So you want to gain massive followers on Instagram? It will be a simple task once you finish reading my guide! You’ll be able to get familiarize with Instagram and get this hot social media site to work for your business by attracting potential leads to your products/services.
Having over 500 million active users, Instagram is a great platform to grow your brand. In this post, I will reveal how to increase your Instagram followers with out spending a dime. I will also discuss the different tactics that helped me go from zero to 15k Instagram followers and counting.
Make sure to follow my account at @nancybadillo13
This post will be broken down into three sections:
The importance of optimizing your profile
Instagram limits and regulations
My guide from zero to 15k followers and counting
Optimize Your Profile
First and foremost before you start working on your followers, we need to make sure your profile is optimize. You’ve heard it before making a first impression is important and on social media this is truer than ever. Instagram bio is the first thing people will look at after stumbling across your account.
It’s extremely important to create a strong bio for those using Instagram to grow their business and gain new leads. The bio will determine if the potential lead will follow you / click on the link or not.
Things To Include In Bio:
What are your services / what do you do
Your special offer which is the link bait
A strong call to action with arrows pointing down
Emojis and line breaks to make it fun and visually appealing (Culture of Instagram is using Hashtags and Emojis)
Max limit of 150 characters (does not include the link)
Profile Picture
The next step is to choose a profile picture, which speaks about your personality or business. If you’re the face of the brand or product then your face must be the featured image. However, for business accounts the brand logo should be use as your profile picture.
Username
The username you use for Instagram should be the same or similar across your other social media platforms like Twitter, YouTube, etc; At times choosing a name can be tricky since all the good usernames have already been claimed. Take your time and choose wisely!
Things To Consider When Choosing A Username:
The username should be easy to remember
Unique username
Easy to spell (Short as possible)
Pick wisely (the username is for life)
Don’t use underscores
Don’t use any consecutive repeating characters, letters, or symbols
Choose A Theme
Having a cohesive Instagram theme can set a brand apart. Why should a business care of sticking to a theme? The main reason is because when you first come across an Instagram account, the first thing you see is an overall feed of their images – so why not make it visually appealing.
A cohesive Instagram theme helps gain new followers and showcase your brand. When the potential buyer is looking to collaborate with you or buy your services they already know exactly what your business is all about.When you have established your theme, make sure to stick with it.
For instance, if your business sells swimwear apparel, then all the pictures you upload should be about swimwear or related items. You not be posting an image of a puppy or anything that is not geared towards swimwear.
Take a look at @thisisglamorous, I love her beautiful theme!
Make Instagram Public
The most common mistake many business make is having their Instagram account private. The fastest way to lose followers and potential new leads is having your account private. If your account is set as private its pretty simple to change to public. Click on profile settings, edit your profile settings, and turn off Private Account.
Set Up Instagram for Business
A couple of months ago Facebook purchased Instagram. The biggest change is that Instagram is finally business friendly. If you want to gain massive leads and targeted prospective customers you need to convert your Instagram from personal to business. Important Note: You must connect your Facebook Page with your Business Profile on Instagram, this is how prospective leads get access to your contact information.
Benefits of Converting To Business:
Contact Us Button: Prospective leads can call, email, or visit your establishment.
Include analytics for: Top post, followers by gender, age range, top locations, and followers are most active.
Additional analytics:
Impressions: The total number of times your post has been seen.
Reach: The number of unique accounts that have seen your post.
Engagement: Number of likes and comments on your post.
The amount of impressions per week.
The number of clicks to your website.
Note: Currently, a Business Profile on Instagram can only be connected to a single Facebook Page.
Upload Images
The final step is to upload a minimum of 5 photos before you start following any accounts or working on your following. The last thing you want is a perspective lead not follow because there are no images in your feed or for them to mistaken your account for spam.
The images should be cohesive to your theme and be high quality images. The photos should convey a message about your brand that will resonate with your target audience.
Hashtags
Understanding how to tag your photos is fundamental to your success on Instagram. Tagging your photos with the appropriate hashtag will help you reach your target audience and earn you a lot of your desired followers within your niche.
Hashtags can be tricky, but if used correctly, it can help you find a target audience. Many top influencers argue whether using all 30 hashtags in a post can be too much. In my experience, using all 30 hashtags help me reach a larger audience. Make sure to use at least a minimum of 11 + hasthtags.
For example, when tagging my photos since I am in the digital marketing space my hashtags tend to be: #BloggingTips #Blogger #Blog #OnlineMarketing #MakeMoneyOnline #blogwithnancy
Read my latest post: 100 Hashtags for Female Entrepreneurs
Add Caption
Did you know that pictures that have caption and emojis have a higher drive of engagement? Every picture you upload should have a caption and an emoji. I have noticed my comments and engagement increased by simply adding both emoji and captions. Why use emojis? The culture of Instagram uses emojis to express themselves and they are not going anywhere.
For instance, Thank God is Friday! What do you have planned for this weekend? Comment & tell us below! (Follow with a happy smile or emoji of your choice)
Here is an example of me using a caption, emoji, and a call to action. I received 30 comments and 157 likes!
From a business stand of point every caption should end with a call to action to encourage the social aspect of social media.
