Everyone wants to get new followers on their Instagram account because each follower on your Instagram account can be a prospective customer. You may wish your followers will keep coming and getting engaged with your eye-catching images, attention-grabbing videos, etc. Instagram content is getting higher engagement than Twitter or Facebook. It means you have more chances on Instagram to convert a follower into a customer or a brand loyalist.
Let’s have a look at the most important aspect of increasing Instagram followers –
Instagram Account Setup
User name and bio
Your account should be searchable and shareable. For this, you need to make sure your username is easy to search. Users should be able to understand the relevance of your profile in a glance. They should know what you have for them.
You can use hashtag links in your bio. Always add your website link so that prospective customers can get more detail about your business from the website.
Instagram Profile Picture
If you are running a business account, you should choose your brand or company logo as a profile picture to give credibility to your account.
Connect your social media accounts
Connecting Instagram account to your other social media accounts like Facebook and Twitter account can give you better insight and multifold your post reach.
Clear goals and strategy
Clearly define the goals that you want to achieve by Instagram.
- Do you want to increase brand awareness?
- Are you searching for a new business opportunity leads?
- Increase the number of loyal customers?
It would be best if you did a social media audit to understand what is working for you and whatnot. You can define your Instagram strategy based on desired outcomes.
Post best content
Content is the heart of Instagram, primarily visual posts. Honestly, you do not need to post every hour. You should post the only best result of your creativity. Best content means good visual quality, well-edited, entertaining, and engaging.
After you have posted a few posts, you should always analyze the taste of your audience. Try to understand what kind of content your users like, Is it videos or images? Which content post is getting more comments or engagement? These will give good insight for planning your forward content strategy. Use hashtag and geolocation in your post. Geolocation is best to reach local users.
Instagram post captions can be up to 2200 characters, but we recommend using content not more than 150 characters.
Posting content as Stories is also essential. Stories are useful for highlighting “in the moment” posts, which will disappear in 24 hours. These stories can be interactive polls, questions, and highlights for increasing personal connection with followers.
You should also time your posts. For example, if you are related to the travel industry, then Friday Morning time is best, and if you are from the food industry, then Friday 11 to 1 pm is the best time.
Hashtags are angels of discovery
Use relevant hashtags in your post for increasing discovery and visibility. Think hashtags as your best friend because they help you in getting discovered by new users. Use trending and focused hashtags for getting maximum exposure. You can establish your brand by using clever hashtags. Onor an average, you should use 4 to 8 hashtags per post.
You should avoid using repetitive or irrelevant hashtags because users can select the “Don’t Show for This Hashtag” option if they don’t like it.
A business profile can see insights about the effectiveness of their hashtags.
Understand Demographics
You need to understand your audience demographics like age, gender, education, relationship status, interests, etc. This information helps you know your target audience and helps you to select appropriate content. For example – If you know your audience is in Singapore, you will post based on Singapore timings.
It also helps to target your audience if you are running Instagram ads on your account.
Position yourself as an expert
Position yourself as an expert by providing tips in the form of images or small videos.
Promote your Instagram presence online and offline
If you already have followers on other social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, etc., then you should promote your Instagram presence on other social media platforms. It will help your existing social media followers to connect with you on Instagram.
Start sharing your Instagram nametag offline communication and materials like your product packaging box.
Monitoring Comments
If you want your follower’s engagement, then you also need to engage with them. You should always monitor and value comments given by users and provide a proper reply. It will help you understand your active audience. Your users will feel that you care about them and appreciate their effort in putting a comment. You may want to provide some of them your giveaways, which will help in your brand establishment.
Connect with Influencer in your field
You should follow lead influencers in your field. It can be done by going to their profile and turn on post notifications. It will help you interact with them through their posts and be their favorite brand. Their followers might notice your profile and start following you.
Tools usage for Managing and handling Instagram
There are many tools which are available in the market at a minimum fee. You can also use BOTs to increase followers on your account. Instoo is one of the BOT which does that. Have a look at how to setup instoo instagram bot.
Build an Instagram community
You should always try and focus on creating a community of followers because that increases engagement, and a visitor to your account will get attracted to i. You can do the following –
- Use Humorous content so followers can share with their connections.
- Share content that can create discussion or debate between followers.
- Ask a question in the caption of your image or video post.
- Encourage to leave a comment, share content, or tag a friend.
As we saw above, there are so many things you can implement to increase your Instagram followers. Definite goals,t good strategy, and best quality content is the key. Continuous analysis of performance and engagement on your post will give you meaningful insights. It would be best if you always upgrade your plan based on the insights.
