It’s easy to get wrapped up in all of the little details of social media. Obsessing over the perfect time of day to share to a network, how many likes we get on a post, or the ideal length of a post are commonplace. But social media marketing doesn’t have to be complicated or overwhelming.

At its core, social media is really about connecting with people on a personal level. Regardless of what tactics you use, your goal should always be the same: to build rapport and strengthen relationships with your followers.

Follow these quick tips to do just that.

1. Be social, not salesy

Social media is a place to engage with others and build relationships, not to overtly sell your products and services. That’s why social media experts recommend making no more than 20 percent of your activity about your business. The rest should be content that interests, entertains, or enlightens your followers.

When you take this approach, your social media doesn’t even have to be related to your industry to be effective. Real estate agents, financial advisors, and other professionals have success sharing content such as this from American Lifestyle:

These types of posts work because they keep the person sharing them in touch with his or her followers. So when those people are in a position to provide a referral, they are more likely to remember that they know someone who can help.

2. Add images

Images are highly engaging. In Socialbakers’ analysis of the top 10 percent of posts by more than 30,000 Facebook brand pages, photos generated 87% of all interactions. No other format had more than 4%.

Wouldn’t this get your attention if it showed up in your feed?

3. Find your best times to post

Lots of research has been done on the best days and times of the day to post to social media. TrackMaven analyzed over 1.5 million Facebook posts from nearly 6,000 brand pages as well as 1,423 Twitter accounts and 1.7 million tweets. SurePayroll and Ghergich & Co also compiled data on how timing affects social media performance. Here are the findings:

Facebook interactions increase on weekends. Interactions were also higher for posts that went out during the evening.

Socialbakers’ research suggests the ideal number of updates to post on Facebook is 1–2 per day.

Sunday is the best day to get retweets, and the most retweets are generated at night.

While these stats are helpful in planning an initial social media strategy, you’ll want to test the variables for yourself. Depending on the industry, location, and other factors, your audience’s social media activities may differ from the typical user.

4. Post share-worthy content

The hardest part of maintaining a social media presence for many is finding things to share. We can help.

According to research from CoSchedule and Buffer, food, home, and lifestyle topics account for 85 percent of the world’s most shared content. And that’s just what you’ll find with American Lifestyle.

With each issue of American Lifestyle magazine, we create exclusive content that you can’t get anywhere else. And it’s available to share at just the right time to engage your followers and their followers when they share it.