How to Get Through to A Digitally Burnt Out Audience

With the constant buzz of never-ending notifications and feeds that churn out new content every second, audiences are quickly becoming exhausted by social media. Since many brands mostly use the same platforms and cater to similar audiences, you need to stand out to attract the attention of this tired audience and show them why your brand is worth their time.

Put yourself in the shoes of someone who has just returned home from work—mind still racing—and now only has fifteen minutes to relax before they move on to dinner and other household chores. As a brand, you only have a few precious seconds to catch a user’s attention before they either close the app or just scroll past – and getting them to click on your page or visit your websites can feel like another hurdle. So, how do you get through to a digitally burnt-out audience? We’ve put together a few steps you can take internally and externally to create meaningful and impactful content that stays with your customers long after they’ve closed the app – even when they’re exhausted by all the other content online. 

1) Identify Signs Of Burnout

The first step to engaging with a digitally-tired audience is to identify signs of burnout. Have you ever noticed your engagement suddenly dropping without any identifiable reason? This could be due to an  audience that’s tired and overwhelmed by everything on social media – including your content. If you think you’re posting quality content at the same pace you have in the past but aren’t getting rewards in return, it might be time to switch up your current marketing campaign to stay relevant and catch the attention of tired users. 

Remember that audiences are particularly volatile during stressful times of the year, some of which will be standard annually, like tax season or as students go back to school or college. However, it’s also important to keep track of other political or environmental changes that are affecting audiences globally. If everyone’s attention is on an upcoming election, they won’t really care if you’re promoting a product or service that isn’t directly related to the event. One way to combat this is to cater your campaigns to the moment and find ways to market your brand creatively. Either way, pinpointing exactly when burnout happens can be helpful to switching up your strategy and reengaging with users.

2) Don’t Push Too Much On Your Audience

Next on our list: don’t ask too much from people you’re trying to sell to. As a brand, you must remember to post with caution. It’s great to post frequently to keep your audience excited and engaged, but don’t get overzealous. For example, suppose you’re a user who follows a beauty brand on Twitter (hereby referred to as X!). Imagine seeing eight posts in one day, each encouraging users to check out a new feature on the website, sign up for the email newsletter, enter a contest, and use a certain promo code. Chances are you’ll either get overwhelmed by the sheer number of posts and unfollow the account or simply get frustrated with the brand for not being considerate with their audience’s time and attention.

By creating content that offers real value to the user—whether personal, educational, or informational—you can create an actively engaged audience and combat user burnout. Your audience must always feel like their time is respected, so constantly demanding their attention might become a turn-off. Remember that the goal is for your brand and content to become a part of everyone’s daily lives, so it doesn’t ever feel like your brand is only posting for the sake of promotion.

3) Turn The Spotlight On Them

If you’re dealing with a digitally exhausted audience, consider turning the spotlight on them. Everyone loves to see themselves on social media; that’s why new features are always added for greater expression! One way to excite your audience is to include them in your content, whether through highlighting funny comments every week, spotlighting users who have used your products, or just highlighting the diverse and exciting following-family your brand has crafted on social media.

While most brands already find a way to incorporate UGC (user-generated content) into their feeds, you can always find a way to make this event seem special or unique. For example, you can have one weekend every month when you exclusively share user feedback, stories, comments, and pictures. This can make a fairly standard brand tactic seem like a new and exciting campaign. Anything that involves your member community helps keep your audience engaged and wanting more. 

4) Always Ask For Feedback

Another great way to keep the attention of your user base is asking their opinions. Asking for feedback—and encouraging positive and critical comments—is essential to running any business. But remember that while you can and should ask your followers what you can do better (and what they currently enjoy!), you should also ask those within your company. If employees don’t want to engage with your content in their personal time, you probably have some room for improvement. 

The goal is always to strive for content that is effortless in its marketing so users don’t actively realize what is advertising and what isn’t! Asking for feedback also shows the world that you’re an empathetic brand invested in what your audience has to say. Remember that it’s not enough to ask for feedback; you must ensure you’re following through on it, too! Feedback is a great way to get your community involved and win back a sense of purpose from an audience that’s tired of being a product online.

5) Remember The Purpose

Last but not least: remember the purpose behind your mission and marketing strategy. Since most brands plan out their social media strategy and campaign ideas months in advance, it can be easy for everyone involved to lose sight of the brand’s values. You must always check in with the content you post to ensure it caters to the brand image, voice, and beliefs you initially set out to express. This will help your brand come across as authentic and re-engage with users that might be suffering from digital burnout.

While the above example is a macro view of analyzing your brand’s purpose, you can also look at it through a micro-lens by asking yourself—and your team—the following questions: What is your brand on social media? What do you hope to gain through social media? What is the direction behind your digital marketing? 

As the number of burnt-out audiences increases, it can be tempting to view digital marketing  as an uphill battle. But remember that the best content is authentic and purposeful. Viral posts come and go, but consistency in brand reasoning and methodology is how you can craft a meaningful relationship with your audience to withstand engagement ebbs and flows. Remember to identify signs of burnout early on, engage with your audience through features and surveys, and keep your brand’s mission top of mind to create a memorable, unique digital presence that will capture the attention of even the most burnt-out users.

Always in your corner,

The Content Queens