3 Tools to Connect with Your Audience

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One of the most important things for your business or blog is finding ways to connect with your  audience. After all, an audience that is engaged usually means more money in your pocket. Not only are your most engaged supporters more likely to buy from you, but they are also more likely to become your biggest cheerleaders.

Before the dawn of the internet, there were only a handful of ways that you could connect with and mobilize your supporters. Basically, there were just a few places from which everybody got their information (newspapers, television, phone books, etc.). These days, there are more ways to engage your audience than ever. On the flip side, your audience could be harder to find. The internet has made everything much more specialized than ever before. So, while cracking into your particular niche may be more difficult, penetrating the right areas could mean a lot more potential for increased sales. Here are three tools you should be using to connect with your audience.

Email List

Of all the options on this list, your own email list is by far the most important tool you should be building and using. If you don’t have an email list for your blog or business, you should start building one now. (Go ahead. We’ll wait!)

Why you do you need an email list? First of all, if somebody signs up for your email list, they are actually asking you to send them information. What you have is a motivated customer who is giving you their information, practically begging you to sell them something. What more reason do you need? Additionally, you are in complete control of your email list. So, while Facebook could someday go the way of the phone book, you will always have access to your email list. How powerful is that?

There are a lot of companies that can help you build your email marketing lists. Some of the options are free while others are paid. You can create your own email campaigns, or you can pay somebody to do it for you. Regardless, you need to start building your email list today, Junior!

(By the way, you can join our email list by clicking here!)

Facebook

As of March 2015, there are nearly 1.5 billion monthly active users. Yes, that is “billion” with a “B.” That is a heck of a lot of people! If you aren’t on Facebook, you are missing a huge opportunity to connect with your current and potential customers.

Engaging your audience through a Facebook account used to be one of the best ways to drive traffic to your website. However, Facebook changed its rules so that not all of your followers will see your posts in their news feed. Essentially, they made it so that you have to pay money in order to reach the same number of users that you used to be able to reach for free.

Even though Facebook isn’t as useful as it once was, you still need to add your voice to the conversation. You need to promote your own brand. However, if you think that plopping up a company page and letting it sit there is going to get results, you are mistaken. It is a social networking website, so get on there and meet some people. Use your personal account to join some groups that enable you to connect with others who share similar interests. Get to know these people and take a genuine interest in what they have to say. If you do, you’ll begin seeing returns in no time.

(You can follow our Facebook page by clicking here! We’d love to have you!)

Pinterest

According to GlobalWebIndex, Pinterest was the fastest growing social media platform of 2014, with about 50 million active monthly users. That’s a lot of connections that you could potentially be missing if you aren’t on Pinterest. Since it is still a growing network, there is still room for you to get your voice heard.

Beautiful images often catch our attention, and that is what Pinterest is meant to do. Think of it as kind of cross between Google and Facebook. Although Pinterest acts as a social networking site, it also works as an image-based search engine. You wouldn’t neglect a search engine like Google, so you shouldn’t neglect this powerful tool either.

As a user, you create your own image galleries that are called “boards.” The benefit for you is that these images can link to your business website or blog. The more beautiful your images, the more luck you are going to have with Pinterest generating leads and sales.

(Please follow us on Pinterest by clicking here! While you’re at it, please pin this article to your boards!)

Connect with Your Audience

These are just three of the ways that you can connect with your audience in the age of new media. There are countless other places and ways that you can use to find and motivate current and potential customers in your niche. Start finding ways to utilize those tools today so that you can reap the rewards tomorrow.

What tools do you use to connect with your audience?

Additional reading: 

• Quit Your Day Job: How to Start a Blog in 6 Easy Steps