It is TIME to announce the release of my social media guide, GROW. I have been working on this guide for months, gathering and compiling all of the information that I’ve learned over the last 4 ish years. There’s a lot. You can read the intro to the guide here.
Let’s talk about how many guides are out there. There are so many. So why would you buy MY guide, when you know there are dozens others accessible to you? I know everyone will say that their guide is different, which is why I want to SHOW you. Show you that I have spent years and years making mistakes, and learning from them, so you don’t have to. This guide is filled with all of the things that I truly wish I had known half a decade ago. But to really help show you, I’ll give you a few tidbits of information from the guide.
How to use hashtags effectively
Hashtags are one of the most important tools you have at your disposal on Instagram, and a lot of people don’t even realize it. If done appropriately, you can reach tens of thousands(to hundreds of thousands) or new accounts through hashtags alone.
But how do you go about selecting hashtags??
This is a lot of trial and error. And unfortunately, you can have hashtags work GREAT on one post, and then have it completely flop on the next post.
Often, I will spend just as long curating hashtags for a post as I do creating the caption for a photo. If I am lazy with my hashtags, it will show up in my analytics and I will get barely any hits on my post from hashtags.
One of the questions I get the MOST about hashtags, is how to find the right hashtags for your post. Unfortunately, I do not have the perfect list of hashtags for you that will result in your Instagram success. The reason for this, though, is because every account is different, and every post/photo is different.
So the hashtags you use for one photo won’t always be the same for the next photo.
Hashtags take trial and error. There are apps and websites that are designed to help you find hashtags that are relevant to your photo, but I personally have never found one that has provided hashtags that have boosted my impressions.
So, here’s my advice for finding the right hashtags for you and your account. Find a few accounts on Instagram that have very similar content to yours, and has good engagement on their account. Go through their posts and copy down their hashtags(the best way to do this is to type them all out in the notes app on your phone!). Do this for a few different posts to see if they change them up, and do this for a few different accounts. This will help you find hashtags that are popular among your niche.
Creating a community
Stop thinking about your audience as an audience.
Start thinking of them as friends.
No, you don’t have the time to be invested in each of their daily lives(and this isn’t necessarily something you want to try to do, either).
But there is a huge difference between someone who has a community of people who support them, and someone who has a passive audience.
That active community is the one that will benefit you. They will like your sponsored posts, they’ll share your posts in their stories, they’ll enter your giveaways, they’ll comment, DM, and generally be engaged. They’ll be INTERESTED in the things you’re posting, the mundane day to day that you share. Why?
The first step to cultivating, or creating, a community on Instagram, is to be authentic. Everyone says that you should be authentic. But what does it even mean?
You want your followers to relate to you, as well as care about the things you’re doing. I’ve seen influencers achieve this without posting incredibly relatable content. But they post things their followers LOVE. People know what to expect when they see your content pop up in their feed.
Don’t try to be somebody that you’re not. If you’re not someone who feels comfortable posting photos in a swimsuit at the beach, don’t feel pressure to do so. If you don’t like to post overly creative photos, tossing items in the air or striking dramatic poses, DON’T. If pictures of your food or baby or cute styled home are what makes you feel proud when you post, then THAT is what you should be posting.
It’s hard to not compare your content with everyone else’s, but you are YOU, so be authentic and stay true to what YOU want to post.
Instagram is all about who you know
Instagram is all about who you know.
Really.
Yes, you can absolutely see success by focusing solely on creating good content and engaging with your audience BUT you will absolutely see success sooner if you are connecting with other creators.
Now, you have to be careful with this. You need to be networking in hopes of genuine connection and NOT to climb the social ladder. If you are connecting with someone solely based on the amount of followers they have and not because you admire them or love their content, then you are doing it wrong.
Networking and connecting is actually super easy! It can be time consuming but in execution, is fairly simple.
If there are creators that you want to befriend, then interact with them. Comment on their posts, reply to their instagram stories. If they have social challenges, participate in them! A huge tip I have is to turn post notifications on for these creators that you want to connect with! If you are pretty consistently one of the first people commenting on posts or replying to stories, you will be on their radar! And most creators spend the first hour after they post, paying pretty close attention to their posts. So, if you comment within those first few minutes, there’s a good chance that they will click through to your profile to reciprocate the love.
All of this, and SOOOO much more(including more on these specific topics, too!) is included in my guide, GROW. The first 20 people to purchase it get $10 off, so grab your copy now to be one of the first!