When businesses started jumping on the social media train back in 2006, strategic marketing goals were simple. Bigger audiences meant better results.

We wish it were still that simple, but we know better. Fast forward to 2015, and we’ve confirmed that a successful social media plan must be far more malleable.

The truth is, effective social media marketing is all about engagement.

The research around consumer behavior also proves that big numbers matter little, in comparison to engagement. Having a large following doesn’t guarantee everything will be coming up roses for your company.

Take McDonald’s as an example. Sure, they have 2.87 million Twitter followers and 57 million likes on Facebook. They were down $1.2 billion in revenue last quarter. Truthfully, their overall social engagement rate is low when you stack the numbers against their fan base. And despite plenty of research, the “bigger is better” mentality remains a common misconception among social media marketers.

Repeat after me: More followers, more content and more ad spend does not equal better results. Engagement matters more than numbers.

So, how do we measure engagement? How much time users are spending on a social channel and how engaged they are with the content are more valuable ways to measure success. A savvy business understands this and instead of focusing on generating new fans, it focuses on narrowcasting: honing in on quality connections and overall activity.

How do you measure engagement? Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn all have built in dashboards to help you keep track of how many people are liking, commenting, sharing, clicking, retweeting, etc. your posts. Another great way to track engagement is Klout, which tracks your engagement across all platforms to determine how your content is performing. Hiring a part-time community manager can also be a fantastic way to ensure your customers get the interaction they seek.

Here’s another way to look at it: let’s say you work for a company that sells swimming goggles and you have 100K followers. Which do you think is more effective?

1. Shouting “we sell swim goggles!” to the masses.
2. Telling a story about the Paralympian who won gold wearing your company’s brand, or the little girl who overcame her fear of the water with your company’s goggles by her side.

If you answered two, congratulations! You’re right.

The quality of the content you share matters more than the amount of followers you have.

When you share authentic content, people pay attention. A great example of this is Sport England’s “This Girl Can” campaign, which aimed to inspire women and girls to get moving, get active and exercise. There is a huge gap between the amount of men and women who participate in sport and the company wants to change this. Their strategy was to generate content that would engage an audience and inspire women to overcome the fear and judgment that can accompany being active.

Thousands of women from all around the world are now sharing their experiences around exercise and body image under the hashtag #ThisGirlCan. The campaign has opened discussions about women, sport and stereotypes and encouraged an international audience to get involved in sport. Of course, the campaign also attracted a large following (70K Twitter followers and 250K likes on Facebook), but that was only a byproduct of the conversation and content value. So just what made this campaign successful?

1. This Girl Can honed in on something that resonated with a specific audience and developed meaningful content around it.
2. This Girl Can campaign content both celebrated and challenged its audience.
3. This Girl Can campaign content encouraged engagement and sparked conversation among new fans.

Relevant, relatable content is shareable content.

For marketers needing to prove ROI on all their efforts, rest assured that the path to ROI starts with increased engagement. You can’t magically create ROI by having a lot of fans. Take for example a recent Vision Critical study which found that 38% of Facebook users have purchased something after sharing or favoriting a post. Likewise, 22% of Twitter users have purchased something after tweeting, retweeting or favoriting. These customer insights can help you build a better content calendar, balance or develop separate strategies and allocate an appropriately targeted ad budget.

So, next time you have a conversation about your social media presence, feel free to put the megaphone down. Start having real conversations. Stop worrying about mass marketing and start narrowcasting. In time, conversation will result in sales. That’s what the influence economy is all about.

Creating social content that speaks to your customer’s hottest topics, sells in relevant categories and matches the community’s tone is the first step to effective social media marketing. The more valuable social media posts are to consumers, the more valuable your company and products will be in their eyes.