4 Ways I Embrace My Audience

Ways I Embrace My Audience

Social media means making those who interact with you part of your community. I love to respond to those to make an effort to connect with me. The connection is an embrace – a collective understanding that we have enough in common to communicate with each other.
Here are four methods I use to embrace my audience:

I respond.

When someone sends me a personal message, on Twitter, e-mail, or Facebook, I make every effort to respond to them promptly if warranted. It’s amazing how many people appreciate a simple response. I know I do, so why wouldn’t my audience?
Mark Schaefer, over at {grow} responds to almost every single comment he gets on his blog, even the bad ones. That’s incredible.

I ask questions.

Whether it’s for advice on a new product I should try or help in deciding what book to read next, I ask questions that my audience can easily answer. I sometimes ask questions at the end of my blog posts to generate conversation with my readers. A while back,  I asked my audience to help me decide which book to read next. I got a ton of responses because the question was simple and interactive.

I welcome new Twitter followers personally.

I loathe automated DMs when I follow someone – Those, “Hey! Thanks for following me! Check out my website at www. . .!” That tells me you’re too busy to connect and engage.
Instead, I chose to welcome new followers by sharing them with my audience:

Sometimes they respond:

I thank people out loud.

When someone retweets or shares something of mine, I try and thank them publicly. Look at this exchange: (read from bottom to top):

A simple and vocal thanks does more for me and the recipient than any other kind of gratitude.
Embracing your audience means making them an active member of your community.

Think about how you interact with your audience. Do you embrace them? Share you methods.