Facebook is dead ‚ it’s going to rest in a Myspace-like grave in a few years. Mark our words.
And we don’t think Legbook or something else will pop up in its place. We already have Facebook’s replacement — it’s called Instagram.
The one billion user strong photographic social media network is strong and growing every day. And, as such, people are giving it more attention.
Are you one of them? Are you trying to grow your Instagram following? We’ve got tips for you below — and they don’t cost a dime!
1. Have a Brand
Even if you’re just one person, you have a brand. Your brand is a mix of your personality, your values, and your tastes. It’s what draws you towards posting one shot because of the lighting, and not the other.
And that’s a good thing! Brands are like fingerprints, none are exactly alike — which is what your followers like. If you don’t know your brand, feel free to ask your friends.
Send them an Instagram message and ask them to describe your brand or give you some descriptors about what you post on Instagram. They’re you’re friends, so they’ll happily take three minutes to help you out.
For example, I had a friend that was a nanny but also liked to post cute selfies. She went through this process and ended up with the brand “a babe who takes care of babes.” It’s specific and fitting — perfect!
2. Post Consistently
You’re never going to grow a following if your followers forget about you. They need to see your name at least once a day to build name recognition and to establish yourself on their timeline.
Some people think you need to post once a day, others twice. Why twice?
With the algorithm, the organic life of a post is about twelve hours. After twelve hours, your post will get buried by others and fewer people will see it.
But don’t take our word for it, you need to experiment with posting times.
3. Experiment with Posting Times
For two or three days, do an experiment. Have four or six posts that you plan to put out on Instagram. Make a little time schedule on a piece of paper.
Like, “Monday I’ll post at 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. Tuesday I’ll do noon and six p.m.”
The trick to this experiment is to use the same hashtags and relatively similar content. Then go back through and see which of your posts got the most likes. These are your best posting times.
Try to stick as close to them as you can, but remember there are going to be off days. Like, no one is looking at Instagram at 9 a.m. on Christmas morning — life does sometimes trump social media.
4. Do a Collab
We’ve all gotten some skeezy feeling message in our DM’s from a no-name brand asking to collaborate with us. Then you talk to them more and it turns out they want $35 to post your selfie on their feed.
No thanks. There are plenty of other accounts who are willing to exchange exposure posts for free — and for access to your audience.
When you ask someone to collab, make sure it’s someone you have some sort of online relationship with. Maybe you’ve been following each other for a while, maybe you’ve had a few DMs.
Be honest about what you want and don’t try to mask it. They probably want to grow Instagram followers too!
5. Use Bots — Or Don’t
There are bot systems out there that will like and even comment on posts from your account. This attention from an unknown account usually warrants at least a glance at your page.
If they like what they see, they might give you a follow.
But yes — this is generally too good to be true. Instagram hates bots, because, as a Facebook-product, it’s obsessed with authenticity.
So if you’re going to use bots, make sure you’re subtle about it and don’t get greedy. You can find an assortment of both apps on the app store or even as Google Chrome extensions.
6. Experiment
If you think about it, all social media interactions and posts are experiments. The idea of an online community hasn’t existed long enough for us to know what it means in the bigger sense.
But it doesn’t have to be that meta. What we really meant by experiment is that you should try out different Instagram products.
Have you posted a video on your feed lately? What about stories? How about going live?
Play with the options Instagram gives you. There are rumors that the more you use their products, the better spot they’ll give you in the algorithm.
Those rumors have neither been confirmed nor denied.
7. Talk to Your Followers
Finally, if someone takes the time to comment on your post, respond to them! Especially if you can tell it’s not a bot.
If you don’t know, bot comments usually look something like Emoji, one or two generic words, emoji. The order may be a little different, but it’ll feel very generic.
Responding to real people will help you grow a community, where followers will follow.
Grow Your Instagram Following — With Consistency
As good as these tips are, none of them are going to work if you just try them once then give up. You need to make a consistent effort before you write something off.
Hopefully, you double-tap liked this post on how to grow your Instagram following.
Want to learn more secrets to success (hint: consistency)? Click here.