Do visibility challenges actually help your social media?
Is a visibility challenge the kick in the butt you need to market more consistently? Could be! Will it get you results? It depends.
If you’ve been guilt-tripping yourself about your lack of participation on social media, well, first of all: cut that out! You absolutely do not have to be on social media to grow your business, no matter what the online marketing bros want you to believe.
However, if you feel like it’s a channel you want to explore, you may find some benefits. The hard part is, of course, knowing what to talk about in your content.
If you’re not sure how to make good on your intentions, a visibility challenge can be a helpful kick in the pants to help you (re-)commit to actually showing up on social media. Whether or not it’s right for you is another question.
What is a visibility challenge?
A fair number of social media pros host visibility challenges, sometimes even as a freebie. The expectation is that you’ll post often or daily for a set period of time, such as 10 days or 30 days. The person running the visibility challenge will often provide content prompts for each day of posting, and it’s up to you to follow through on creating and posting the content.
If you’re in a place where you want to post more often, a visibility challenge can offer the extra bit of support and accountability that you might need to make it happen.
Do social media visibility challenges actually work?
I’m of the mind that, if you have the bandwidth and aren’t expecting miracles, a visibility challenge can be a good opportunity to experiment and observe what happens. That's especially true if:
- You want to test whether you can create good content at a more frequent cadence
- You think you’ll gain a noticeable number of followers—not just one-off Likes or Commenters
- You think you’ll see actual, quality leads coming from your social media efforts.
Aneisha Velasquez of Yellow Sky Bookkeeping tried a visibility challenge after picking up some new LinkedIn skills, with the hope of bringing in new followers. “I was trying to change my audience from being mainly other accounting professionals to more outside the industry, so this felt like a good way to do that.”
Whether or not it “works” depends on what your actual goal is, however. Participants do generally see an uptick in feel-good metrics such as Likes and comments, but whether or not that translates to any sales is unclear.
Velasquez noticed that she got new eyes on her profile, and more comments and impressions–but no new client leads. However, her primary goal was expanding her LinkedIn network, so in that way, it did work.
Have an online marketing goal but aren't sure how to get there? I can coach you on how to get there, and how to create the habits that keep you going for more than just 10 or 30 days.
Social media is about experimentation
When you go from posting occasionally to posting frequently, it’s only natural to see a bump in engagement. It only lasts for a limited amount of time, however, so it may not necessarily translate into a lasting habit.
If you do go back to your old posting habits post-challenge, the amount of exposure the algorithm gives you will also begin to reset to where it was before. That means it’s also important to notice whether posting more frequently is a habit you can continue.
One author who participated in a 5-day Instagram Stories visibility challenge noticed that the challenge helped her understand her capacity better. “[The visibility challenge] actually made posting stories feel a lot more manageable, and feels like something I could repeat with adjustments each week!”
On the other end of the spectrum, Velasquez found that the return on her time investment wasn’t worth it for Linkedin: “I think I posted even less afterward because it proved that for me, daily LinkedIn posting isn't worth the effort.”
Both perspectives, and all the ones in between, are valid! Whether or not social media is worth your time can vary massively based on what platforms you’re on, your own habits and preferences, and how well those factors do (or don’t) play nicely with each other.
If you do choose to try a visibility challenge, take it as the experiment it is, and don’t just look at the Likes and Comments. Take the time to notice what tangible rewards you see, and how it fits with your work style and your mindset, and see whether it’s worth the time you put in.
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