If you are wanting tips on how to grow your social media audience and connect with new families, then look no further.

Here are 10 Social Media Hacks for your child care to help you grow your presence and kick start your social media…

1. Add all of your social media links to your email signature. Every email you send should automatically give people a connection to your website, Facebook page, Instagram, Twitter, blog, etc.

2. Boost a Facebook post. Even with a $5 budget you have the potential to get HUGE reach! By playing around with strategy and carefully selecting your target audience, you can connect with families right in your area and market your child care center to the right people. You can tweak your settings and gain the best reach by logging into the Facebook Ads Manager and following the prompts.

3. Always include graphics with your Facebook posts. Adding graphics to your posts can dramatically increase the number of people that view, comment and share them, helping to build engagement

4. Schedule your daily social media posts ahead of time. Rather than throwing up a random post at a random time of the day, set aside some time once or twice a week to plan and schedule. It will save you time in the long run and make things much easier! Scheduling also helps create consistency for your audience and sets expectations for when they’ll see posts from you. A user-friendly scheduling site such as Buffer gives you the ability to send out one post on multiple accounts- Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Facebook and Pinterest! And because Buffer allows you to see all of your posts at a glance, you can evenly spread out the different types of content you share.

5. Optimize your posts for engagement. Use hashtags, add descriptive text, and ask questions. A ‘call-to-action’ will significantly increase engagement on your social media posts.

6. Use Geotags. A simple way to build your local network and attract new clients is to add geotags for the location of your photos posted to Instagram and Facebook. After you’ve posted, click into the geotag you used and start browsing through the photos others have shared using the same tag. Now you can connect with local families and businesses, and start a conversation that could potentially lead to new clients and enrollment for your child care center.

7. Use popular #hashtags. Hashtags are great for visibility, and increased visibility leads to follows, likes, clicks, and more engagement. Websta has a running tally of each day’s most popular Instagram hashtags. If any of these fit with what you’re posting, it is a good chance to see the effect a popular hashtag has on your engagement! Hashtags can also be used on Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest.

8. Create ‘Pinnable’ content on your website & blog. Pinterest can be one of the most effective ways to promote your child care center online. Have pinnable images on both your website and on every blog post you publish and post them to your Pinterest page. You have two opportunities with each pin to add your link: one in the description and one in the source for the pin. Linking back is always key!

9. Keep it brief. Try to keep posts relatively short. Aim for between 100-250 characters in length as they generally receive 60% more comments, likes and shares.

10. Engage and communicate. Search out new people and local businesses to follow on all social media platforms. Take time to comment on their posts. ‘Liking’ posts is great, but making a comment gets more attention from both that person and the public. Get your child care center noticed!

Get the content guide to help you with your child care’s social media content.