1. Know your audience

Who are you trying to reach with your posts, and when are they active on social media? Knowing your audience will help you to design your messages to reach and engage them. It will also help you to decide what are the best channels to focus on. Remember that it is possible to schedule posts for later if you want to reach people in different time zones.

2. Create inspiring and engaging content

Content in social media is really anything you post or share with others. If you create good content, it has a much higher chance of engaging the people you want to engage. Therefore, you should focus on quality over quantity. It is better to make a few high-quality posts every week than to post many updates every day that are not engaging. The algorithms will punish you for that.

Don’t just inform but try to inspire. Focus your messaging on why you are doing the innovation project and why people should care. Try to start a conversation by asking questions or calling out for actions.

«Active» pictures of people can be great content. For example, pictures of people testing and using the innovation, so remember to take pictures throughout the innovation process. It is also a good idea to write down quotes from the people in the pictures that you can use for your posts.

When it comes to content, algorithms love videos! Videos are actually prioritised by the social media algorithms, and it is the algorithms that decide what shows up in your news feed. This is why video content should be part of your communications. It is easy to create simple videos directly on smartphone and edit them in programs like iMovie. Some good advice when it comes to videos on social media are:

• Never make social media videos longer than one minute! People on social media have short attention spans. You need to capture their attention within the first few seconds and drive your point across quickly.
• Always add subtitles.
• Ensure good sound quality. An external mic is cheap and easy to use.
• Always film horizontally.

3. How to reach a bigger audience

If you have created inspiring content, and you know your audience, there are a few additional things you can do to spread your content to a bigger audience.

• Hashtags are great to put your messages in front of a bigger audience. It might be worth spending doing research on which hashtags to use.
• Tagging relevant stakeholders can also be important to gain traction to your posts. A repost from a profile with many followers can help spreading your message to a larger audience.
• Track and adjust! There are many useful metrics available on all social media platforms. Use these to see how well your content is doing and iterate. And do not be afraid to try new things!
• Be active in liking and sharing other people’s content. This will help you to build up your own follower base.

Social media can be a great vehicle to spread the word about your innovation project. It is therefore worth doing in a systematic and strategic way. We hope these social media quick tips were useful! To learn more about how to get started on your communications strategy, click here.