Every time I visit any type of website, I often see the typical call to action, “Follow Us on Social Media“, but I often wonder, why would I?

It is not enough to ask people to follow you on social media, you have to give them an incentive to do so.

How to get people to follow your company on social media

Discount for the Initial Follow

For example, a lot of companies will offer a special discount for “liking” their page on Facebook.

“Like us on Facebook and get 10% off your first order”.

Consider broadening this and say, “Like us on all of our social media and get 40% off your first order!”.

Tell Them What They Can Expect

Besides offers, how about giving visitors insight into the type of content you will be posting on social media to peak their interest. So, if you are a realtor, maybe you want to say:

“Follow us on social media to get new listings as soon as they are available as well as hear about unique investment property opportunities.”

But the content doesn’t always have to relate back to what you sell. A lot of businesses have had success posting a photo of the sunrise of the day, or inspirational quote of the day or cute dog pix of the day – content that tends to appeal to everyone that never gets old.

You can also post practical content that the busy person would find useful, such as What to Make for Dinner Tonight or Online Sales to Shop This Weekend or Our Home Renovation Tip of the Day – generalized, helpful, time-saving information that people become reliant upon.

Post Different Content on Different Social Media Sites

If you are posting the same content on all of your social media, people may not want to follow you on each. But if you only offer certain content on certain sites, that helps to get people to follow you everywhere. Maybe contests are only available to your Instagram followers or you only announce exclusive one-day sales or flash sales on Twitter.

So re-look at your social media call to action. Would you follow you?