One of the hardest parts of beginning a routine social media campaign for your business is brainstorming ideas for daily social media posts. Social media can be overwhelming and time-consuming when you are unsure of what makes good content. If you want to start regularly posting to social media for all of the great business benefits, but you find yourself worrying about what to post or how to keep that up, read on!

There are two simple rules that can guide the content that you create on your social media accounts. Your social media posts should do two things: engage viewers and drive business. If you accomplish these goals with your content, your social media will not only be successful, but you’ll increase sales.

To engage your followers, you just need to know your typical client. What interests them? What do they like? If you know the answers to these questions, post content that relates.

However, driving business with your posts should be done indirectly. Your client will be more likely to buy from you if they trust you, value your services, and realize that you are an expert in your field. Instead of blatantly trying to sell your services, post things that show who you are, that demonstrate the importance of your services, or that display your skill. This will drive business.

Below, we’ll go into detail on different posts that will both engage followers, while driving business.

1. Content for Your Audience

Good content can be a blog post, article, video, infographic, and much more. This does not have to be (and most of the time won’t be) content created by you. Sharing others’ content is a great method for boosting your social media and creating engagement. As customers realize your social media sites are sources of valuable information, they will like your page, if they haven’t already, and start visiting your page more frequently. Then, when you do post advertisements for your services, you will have a larger and more engaged audience.

2. Pictures

Pictures of your designs are interesting to your potential customers, and they demonstrate your expertise. The same goes for items that you’re using in designs. You can also keep clients informed by posting pictures of the places you visit on business and the items that you see at different vendors.

3. Quotes

Posting a meaningful quote can inspire your followers and demonstrate what matters to you. You could use quotes from a famous interior designer, artist, business person, or any influential person.

4. Tips and Advice

Create a weekly segment where you give interior design tips for homeowners or have followers post their interior design questions to your page and then comment with your answers. It may seem like you’re giving away your services for free, but tips are not going to discourage leads from hiring you. Rather, by giving them tips, you are slowly creating a business relationship. If they haven’t already realized how valuable your services are, this will enforce that knowledge.

5. Sales and Promotions

Every other post type we’ve described should help to further the effectiveness of your sales posts. Sales posts are most likely to drive business, but too many will drive away your audience. Be careful; posts with good content will increase your audience, because people follow social media pages and engage in those pages, because they find the content useful. So use sales/promotion posts sparingly, but when you do create posts about your offerings, make them convincing and brief.

There are many more different post options out there, but hopefully these examples will encourage you to begin employing social media regularly. If you ever run short of post ideas, study the social media of brands that you respect. But most importantly, remember that your social media will benefit you most when it benefits your audience.