The following is a guest article. Frank Viola did not write it.
After the pandemic struck and the world shifted to virtual platforms, the popularity and rise of Instagram grew massively. The app is now not just a medium of communication, but a way to form a business or attain fame.
With a certain amount of followers and likes received on a daily basis, your brand can help you generate income enough to support your life. This is how the most famous Instagram influencers and models are also celebrities now. Formatting captions and bios with IG line breaker by MegaFamous is also a good option.
If you want to know how to promote your Instagram account in a way to get maximum engagement, continue reading this article to find out.
1. Be Consistent With Your Content
Whether it’s going viral on social media or any other personal goal you want to achieve, being consistent is the key to success. As a brand, a healthy amount of daily engagement is necessary to boost your account.
Research by Shopify shows that a company should be posting two stories and one post every day to get better engagement from users. You should also be consistent in a way that the content you post is what your audience wants to see.
For example, if you started off and reached a certain number of followers by being a fashion account, it might not be the best idea to switch your content over to another category like art.
Viewers follow accounts that cover their area of interest and like to stay when they are attracted by creative content in that field. Hence, make sure to try and give your audience what it wants.
2. Research Your Competitors
If you are somewhat new to making your own brand – whether as a company or an individual, it is always good to research your peers, seniors, and competitors in the field and be inspired.
Directly copying or plagiarising is not a morally correct thing to do, and should be avoided at all costs. However, there is no harm in getting tips from those who work in your same field.
You might be inspired by a trend they started, try an idea for a video, or even get into touch with them for collaborations. Many times, those long in the business can also help you get in touch with sounds or memes that are popular at the given time.
Big accounts are not the only ones useful – those who are starting at the same time as you can also be beneficial for forming a system of promotion or shoutouts. In this way, both parties are benefited from the bond.
3. Be Visually Pleasing With Posts and Captions
Instagram is all about aesthetics and what is pleasing to the eye. You already know that the best pictures are supposed to go on the platform, but there is another way to make your profile more attractive.
A lot of brands follow a certain theme which makes posts look sorted and pleasing to the eye. You could pick a certain color or a filter that you use for every post to match with the previous one.
For example, the home scent brand Vitruvi has an Instagram feed that promotes its products and also follows a homely theme. Their pictures are minimal, and the colors they use are light, giving off the feeling of freshness and cleanliness.
A scent brand needs exactly that type of vibe. Hence, in this way, a feed can greatly affect a viewer’s opinion of the account. It is also necessary that your aesthetic feed has captions that are just as great and neatly written.
4. Make Use Of Meme Culture
The most common form of communication among people these days is through sending memes or relatable content. Meme culture is the quickest way to make people interested in your content.
Many brands like Chipotle and OKCupid are well known for their use of memes to help promote their content. Although this may look informal from a reputed organization, the silliness is what draws in the audience.
By making funny content that is relevant to the audience, they get engagement, as well as a possibility that the post will be shared with other people, simply for its humor.
There are many free, online meme formats and makers available to use for this kind of content creation. Since it’s Instagram you want your account to grow on, just being there will also naturally get you the knowledge of the latest memes.
5. Make Reels
Although posting pictures and videos are important to grow on Instagram, with its new algorithm, and its competition with video-making platform Tik Tok, Instagram reels are given more of a boost than an image is – and that is a proven fact.
A research has shown that posting reels boosted one’s engagement more than any post or video. This is mainly because, in today’s fast-paced world, people need content that stimulates all senses along with the mind.
This is why Tik Tok has become as popular as it is now and why Instagram Reels are given more of a boost than posts. There is a whole ‘explore’ section dedicated especially to Reels even though they show up on your normal feel as well.
Hence, making reels is the quickest way to get engagement from people. To have the best reach with your Reels, use audios that are trending (can be identified with a small, diagonal arrow next to their name) as Instagram tends to push them more.
The research mentioned above also proved that reels with people did better and that sharing them on Instagram stories was good promotion. Hashtags seemed to not have much of an effect even when used in reels and the content mainly mattered.
6. Get In Touch With Influencers
Instagram is a domain of expertise that has been conquered by social media influencers. There is no one who knows better about creating engagement than completely normal people who have gained Instagram fame.
Influencers are a great way to promote your brand as they usually have a good bond with their followers. They also have to keep in touch with the latest trends and fads to remain relatable to their audience, which helps greatly with promotion.
It is not necessary that you contact big influencers with millions in their following. A good starting limit would be someone who has at least 10K followers.
The best thing about promoting through small but relevant influencers is that you do not always need to pay them an income, but can also trade their skills with your own products.
If you are trying to be an influencer yourself, it is always good to engage with your peers by commenting, liking, and sharing their content. You can also get in touch with them personally for a follow-for-follow or like-for-like system.
Conclusion
We hope that this article has been helpful in making you understand the demographics and the promotional system of the app. We hope that with these free tips, you are able to achieve your social media goals and grow your account.