How to Create Relatable Content for your Followers

You’ve seen all of the articles that are like, “Make sure you’re being authentic!” or “Are you being relatable enough?” and realistically… that’s not really a helpful question. How do you relate to people you don’t know, especially when you feel as though you’re just presenting them with content. 

I’m going to break it down a little more for you. I’m going to make it really simple to create relatable content. 

First, know your audience. Who are you speaking to when you post content? Every social media platform you have is able to give you demographic information on who is interacting with your content. 

While knowing someone’s age, location etc. isn’t necessarily the key to knowing what will be relatable to them, it is a good jumping off point. If you find that all of your followers are college aged, talking to them about motherhood likely isn’t going to land. If they’re all from West Texas, they also might not be able to lament with you about the winter blues. Knowing who you’re talking to is a great way to begin developing content that will land with your audience. 

Be personable. What’s the worst article you’ve ever read? If I had to guess it was a stale scientific article that you had to read for school. You skimmed through it, retained literally zero information, and were counting down the seconds until you could put it down and never look at it again. 

We’ve all been there. 

That’s how your followers/readers/customers feel when you send them something that’s full of overly technical gibberish. That’s how they feel when you put a caption on a photo that is literally just describing the photo. Be personable, be friendly, spark a conversation. You want people to start talking. Ask them questions in the comments, engage your followers with your words not just your photo. 

Tell a story. Remind people that you have a life outside of your Instagram account. If you follow me on social media, you’ll see that I talk about my horse a lot. Training and caring for him shaped me into the person I am today and I share that with people. Everyone has something that they feel made them into who they are as an adult. Something that affected them in such a way, that literally changed their personality and helped them grow up. 

That’s relatable. It’s a relatable feeling. Tell your story, or a story at least. Show your customers/followers what’s important to you. What your day-to-day life looks like outside of your business. They don’t want to feel like you’re just showing them products, they want to feel like they’re your friend. They want to feel involved in your life. The more involved they feel, the more brand loyalty they’ll have. 

Be authentic. This ties back into telling your story. People will know if you’re lying. I’m not saying they will launch a full fledged investigation into the voracity of your claims, but they can just tell.

You know when you see an influencer claiming this amazing life and you just KNOW that’s not true. That’s a significant lack of authenticity. Either they don’t have enough credit built up with your trust department, or they just don’t seem like they mean it. It’s easy to tell when someone is lying online. Besides, it’s much easier to keep track of your brand history if you’re always telling the truth. 

Find your voice online. Everyone speaks in a certain cadence, you say specific phrases, you’ll choose certain words to explain how you’re feeling. All of that needs to come across in your Instagram caption. 

I remember when I first started blogging for my own business, I always tried to be professional and polished. I wanted people to see me like I was this big shot business owner with all the answers. But, that wasn’t me. 

The truth was I was very scared, very confused, and very new to owning a business. All I knew was digital marketing, but I didn’t have all the answers because I never walked in my client’s shoes. So instead of telling you what to do, I decided to have a conversation. I decided to talk to all of you about what I do, what I see others doing, and what I think works. You can take what you need from what I tell you and try on your own. 

That’s my online voice. I’m not a teacher or a guru, I’m just another business owner figuring out what works so we can grow our businesses. 

Your voice will be something similar. It’ll be the friendly lady down the road who wants to dress you in the best style for your body shape. It’s the guy who has all the answers when it comes to your car’s cooling system, but maybe isn’t all that good at body work. It’s the nutritionist that can have you eating like a well oiled machine, but definitely isn’t out here running 10 miles a day. 

Your voice is inherently yours, part of being relatable is finding it. 

Find the commonalities in your audience. Right now, you know the biggest commonality… We are all at home.

Creating relatable content also means finding similar pressure points in the audience you’re speaking with online. When I talk to small business owners, I know that we’re all feeling the pressure of the lockdown, the pressure of pivoting and creating a new way to sell in this weird and uncertain time, the pressure of growth when it seems impossible. 

You started your business to solve a problem for your audience and that’s the main commonality that you have together. Post about that and remember it’s the reason you’re here today. 

Do unto others as you would have done unto you. The age old question is, “how do I increase engagement?” or “how do I get more followers?” The easiest way? Engage with people. Follow more people. Interact with their content in a way that you would make you happy personally. 

Do you love getting a nice comment? Then leave some on other profiles. Want 100 followers? Well then follow 100 people. There is a reciprocal relationship on social media and I think we play too much into “trying to keep our ratios tight” and focus less on being human beings who are interested in other human beings. 

Don’t be interruptive. Disruptive is one thing, but interruptive is annoying. Don’t leave comments begging for follows all over social media. Don’t post pictures begging people to like your content. Don’t be the person that is constantly posting flashing pick-me signs on their profile. 

If you want eye-catching content, then make it interesting. Make it arresting, thought-provoking, inspiring. Eye-catching is too shallow and empty. You want to create discourse not just a distraction. 

Be helpful, courteous and kind. Most of all social networking is social. The best way to ingratiate people to your content and be a relatable human, is through being kind. Help when people ask questions, respond when people tell you nice things. Always acknowledge people and don’t be afraid to spark a conversation in the comments.

You don’t need to be this cold and aloof, insta-famous influencer to gain followers and be taken seriously on social media. You just need to be kind and authentic. There’s no real secret sauce when it comes to being relatable. You just need to be unafraid to be yourself. 

As always, if you have any questions, comments, critiques or fun facts about you to share with me, you know where to find me! You can always email cecily (at) grizzlymarketing.team or give me a call at (519) 400-5531.