01 Sep How My Instagram Account Went From 10K to 48K
My Tricks and Tips to Growing Your Instagram Profile
My Instagram account started out innocently as my therapy page. It was a page that was filled with quotes and images that inspired me. It was an outlet to help me fight the brain game. To kept my mind in check and feed my brain with positive, inspirational thoughts and images daily. It was solely for me. As my page began to grow I noticed that more and more people liked what I shared and became inspired along the way. It become a page for everyone and that’s when I decided to changed it up a little.
I started to take notice. The thing is I’m dyslexic as I’ve said before (You can read more on this here) I pick patterns up really quickly, I can feel when the markets about to changes and can normally feel the next move. I’m no guru by any means, I just see and feel things differently. I monitored the things that worked and didn’t and upped the anti. It became a challenge. I’m competitive, with myself and only myself. I like to challenge myself, feed my brain and be my own inspiration. It’s as simply as that. So here’s a couple of tricks I learnt along the way…
My top 5 tips on growing your Instagram page
1. Know your market.
Research your followers. Are your followers prodominately male or female? What are their age groups, where do they live? I can tell you I have 75% female followers that range between 25-35 age group mostly and live in Australia, America, Ibiza/Spain. If your a blogger or business I strongly suggest you use the Instagram Business Tools. It’s bloody brilliant! It tells you so much about your market. It takes the guessing game away. Once you know your followers you can then target them appropriately. Please don’t lose who you are along the way thou. Remember this is your page, share your thoughts and inspo with your followers in mind.
2. Timing is everything!
I prodominately share first thing in the morning or late at night. Majority of my followers seem to be like me, lay in bed and check their phones. As I have a lot of followers overseas my posts start as early as 4:30am… yep! I’m a morning person, always up at sparrow fart! My images with the most likes are always during this time. I also find Friday to Sunday is when I recieve majority of my followers. I flood my page at this time but if you find your page has momentum, stop everything for a day! Sometimes your post maybe in the top posts under a hashtag and traffic is driven to your page, stop everything! Can’t stress this enough. Just comment on your post. This has worked for me numerous times and I’ve got over 2000 followers in the one day! Don’t ask me how it works but it does, well for me anyway. And consistency, your followers look forward to your morning or evening posts, it triggers their brain to check. Consistency is everything! So once again know you market, their movements, the lot! Market research is key!
3. Hashtags!
These puppies are gold! They can generate 1000’s of followers to your page. I know I find majority of my followers via this avenue. Research the hashtags that best suit your style and try and only tag the ones with over 1 million links. This made a huge difference to the growth of my account. It’s the little things that make all the difference. Your capped at 30 per post so use them wisely. Change them up from time to time also. A friend just brought to my attention shadow blocking. It’s when you use the same hashtags over and over. Instagram thinks your a robot which obviously means no traffic.
4. Don’t buy followers or promote images!!
Can’t stress this enough, your followers can pick it a mile away. Please don’t do it. I know sometimes it can happen via Facebook (learnt this the hard way) but try not to do it. It’s almost like an unwritten law within the Insta community. You can tell who has and who hasn’t. When they have 10,000 followers and only get 25 likes? Hmmmmm.. Save your money. Facebook however is a completely different kettle of fish. If your not promoting via there then your snoozing. That’s my option anyway, that might be a whole other post. You can get bots that boost our page with out you knowing then suddenly remove them weeks later. I hate these little bastards! I recently had this happen. I lost 1500 followers in one weekend. It’s so frustrating!! They come from the companies that help you gain followers I think. You take it personally, they get you in the feels and you almost become tempted to buy followers. Don’t do it! It’s not worth it! You want genuine followers that are inspired by you, that are interested in your page and want to share the love and like your images. It’s bit like the giveaway loops. It’s kind of like buying your followers but not as bad. Lots of followers but not much interaction. Don’t get me wrong you may get a small amount but often or not they unfollow after the giveaways finished.
5. Always speak your truth….
Believe in your message. Followers can see if your images are paid or not. They can see if it’s not in theme with your vibe. Always try to be genuine on your page even though you may get products always keep it real and honest. I never imagined my page to get to 48k followers, it’s got so much bigger than I had ever anticipated. It’s not just for me know, it’s for the teenage girls that get bullied at school and private message to say ‘Thank you! Thank you! For teaching me I’m ok just the way I am’ it’s for the mother who’s ready to run away and not look back, it’s for the budding photographer to learn a new angle for an image. I get countless private messages via Instagram, Facebook and Twitter thanking me for the inspiration, thanking me for helping them to believe in themselves. That’s why I do my Instagram page now. As I’ve said before I’m no guru, but if I can bring a little sunshine to a dark day then I’m happy! Not everyone needs to believe in your message, not everyone has to like your page but if you speak your truth you’ll find your people, you’ll find your cheer squad and you’ll soar! Know your people.
Well that’s my top five tips hope that helps you in some way. Feel free to check out my Instagram account here>>> @thegypsy.mumma and don’t forget to follow 😉
Keep shining bright beautiful souls, until next time. 😘😘
