Want to get more people to like your content on social media and share it with their friends? Then it’s time to go right back to basics and to remember why people use social media in the first place. You need to remember what it is that social media is first and foremost.
And what is it? It’s a form of communication.
And communication is inherently about expression.
Once you understand this, you’ll be able to better understand the psychology of sharing and thereby encourage people to share much more of your content. So read on…
Why People Share
So social media is about communication, which is about expression.
This holds true in real life too – when we communicate, we are largely expressing something about our views, our feelings or our personality. We love to express ourselves and in fact, most of us are pretty narcissistic. Given half a chance, we’ll almost always try to steer the topic onto something about us!
And this is also apparent when you look around someone’s bedroom or home: it will be decorated with things that say things about them. It’s about their sense of style, their hobbies and interests and their families and friends.
Your Facebook profile is very much an extension of this. And the things you share on your wall and the pictures you post are all about showing people what matters to you and what you like to do (or what you’d like them to think you like to do!).
Knowing this, what is it that makes someone like a Facebook page or share a link often? Self-expression.
If you write a post that’s all about the health benefits of martial arts, then who do you think is going to share it? Martial artists! Why? Because they want people to know that they agree with your statement and thereby make it a part of their identity.
Likewise, if you write something about working from home and it’s amusing/relatable, then people will post it who work from home so that their friends can learn a little more about the way they work.
As you can see then, sharing content is very commonly just a way to show off different aspects of your own personality.
Sharing With Friends
And the other reason we share? That’s to show that we’re thinking of someone. When we’re not expressing ourselves, we’re usually sharing content that we think is ideally suited to someone else.
So what do both these scenarios have in common? In both situations the content is aimed at a single, very specific person. Don’t try and please everyone – try to write expressive content that the right people will identify with.
