06/19/2025

How to engage with a social media community in regulated industries

Community management is an essential part of every brand’s social media strategy. Social media users expect your brand to engage with them through comments and likes, not just posting. There are multiple examples of great community management in retail brands from the humorous Duolingo to the ever-present Sweetgreen.

However, reaching an audience in heavily regulated industries, like investment banking or law, is more complicated. Here are a few tips to connect with your brand’s audience beyond the post.

Consistency is key

Before you begin to engage with an online community, you need to build and maintain one. Posting consistently across key channels signals to your community that you are present, insightful, and ready to engage. If you only post sporadically, we recommend increasing the consistency of posts, so your audience knows that you are an active member in your online community.

Ditch the ‘timely or nothing’ mentality

It is well known that commenting on a post over 24 hours old dramatically decreases potential engagement. However, many heavily regulated industries do not have the privilege of working without layers of approvals. While best practice is to comment on a post within 24 hours, it is also possible to engage within 72 hours to even a week, depending on your target audience, and still yield higher engagement results than not commenting anything.

Comment with compliance

If your brand is comfortable commenting on community posts from its brand profile, make sure the person commenting is a trusted member of your team. Whether they are engaging on LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, or even TikTok through comments, likes, and reposts, set up a two-step approval system with a trusted senior leader so engagement remains on-brand and compliant.

Exciting executive profiles

If your brand will never be able to get comments made by its brand profile through compliance, you can still engage with the community through key executive profiles. Creating an executive social media program boosts your executive’s online presence as well as brand recognition. The person who engages with the community through an executive profile should learn the executive’s personal voice and set up a two-step approval system to ensure on-brand messaging.

Engaging with industry leaders, content creators, and everyday people in your brand’s online community can not only lead to increased online engagement, but also an increased sense of authenticity and trust in your brand.

Read about our executive communications for CFA Institute.