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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/Engagement-CC1.jpg\" "\\"Engagement")
<\/a>\nWikipedia lets us down for once: \u201c<\/em>An engagement<\/strong> or betrothal<\/strong> is a promise to marry\u2026\u201d it begins. We knew that. That\u2019s an existing, useful definition of engagement.<\/p>\n
Good old Social Media Explorer<\/a> comes in first on any Google search with a relevant result for What is engagement? (article no longer available)<\/em>. Good for them \u2013 they even call it a \u201cbullshit term\u201d. (The article is two and a half years old, so must be still striking a chord.) The writer goes on to make good points and struggles to find an answer. Funny that.<\/p>\n Then this \u2018Engagement is a real metric\u2019 infographic<\/a> from socialbakers (great name) does a robust \u2013 mathematical, even \u2013 job of explaining different ways of measuring it.<\/p>\n But we have something much simpler to put to you.<\/p>\n Engagement\u2019s evil twin is mere old exposure. Exposure just happens. It is usually fleeting. It is those \u2018500 marketing messages each day\u2019* you see, whether you like it or not.<\/p>\n You don\u2019t choose most of them \u2013 they\u2019re outdoor ads you only glance at on public transport, signs above shops, the logo on that passer-by\u2019s T-shirt<\/a>, the side of the cereal box at the breakfast table.<\/p>\n While you are exposed to them, you don\u2019t choose to stick with them. (I would love to see a version of that with the passer-by\u2019s T-shirt as they\u2019ve passed you by \u2013 \u201cHey, you \u2013 STOP!\u201d.)<\/p>\n Mostly, in the vast majority of cases, they are not engaging.<\/p>\n So if \u2018engagement\u2019 is the flip-side, what is it?<\/p>\n You are happy to spend time with engaging content.<\/p>\n You choose to come back for more. It is the bookmark, the subscription, that section of the bookstore, the person who speaks and you shout “Hold on, don\u2019t change the channel”.<\/p>\n A headline can be engaging, though it doesn’t follow that the following article will be. (You\u2019ll eventually discount such headlines in those contexts.)<\/p>\n A wrapper brand can be engaging. Someone who doesn\u2019t say a lot but curates the best links? Engaging. Could be a friend\u2019s blog, could be Mashable, could be Facebook.<\/p>\n And to come back to that Wikipedia definition\u2026? Maybe it was relevant. Maybe the engagement we\u2019ve been discussing is the difference between matrimonial engagement and a one-night stand.<\/p>\n (*Or whatever huge number various research throws up.)<\/em><\/p>\n Photo The Proposal Number 2 (43\/52)<\/a> by timparkinson<\/a> used under Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Generic<\/a> (CC by 2.5).<\/em> \u2018Engagement\u2019 is now a bullshit bingo word within the media industry. But irritation aside there must be a good reason why everyone appears to be \u2018seeking engagement\u2019, \u2018measuring engagement\u2019 and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9479,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[230,91,33,85],"tags":[101,182,287,66,192,288,289,20,40],"coauthors":[],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1057"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1057"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectivecontent.agency\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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