The images should have the following:
Tell a story
Ask a question
Tag appropriately
Experiment with emojis and hashtags
Encourage your audience to click on the bio link
Understanding Instagram
The following are important limits about Instagram to keep in mind:
The number of people who you can follow on Instagram is 7500 (The purpose of its to reduce spam)
No limit on how many people can follow you
The number of likes you can perform on Instagram is 350 likes per hour
Your Instagram bio can not exceed 150 characters
No limit on the number of posts you can share
The bio is the only place where a link can be added
30 Hash tags per max (Use a min of 11 + )
2,200 Characters when writing an image description
100 Comments per hour
You can only include up to 5 @ mentions in a single comment
You can’t post multiple, duplicate comments (including emoji)
Depending on the size of your account anywhere from 49-90 follows and un-follows per hour
How To Get More Followers on Instagram
I will teach you now of all my tricks, tools, and strategies that helped me built my Instagram account from zero to 15k and counting.
WARNING: Some of the tactics may violate Instagram Terms of Use. What does this mean? Well these tactics can lead to your account being permanently closed with no warning! Proceed at your own risk.
Steal Your Competitors Followers
The easiest way to increase your following is stealing your competitor’s followers. The best part of this strategy is that your competitor already did all the hard work finding their target audience.
For instance, I would find competitors in my niche and start following all of their followers. These are people that have already express some level of interest in my niche because they are following my competitor.
I will make sure to abide by Instagram limit of 90 followers per hour. The percentage of followers who do follow back is pretty low so you want to continue doing this strategy every hour. If you have a lot of time in your hands you can grow the account quicker. Consistency is the key and it will not happen over night. If you do this strategy at least 5 times a day, you can gain hundreds of new followers per day.
Post At The Right Time
Are you posting on Instagram at the right time of day to ensure your followers see your photo?
Accordingly to Matt Smith founder of Lategrammer, the most successful times to post on average are before school or work or after 5pm when people are commuting back home.
The highest engagement was found on Wednesday evening between 5-6pm. I have noticed that my morning post have been receiving a lot more engagement and impressions than my evening ones. I tend to post during lunch time and before 8 am.
Start Commenting On People’s Photos
Another tactic that I use to grow my Instagram account is leaving meaningful comments on people’s photos.
For instance, I love the dress! I wish I had your style to rock it, love it. The comment should be genuine and relevant to the picture. (Do not spam with comments)
I usually leave comments when Instagram limits have kicked in and I can’t follow any additional accounts. This helps me kill sometime until the limit has been removed and hopefully gain new followers. It aslo gives me time to find other competitors within my niche.
Start Liking Photos
Another way to get noticed and gain new followers is to start liking photos in your feed. When you tap “Home”, you’ll see a feed of all the pictures of the people who you are following.
The purpose of this technique is that individuals who have not followed you back yet, will now start taking notice of your profile and hopefully follow back. TIP: I suggest liking about 2-4 pictures, so when they take a look at their notifications you can stand out.
Download CrowdFire App
Crowdfire is my favorite app that helps me manage and grow my Instagram following. The social media engagement tool can be used on both Instagram and Twitter.
It really helps me become more efficient with time by unfollowing people at a faster rate than doing it directly from Instagram.
The new followers, I usually give them two days to follow me back. My normal regimen is head to Crowdfire app, click on non-followers, the app automatically syncs and ask, would you like to load the results now? Tip: I don’t upload the new results because it’s going to add the recent followers and I want to give them at least 2 days to follow back. (I press cancel)
I then proceed to un-follow all the non-followers until I hit the threshold of around 90 people and have to wait another hour.
I will continue doing the same thing every hour or 2 hours depending on my workload for the day. However, even if you do it once a day by the end of the month it will help you increase your following.
Post Regularly
Many people might argue that posting on a regular basis can over saturate your followers feed.
Posting regularly anywhere from 3-5 post a day has helped me increase my following and engagement compare to when I was posting 1 per day.
An easy way not to over saturate your audience feeds is by posting at different times. For instance, you can upload two photos in the morning, maybe one in the afternoon, and upload again in the evening.
You can also find out when your followers are active on Instagram by using the Business Insights feature which will help you determine which time are the best to post for visibility and engagement.
The biggest mistake many businesses make is not posting on a regular basis and loosing out on prospective leads. Every time you post, it’s stamp with the day you uploaded that image and you don’t want the last post to be 3 weeks old.
Plan Your Instagram Content
As you explore the potential of Instagram for your business, it’s important to plan your Instagram content. Plan your content ahead, set a regular schedule for posting, and don’t forget to engage with your audience.
4 Instagram Tools for Scheduling Instagram Updates:
Instamate
ScheduGram
Latergramme
Instapult
Take off
Reply To Comments
When a person takes time to leave a comment you should always reply back. Make it your objective to always show your reader, how you value their feedback. Make sure to acknowledge your readers and you will be rewarded with a great online community. All social media platforms main purpose its to be social with your audience.
Benefits of Replying To Comments
Build Relationships
Gain Readers
Create An Online Community
Become the expert of your niche
It’s nice to be nice
The most important aspect of this tutorial is to remember consistency is the key to growing your Instagram account. It will not happen over night and it does take a lot of time and effort from your end.
Make sure to follow this procedure every day and when you least expected it, you’ll start seeing your Instagram account growing. Spend a little more time and see it grow as at faster rate about hundreds of new followers per day!
I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial on how to increase Instagram followers! Please join my newsletter to receive free digital marketing tips and tricks!