An engaged social media following can be an invaluable asset to any business. In fact, a loyal and engaged following can help to amplify your marketing to new heights.
However, it isn’t just enough to post some nice pictures and get followers…
We learned this the hard way with our own social media channels.
But having worked with brands with hundreds of thousands of engaged followers and raving fans, we’ve been able to reverse engineer what really works.
SPOILER: It’s not because they created a fancy tile grid on Instagram, or spammed invites on Facebook.
At the core of this, you need to build a community and be consistently engaging with your followers in order for them to become true advocates.
But before we get into what those 3 things are, let’s talk about what to avoid:
What To Avoid When Growing A Social Media Following
There are a number of things NOT do when trying to grow a social media following.
In fact, some of these things can actually do more harm than good by annoying your followers; not to mention putting your account at risk from deactivation!
The other risk is that platforms like Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn will usually limit your reach depending on your engagement rate (this is the percentage of your followers that, like or comment on your posts).
That means that if you build up a lot of fake or uninterested followers, your engagement rate can plummet, putting your account at risk of going dark (meaning your visibility and reach will become almost non-existent). As a result, your dream audience may end up missing your posts! That’s why it’s so important to build an engaged social media following from the start
❌Follow/Unfollow techniques – this Is often used by cheap social media management companies as a way of growing a superficial follower count. They do this by following hundreds of profile a day and hoping some of them follow back. Then at the end of each week, they will unfollow the majority of accounts so their followers look more genuine.
❌Buying followers – we’ve seen companies that actually sell social media followers – these accounts are usually fake profiles/bots meaning you will get ZERO engagement from them. As such, this can seriously hurt your reach and visibility over time because your overall engagement will be so low
❌Constantly promoting your brand – this is a big mistake we see a lot of brands making when starting out. You have to remember people aren’t on social media to be sold to. They want to be entertained, educated or inspired. If you’re only ever promoting or talking about your company, people will soon switch off.
So now that we’ve talked about what to absolutely avoid when growing a social media following. Now let’s talk about the 3 of the most impactful things you can do to grow a truly engaged following from scratch.
3 Ways To Create Raving Fan Followers on Social Media
1. Personalised Messages
It’s all too easy when growing a social media page to see your followers as just a “number”. However, it’s critical not to lose sight of the fact there is a human on the other end. When you’re starting to build your following from scratch.
Something that can really help to boost your engagement and customer follower loyalty is to acknowledge your individual followers. Doing this can help you create raving fans that will not only engage with your brand, but will advocate for you! For example, this might mean sending each new follower a personalised video or voice note via DM (voice notes and video can be highly impactful as they cannot be faked and people know it’s not a copy and paste).
This can be done in as little a 10 seconds, and for the impact it makes, it’ll be worth every second. Just think how you’d feel if a brand personally reached out and acknowledged you.
Here’s an example…
2. Giveaways & Competitions
Giveaways and competitions can be a highly effective way of building a following whilst having fun along the way. The prize(s) you giveaway will ultimately be dependent on your budget; but it’s important to make them highly specific and relevant to your brand. Otherwise you run the risk of gaining followers who are just trying to get freebies.
There are a number of ways you can structure a giveaway, from incentivising people to like and follow your page to having fun quizzes relating to your niche/audience.
A great tool that can help with this is KingSumo which will also help to build your email list at the same time.
3. Collaborations
This is an extremely underutilised method for growing an engaged social media following!
Collaborating with others not only demonstrates authority and build credibility, but it also helps you tap into other audiences outside of your reach.
A collaboration could mean doing a podcast, an Instagram live hangout or chat, or even sharing each others posts when you see something that resonates.
When you gain new followers from collaborations, they tend to be much more engaged as there is already some trust built up from the person you are collaborating with.
The best way to begin doing this is to build out a Dream100 List; a term coined by Russell Brunson. In a nutshell a Dream100 is a list of influencers/thought leaders or just other brands in your industry that you’d LOVE to collaborate with.
When you’re just starting out, it can be a good idea to start by finding people that are just ahead of you in terms of followers, as they will usually be more willing to collaborate. However, that’s not to say you can’t aim higher sometimes! When we built our first online festival last year with Om & Bass, we managed to collaborate with influencers with over 1,000,000 followers just by being authentic and sending voice notes/videos via DM (for reference, I only have 349 followers on my personal profile). The key is to be real and authentic!
BONUS: GaryVee’s Dollar Eighty Strategy
GaryVee coined a new term a few years back called the Dollar Eighty Strategy. The strategy is built on the foundations of becoming a part of the community your business serves by engaging with others.
The strategy involved creating a list of 10 hashtags that relate to your industry or niche. Then leaving your 2 cents worth of thoughts, comments or appreciation on 9 posts in each hashtag.
But this doesn’t just mean doing copy and paste responses on posts. It means, leaving genuinely thoughtful comments, maybe even a few sentences! As that’s exactly what will make you stand out and increase your chances of gaining a truly engaged follower.
For the full step-by-step, check out Gary’s blog here.
So there you have it! 4 of the most impactful, effective and proven ways, we’ve come across to building an audience of truly engaged followers on Social Media.
