October 5, 2023
Growing a community as a content creator is one of the most difficult things to do. Especially when starting, it’s often challenging to find networks to tap into to promote yourself, your brand, and the content you create. While it’s important to stream consistently, develop your voice, and be authentic, it’s equally important to connect yourself to your audience as often as possible. One of the best ways to do this is through social media. Find some tips below on exactly how you can use social media as a tool to grow your community on Twitch, YouTube, or any other content creation platform.
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Be consistent
The number one rule of content creation and social media is to be consistent with what you create. It doesn’t do you any good to create a Twitter account that you never post on. Instead, post your going live announcements, update your followers on what you are up to, and post meaningful content. Even if you do not yet have many followers on your social, it’s important to establish consistency so that people are inclined to follow you when they come across your page. Try to post at least once a day, on at least one channel. From there, you can grow to other channels and spend time where you enjoy connecting with your community most.
Figure out which channels work best for you
If you already know which channels you want to try, there’s no point in putting effort into something you don’t think will stick. If you don’t like making videos for socials, don’t try TikTok. If you’d rather not post pictures and let people have a look into your personal life, don’t go to Instagram.
If you don’t have any idea what you will like and want to try out as many options as possible, you should do so. Start with as many as you have the time for, and then follow through with the ones that stick. Choose one or two social platforms to dive into, and master those.
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Cross-promote
Promote all of your channels to all of your channels.
If you’re a Twitch streamer, link your socials on your channel page. On the other end, make sure your socials link directly back to your Twitch. The same goes for your YouTube channel, blog, or anywhere else that you create and share content. None of your channels should live in a bubble, and your followers and fans should be able to visit all of them from anywhere seamlessly.
Promote your content (promptly)
This one goes hand in hand with cross-promotion. Be sure to promote whatever your main form of content is specifically. All of your socials should have notifications when you go live or when a new video is posted. Make sure the notifications are posted in a timely manner, so that your community knows precisely when there is something new from you coming up. It doesn’t help to Tweet about a new video the day after it goes up on YouTube.
Humanize yourself
Whether or not you are comfortable being candid, you at least need to seem like you are. You don’t necessarily need to let your followers into the private aspects of your life, but it does not hurt to share some life updates. People will follow you and come back for more if they feel like your friend.
To do this, try to find little things to let people in on. Let your community grab onto little tidbits about you. Did you get a new puppy? Let them know. Celebrate with your supporters. New job? The same applies. Try to pick and choose things to share.
Engage with your followers
This is probably the most important tip on this list. Social media is more than just a platform for announcements, especially when you are just starting out. You have to make sure that you are engaging with your followers.
At the start, this can be as simple as thanking them for a follow on your socials. Yes, it’s a lot of work and isn’t scalable to thank everyone who follows you in the future, but it could mean a lot at the start. Once you have a larger community, continue to engage with your followers as you are able. Like their comments, and even respond to those you find particularly compelling. This will create a stronger sense of community among those who choose to spend their time consuming your content, and it will help make you seem more ‘real.’
Engage with other creators
Second only to engaging with your community is to engage with other content creators. If you’re on a stream team, especially, you should be consistently engaging with your teammates. If there are other content contributors in the space that you are drawn to and have similar followings, retweet their tweets, comment on their Instagram posts, and duet them on TikTok.
You can also use social media to form relationships with them and even reach out for event collaborations. Social media is a great way to supplement the relationships you may develop through your content creation alone. It can lead to deeper and more meaningful relationships with other streamers.
Social media is generally a great way to connect with people and develop deeper connections. It lets you give your community a glimpse into your life, offers opportunities to connect with other content creators, and allows you the chance to cross-promote your content on all channels. Even if you don’t know where to start, the important thing is to start somewhere, test the water, and find what works best for you. If, at first, you don’t see any growth or traction, don’t get discouraged! Social media is hard to manage, and it will take some time to see growth. Stick with it and gravitate towards the platforms you enjoy most, and you will eventually see results.