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5 strategies to increase engagement on your content
Do these consistently if you want to grow
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“How do I get more engagement on my content?”
It’s one of the most common questions I hear from people early on in the journey of writing online.
Engagement is important.
It drives your reach online, the pace at which your audience grows and ultimately the impact your content will have at scale.
But it’s also one of the biggest traps creators can fall into.
“Engagement hacking” can lead to bad habits, tired content and a low-value brand online.
We don’t want that.
Here are five of the best strategies I know for getting more engagement on your content.
Warning: None of these are instant “growth hacks,” but I guarantee they’ll work if you consistently execute them.
1. Engage with others
Sounds obvious, right?
Well, so many people writing online don’t do it consistently (or at all).
Here’s a harsh truth: You can’t expect engagement if you don’t engage.
This means liking, commenting and sharing other peoples’ content. Support them and their growth, not just your own.
Don’t do this in a slimy way. Just be a regular human being who wants to have conversations and build relationships online.
When someone asks me why their engagement is low, the first thing I ask is: “How much time do you spend every day engaging with other people?”
Most of the time, the answer is very little.
So start here.
2. Give away unbelievable content for free
Entrepreneur Alex Hormozi has a philosophy I love:
Make your free content better than the content other people charge for.
If you do that consistently, you will win on the internet.
You’ll become known as an invaluable resource who shares FREE value without (or rarely) asking for anything in return.
There’s a funny thing about humans.
When someone helps us tremendously without asking for anything, we feel indebted to them. We WANT to return the favor.
One of the ways people return that favor is by engaging with your content and supporting your growth.
Give value, get value.
3. Pay attention to formatting
This is more tactical than strategic.
Formatting matters a lot.
Most people are consuming your content on a mobile device.
On mobile devices, 100 words reads like approximately 500.
Look at this piece of content:
Now look at this one:
Which one is easier to read?
Which one can you skim?
Which one is more inviting?
The second one, obviously.
It’s the same copy word-for-word from one of my recent LinkedIn posts, just formatted differently.
If your content is aesthetically overwhelming, it sends a signal to readers’ brains that “this is a lot of work” and they will skip it.
Make it easy for people to read your content and then leave their opinion.
Formatting is critical for engagement.
4. Find a few friends and support each other
“Engagement groups” are controversial.
People love to hate on them, and I understand why.
But there’s a big difference between a hacky engagement group and a tribe of friends who genuinely get value from each other and want to see the others succeed.
Find a few friends like that.
Share your content with each other with an expectation that if you get value from a piece of content, your engagement is appreciated.
If you don’t get value from the content, don’t engage with it. Simple.
There’s nothing wrong with sharing work you’re proud of with people who you think will genuinely enjoy it and benefit from it.
That’s why you created it in the first place!
5. Show up every day for a long time
The last point is the most important.
The best way to get engagement on your content is to show up every day for a long time.
Create consistently.
Engage consistently.
Support others consistently.
There’s no magic to this, but most don’t want to hear it because it takes sustained effort.
The majority of people want to build large, highly engaged audiences in a matter of months.
In reality, that takes YEARS.
And that’s why so few break through and do it.
Most are not willing to create and engage consistently for that long.
But if you’re willing to put in the work and make that commitment, that’s how you build the most engaged, powerful community of all.
Action Item
Two things for you:
(1) Start engaging with others every day. You can begin today. I suggest setting a time limit — say 15 minutes a day — so it’s not overwhelming. If you can do more, great, but make this minimum commitment to yourself.
(2) Build a plan to start implementing these other strategies within the next 30 days. Do them consistently. Over time, you’ll see your engagement increase.
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