Instagram Hacks
Instagram is now one of the most popular social networking platforms.
It is driven by creative visual content which engages and attracts new audiences every day.
With this blog, I'm trying to help the reader with proven and tested techniques that can help improve your overall Instagram performance.
Organic Reach Hacks
- People use the search on Instagram to look for specific keywords. Having such keywords in your username can help. For example, Fitness Trainer
- Your Instagram captions are critical. It is essential to use power words. Write captions that discuss dreams, aspirations and goals. The following tools can help
- https://seopressor.com/blog-title-generator/
- http://www.upworthygenerator.com/
- https://www.portent.com/tools/title-maker
- https://www.hubspot.com/blog-topic-generator
- https://www.impactbnd.com/blog-title-generator/blogabout
- Quality check the caption’s first line using either of the below
- Mix and match different hashtags. Generic, specific to your post and popular ones such as #business or #success, can help improve your performance over time.
- Hashtag search volumes can be found here - https://hashtagify.me/
- I recommend using a maximum of 20 to 24 hashtags.
- Do not repeat hashtags in the same post. Also, look out for banned hashtags and prevent using to avoid being shadowbanned.
Like & Comment Hacks
- Post optimization: Add location, tag people, engaging caption and relevant hashtags
- Captions & Emojis: Add a call to action to your captions. For example, drop your favourite emoji if you agree or double tap if you agree. Encouraging the conversation to happen in the comment section can boost your engagement.
- Try and reply to the comments within the first 30 minutes.
- Best time for posting content. You can find this under Insights.
- Always share your new post on Instagram Story so that you can drive traffic to the original content within the first 30 minutes
- Add location, content specific hashtags to your story.
- Use 4 different sets of hashtags for you post
- Post videos in the format Garyvee uses- https://www.instagram.com/garyvee/
- List of video editing tools - https://buffer.com/library/video-editing-software
- Make slightly over 1 minute or 2-minute videos to post on IGTV
- Follow hashtags and accounts relevant to you. Repost good quality content.
- Instagram repost apps - https://appstipsandtricks.com/instagram-repost-apps/
Instagram Story Hacks
- To create a rainbow text on Instagram story follow below:
- Select text
- Press and hold any colour you want in the colour tray and it will automatically open the rainbow palette
- Simultaneously using two hands, drag one finger across the text you want to switch to rainbow and the other across the rainbow palette, slowly
- Post multiple images in a single image by simply copy-pasting it using the text tool
- Reveal the underlying image on Instagram Story
- Upload the image you want to reveal from camera roll
- Tap the pen icon and choose your brand colour
- Tap and long press until the chosen colour is filled
- Now, tap the eraser icon and choose the size of the eraser. Swipe or tap on the screen to reveal the image
- Adding hashtag stickers can destroy the look of Instagram Story. Follow any of two methods to hide the hashtags
- Make the hashtags smaller and place a GIF or image sticker above it
- Change the hashtags text colour to match the background
Instagram Follower hacks
- Run a contest
- Partner with influencers
- Curate your stories and feature them in your Instagram story highlights
- Use quiz stickers in your stories as and when appropriate
- Go live from the place of your event and if some of the audience is highly interested or you know that have a good amount of followers, go live with them
Hashtags logic
- The use of hashtags Hashtags typically came into existence as searchable terms on Twitter
- This helped Twitter to categorise, tag and index content, brands and accounts. When hashtags were brought in to Instagram they worked based on how many posts had them.
- Now the Algorithm of Instagram has changed, to make people stay longer on the Instagram platform
- The longer someone stays on the platform, the more ads they can be shown
- Instagram now uses hashtags to tag accounts and their content based on reach, hashtags, etc.
- Using more hashtags gives mixed signals to the algorithm. Hence, our request to use a maximum of 20 to 25 hashtags. Always keep hashtags relevant to the brand & topics you want to be associated with.
Instagram Hashtags
Adding the right hashtags on the posts gives higher engagement than if you didn’t have any. Hashtags are a combination of emoji, number or letters preceded by a # symbol.
When one clicks on the hashtags or searches for it, they will see a page with posts tagged with it.
Your post rank on the hashtag page depends upon engagement rate and posted time. You can reach the user's feed even if they are not your follower. Creating good content and adding the relevant hashtags can increase the followers count.
Find Instagram Hashtags
- Check out what hashtags are used by your competitors and search for alternative hashtags to use
- Enter the relevant keyword in Instagram's Explore feature and then go to the Tags tab. Instagram will now show you the hashtags with the specific keyword as well as posts counts
- You could also do “(hashtag you want to explore)” Google search. The top result is usually from Instagram or picks the Instagram ones
- Browse through the most successful posts that have your hashtags and include them if appropriate. Repost if highly relevant and add a great caption to it
- Hashtag categories to look at
- Industry tags (#hotel)
- Niche tags(#Healthandwellness)
- Branded tags (your company or product/service name)
- Community tags (#GoBucks)
- Location tags (#OrlandoHotels)
- Event tags (#NationalWomensDay2019)
- Event type tags (#WeddingDay)
Other Instagram Best Practices
- Research: Find out the keywords your audience and influencers are using in their posts
- Influencer finding tools
- Hashtag research tools: Use hashtag finding tools like Hashtagify to find the demand of each hashtag and related keywords. This will help you to increase the post reach and gain followers
- Branded Hashtags: Create a branded hashtags for your business and share it constantly to increase brand awareness. It is one of the easiest ways for the user to find your content
- Always use a mix of hashtag sizes from small to medium because when you use a generic hashtag like #business or #success post would struggle to appear in the feed since it has a massive volume
- Instagram may consider you spam when you use the same hashtags too many times which reduces the post reach as well
Other options to explore
- Shop: Set up a shop on Instagram & Facebook to sell your brand merchandise
- Another stream of income
- To have more tangible ways of interacting with fans
- Create a cult/followership for individual artists as well as the brand
- Steps are here - https://www.facebook.com/business/instagram/shopping/guide
- Collaborations: Once we have 10,000+ followers collaboration opportunities could be explored and post specific revenue could be generated
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