”Want
Book your FREE digital review today and we’ll record you a 10 minute video looking at your current strategy and suggest some ways you could significantly increase your results!
The honest update
The original guide above covers the basics of growing a social following. The fundamentals still apply. What's changed is how brutal the gap got between brands with engaged followings and brands with vanity follower counts.
In 2026, a 10K engaged following is worth dramatically more than a 100K passive following. Algorithms suppress reach when engagement is low. Customers don't trust accounts with high follower counts but no comments. And paid retargeting against an engaged following converts 5-10x higher than against a passive one.
Here's the 2026 playbook for building a social following that actually moves business outcomes.
Method 1: Pick ONE platform and dominate it
The biggest mistake we see: brands trying to be on every platform with mediocre execution. The result: no platform gets enough investment to break through, and the brand looks like a generic corporate account on each one.
The brands that win pick ONE primary platform and execute it brilliantly. Once they dominate that platform, they expand to a second.
How to pick:
- B2B: LinkedIn first. Twitter / X second if relevant.
- DTC fashion / lifestyle: Instagram or TikTok first depending on demographic. Both eventually.
- DTC food / wellness / home: TikTok first (highest organic reach for product demos).
- B2C high-consideration (cars, real estate, financial services): YouTube first for trust-building long-form.
- Creator / personal brand: depends on where YOU show up best on camera, plus where your audience already lives.
Pick one. Commit for 12 months minimum. Don't dilute.
Method 2: Post specific operating data, not generic content
Generic content gets ignored in 2026. The posts that earn engagement and grow real followings are specific.
What's specific:
- Real numbers from real campaigns ("we cut CAC 32% by killing one campaign")
- Specific failures and what you learned ("this £80K campaign flopped because we didn't validate the ICP first")
- Operating decisions and the rationale behind them
- Frameworks built from actual experience, not theory
- Behind-the-scenes of how you actually do the work
What's generic (and ignored):
- "5 tips for X" with no specifics
- Inspirational quotes
- Generic industry observations
- Reposts of news articles with one-line commentary
- Anything that reads like ChatGPT generated it
The brands earning real engagement post 70% specific operating content, 20% personal/behind-the-scenes, 10% promotion. Most brands invert this and wonder why nobody engages.
Method 3: Engage 5x more than you post
The single fastest way to grow a following in 2026 isn't posting. It's commenting on other accounts' posts.
Spend 30 minutes per day leaving genuinely substantive comments on posts from people 1-2 tiers above you in audience size. Three-paragraph comments adding new perspective, examples, or counter-arguments. Not "great post!".
Those comments get seen by the original poster's audience (often 10-100x your current following). Your profile gets clicks. Your follower count grows. The original poster (often a category-defining founder) starts recognising your name.
Brands that grow fastest do 50% posting, 50% engaging. Most teams only do the posting half. That's why they grow slowly.
The compound-engagement framework
Engagement compounds in 2026. The algorithms reward accounts where existing followers consistently engage with new content. So early engagement on every post matters dramatically.
The pattern that works:
- Post during your audience's peak active times (varies by platform / geography)
- Reply to every comment within 30 minutes for the first 2 hours
- DM your top 10 most-engaged followers when you publish ("hey, just published this, would love your thoughts") — they'll engage and the algorithm sees it
- Cross-post the link to relevant Slack communities, newsletters, etc
- Engage with other accounts immediately after posting (you're in the algorithm's prediction model)
This sequence produces 3-5x the reach of just "posting and waiting".
The metrics that actually matter (not follower count)
Vanity follower counts don't matter. The metrics that do:
- Engagement rate (engagement / impressions): 3%+ is healthy, 5%+ is excellent
- Comment depth: are people writing substantive comments or just hitting like?
- DMs and inbound leads: are followers becoming actual prospects?
- Branded search lift: is your social presence translating to more people Googling your brand?
- Pipeline contribution: are deals closing where social was a meaningful touchpoint?
Brands tracking these instead of follower count make completely different content decisions and grow real businesses, not just vanity audiences.
The 12-month commitment problem
Most social media efforts fail because brands quit at month 3-6 when results haven't compounded yet. The brands that succeed commit to 12-24 months minimum.
What growth typically looks like:
- Months 1-3: minimal engagement, finding your voice, learning what works
- Months 4-6: gradual engagement increases, occasional posts breaking through
- Months 7-12: meaningful follower growth, consistent reach, occasional viral wins
- Months 13-24: structural distribution advantage, inbound leads / pipeline contribution
The brands that quit at month 4 miss everything that comes after. The brands that don't pull dramatically ahead.
The takeaway
Growing an engaged social media following in 2026 isn't complicated, it's just unsexy. Pick one platform. Post specific operating content. Engage more than you post. Track metrics that matter. Commit for 12-24 months.
For B2B specifically, see our LinkedIn marketing playbook. For DTC brands using social as a primary channel, see our DTC marketing examples.
Need someone to pressure-test your setup?, book a free 15-min review. We'll audit your current approach, identify the platform-fit, and give you a 90-day plan.
