With one billion daily active users and as many as 200 million checking almost one business account daily, it is clear that Instagram is one of the biggest platforms for marketers and entrepreneurs.
However, it is also true that there are 25 million business accounts on Instagram and which makes it hard for brands who lack a well-planned growth strategy.
Suppose youโre trying to figure out how to get more engagement on Instagram. In that case, you have to think out of the box and work like some brands that are resorting to dubious means like using bots to create more likes, buying followers, and also use third-party apps to automate engagement.
It is more likely that you would have heard of certain shortcuts for gaining a huge following. There are certain users who buy followers on Instagram, and there are others who use bots. Although these techniques could help you out in growing your followers, they are not that effective from the business perspective. In addition, Instagram has also revamped its algorithm for monitoring fake activity on its platform. Therefore, while Instagram shortcuts can boost your number of followers, the achievement through this means is temporary.
The question that arises is what you should do to grow your number of followers organically. The simple answer would be to follow real strategies and hard work while avoiding shortcuts.
Before moving forward, you should keep in mind some of the most common KPIs, such as engagement per follower, website traffic, link clicks, post engagement, and hashtag usage. Letโs talk about some of the ingenious ways to grow your Instagram profile followers organically.
1. Try to Create Engaging Content
It is true beyond the shadow of a doubt that Instagram users are engaged and prefer to share and comment on posts and stories that can be photos or videos that are good in their opinion.
A recent study has revealed that, on average, Instagram images can get as many as 23 percent more engagements as compared to Facebook images.
The very first rule to create unique and engaging content is to draw your audienceโs attention on Instagram. The more engaging your content is, it is more likely that people will decide to share it. Here are some of the useful tips to create engaging content and enhance your engagement rate on Instagram:
- Make sure that you have uploaded more video content as this kind of video post is more efficient to get 38 percent more engagement rather than posts with images. Just in case if you are not willing to hire a professional video agency, you should opt for creating your own video with the help of video marketing tools as well as platforms.
- Try to create content that you personally feel your audience can relate to. The top-level content will mostly depend upon your audience, so it is essential that you have a clear understanding of them in the very first place.
- One of the essential strategies would be to post viral topics from other platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.
- It is also necessary that you use the right hashtags to create more engagement and subsequent followers. One of the best ways can be to take the advice of topmost social media trainers and Instagram advocates and earn more followers quickly.
2. Make Sure to Search Your Target Audience Thoroughly
It is an undeniable fact that there is no long-term advantage of promoting your content to the type of audience who have no interest in you and want a like back. The reason behind it is that they will un-follow you in no time and ponder as to where everything went wrong.
If you can easily get your target audience on the Instagram right, you can comparatively get a higher engagement rate, and this clearly means your posts will appear higher up in your followersโ feeds.
Make sure that you get an overview of the demographic makeup of your clear follower-base, such as age, gender, and location, and this will become easy on how to get more followers on Instagram for free. It is advisable to research more in-depth stats such as when your followers are online or what language they use, etc.
You should also keep an eye on your competitors with the same target audience and what kind of posts are they making? And if yes, what are they saying there, and what tone are they using? Try to make sure that you focus on the most boosted posts of your competitors and then break it down to comprehend the most probable reasons that post worked so good with their audience.
If you want to gain some knowledge, just ask! Try to ask your current audience about their most favored type of Instagram content and the accounts they follow. Try to ask them in your next Instagram post or Story, and wait for the beneficial insights.
3. Try to Use a Variety of Hashtags That are Relevant
Hashtags are currently an amazing discoverability tool, but thereโs no need whatsoever to use the full 30 hashtag allowance that social media offers.
Instead of using 30 various hashtags on each and every post and the risk of some of these hashtags being blacklisted, use lesser but rather than better-researched hashtags that better reflect your content. Experts suggest that between 7 โ 10 hashtags will be good enough, and try to remember that your content must deliver what your hashtags are promising.
4. Use Tagging and Geo-Location As Much As Possible
One of the most convenient ways to grow your Instagram organically is by utilizing the geo-location tags, most specifically if youโre posting from a renowned and Instagrammable place.
In addition, if youโre working in coordination with another brand or reposting content from another account, the best advice would be to get permission in the first place. Make sure to tag them in your caption and also on the photo.
It is more expected that they will repay the favor in future and the best part is that this works both ways. Just in case if anyone wants to share your content, try to send them a reminder that they must tag you and also give you full credit through the post.
5. Schedule Your Posts
After youโve accumulated fresh and engaging content, the next step will be to schedule your posts for a specific duration, like one week or a month, depending on how far out you would like to plan.
The key is to post at the proper time. After carefully analyzing the top 20 Instagram accounts from as many as 11 different industries, they found, the best time to post depends on the type of industry.
Let us take the example of travel and tourism in which the best time to post is on Friday between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. while the ideal time for media and entertainment will be from Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12 to 3 p.m.
6. Join the Engagement Group
An Instagram Engagement Group is the best place for Instagram users that can help each other in gaining more engagement and the type of followers. Most of these groups can easily be found on Telegram.
Instagram Engagement groups are the type of group conversations within Instagram and various other platforms such as the Telegram app. In participating in these kinds of groups, you should like and/or comment on other membersโ posts in return for their own posts getting liked and/or commented.
If each member of the group tries to upload a new post on Instagram, the overall group will be of help by liking, sharing, and leaving certain comments on the post. Most of the groups also have certain rules that you have to follow when it comes to participating to ensure everyone gets the most out of each post.
Wrapping Up
Instagram for business is one of the best platforms to communicate your brand visually and also reach your audience, itโs no longer a social network. Ever since the launch of Instagram Ads, Instagram TV, and Instagram Business Profiles, it has revolutionized into a playing field for influencers as well as marketers and certain businesses to boost themselves.
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