash, they don’t worry about it anymore. The truth is, however, that one straw that gets thrown out finds its way into the ocean and harms marine animals.
Show your audience how that affects them personally – the plastics that end up in the oceans are then consumed by ocean animals and can end up within the fish they have on their dinner plates. Explain to them why your product or your mission makes both the world and their personal lives better.
People care about what matters to them. Some people will step up for the environment no matter what, while others need to know why they should take action. Showing how these things affect their lives on a personal level engages your audience and keeps them hooked.
Make it consistent
You know the exact day and time of your favorite TV show, right?
It should be the same with your content.
Consistency is key. Blogs should be updated at least four times a month, social media posts should go up a few times a week, emails should appear in inboxes at regular intervals.
Your audience will start to pick up on when you update your blog or send out an email. If you’re consistent, they won’t have to guess. They’ll know that Tuesday mornings are yours and they’ll check in automatically to see what you have to say.
Consistency also helps with coming up in search engine results. Google likes long-form content that is regularly updated and educates your audience. The more you focus on updating your blog and optimizing it for search engines, the more authority you’ll build for your website and come up in more search results. This helps potential supporters find you.
Connect on Social Media
Connecting with your audience on social media is very important. You’re going to have different types of audience members – some who want to read every word of your blogs and some who just want to stay up to date on what you’re doing and engage when they have the time. Some people won’t want to be on your email list, but will interact on your Instagram posts.
Just like blog posts, social media should be consistent. Most platforms recommend that you post several times a week to help you show up within the algorithm. Regular Instagram posts are important, but don’t forget to include ways to engage your followers within your stories or reels. Do fun trivia, have people submit questions, jump on the latest Instagram Reel trend! You’ll stay on the top of everyone’s mind (and closer to the front of their story feed!)
Give them something to do
Do not let your customers walk away from your content saying, “oh cool” and then do nothing. A Call to Action (CTA) is a must on everything you put out. It doesn’t have to be complicated. It can be as simple as asking someone to forward an email, or share a post on Facebook, but everything needs to ask your customers to do something.
If you write a blog post on why we need to save the elephants but don’t ask people to donate at the end, they won’t end up doing it. Remind them to donate and embed the link in your post. Make their lives as easy as possible – people won’t go searching for the link. Put it right in front of them so they can take action easily.
Having people engage with your content and donate to you, share your post, or check out that video link makes people feel part of something bigger than themselves. Sharing a post on Instagram also shows your business to their audience – which could mean more support.
Build a community
People like to feel like they’re a part of something bigger than themselves. When you build a community, people are excited about what you’re going to do next. Have spaces where supporters can interact with your business and with each other. It’ll encourage others to join in.
It’s like when you’re trying to find a new bar to hang out at. No one really walks into an empty bar, right? When you pass by a bar that already has people drinking in it, what does that tell you? That it’s probably a good place. You’ll try it and maybe you’ll become a regular – it’s the same thing. Your regulars set the tone for the newcomers. They fill your bar and show that it’s a place others also want to be.
Have your regulars’ backs and they’ll have yours.
A Facebook group is perfect to have all of your supporters interact with each other. A rewards program is a great gift for your most loyal subscribers or buyers. Make your audience feel like their voice matters with an email asking for feedback. People want to feel like they count as part of your audience. They’ll stay active in your community and feel proud to be a part of it.
Why is it important to connect with your audience?
Environmental work can’t be done alone. Teamwork is the only way to make sure we accomplish our goals. As an organization or business, you build your support network by connecting with your audience through social media, blogs, emails, and more. This strengthens your core base and enables others to become potential supporters.
Keeping your audience engaged is imperative. It builds your community of energized, engaged supporters that are excited to donate to you, buy from you, and spread the word about your mission.
Need help figuring out what your audience wants?
Each audience is special. No one has the exact same one. What does your audience need and want to engage with? If you don’t know, or if you know but are overwhelmed with everything you need to get done, shoot me an email here and let’s chat!