How should I engage with people who follow and support my work on social media?

Nurture and genuinely care for everyone who follows you. Reply to everybody who comments or messages. Identify your cheerleaders—those three to five super-engaged followers who share every post, comment on everything, and are active in your community (often retired people with time who’ve made social media their community). Even if you’ve never met them in person, acknowledge them: send them cards, write back personally, and build real relationships. These relationships pay off—followers who engage for years often eventually become customers. For every order, include a handwritten note and a small extra like a sticker or bookmark to keep yourself in their mind. This personal touch and genuine relationship-building is worth doing and creates loyal fans for life. People want to buy from people they feel connected to.

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Asked by an artist building a social media following · Answered by Karen Payton (sharing approach); Patrick Shanahan (affirming strategy) · art-marketing-podcast · 2025-08-29