As social media platforms develop and mature, they continue to tweak their algorithms. These changes have an impact on organic reach. Organic reach has been declining on all platforms for the past few years as a result. How do you fight this decline? 

Here are 9 steps to improving organic reach:

• Know thy algorithms. Each platform has its own algorithm, but there are some common algorithm principles among the various platforms:
  • Recency – how long it has been since a post was published
  • Relevancy – how pertinent your posts are to your audience
  • Engagement – the reaction of your audience to your posts via comments, likes and shares

  Using these principles plus the specific information from each platform can help you hone your social strategy.

• Live video. It has been well documented over the past few years that social media video posts have the highest engagement. Not only do live videos receive interaction while live, they can be re-used later for more engagement as additional content. Use live video to promote new services or facilities, provide seasonal or topical information, or to preview upcoming events.
• Utilize user-generated content. Consumers place great stock in user-generated content when making purchasing decisions, so this type of content is a good option for increasing engagement.
• Remember, each social media platform uses content differently. Copying and pasting a Facebook post onto Twitter won’t bring the same results. Take advantage of each platform’s unique features – Instagram Stories, Twitter Moments, etc. – to create content that engages the people on that platform.
• Pay to play. If possible, boost posts or use other ad options available. To get the most bang for the buck, be sure to target the appropriate audience for each boosted post.
• Make use of Instagram Stories. Although this was mentioned above with user-generated content, Instagram Stories are also great for posting your own original content. By using hashtags and hashtag and location stickers, you can increase your reach.
• Quality content. You already know that if your content doesn’t give your audience what it wants and needs, then it’s not very effective. You can use social media to help improve your content by conducting polls to learn what your audience is looking for.
• Consistency. If your approach to social media posting is lax, your audience won’t stick around for long because they won’t know when or if you’re online. Have a set schedule for posting, be consistent with the type of content you post and maintain a certain look/feel with all of your social media accounts. 
• Don’t forget the analytics. Most social media platforms have their own analytics tools, but there are other tools available as well. Whichever tool you use, take advantage of it to ensure your social media efforts are on the right track with engagement and organic reach.