Welcome to my 8th of 10 threads posted on 10 consecutive days all about growing an Instagram business!
Topics:
👉Explore Page
👉Comments
👉Using Stories
👉Shoutouts
👉Collaborations
Let’s go! ⬇️
📍The explore page is the holy grail of Instagram growth
One of your main goals when it comes to Instagram growth should be to enhance explore page presence
That’s also what you’re trying to do whenever you try to boost engagement on your content
But don’t expect to rank well on big hashtags when you’re young
Now that we understand the explore page a bit, let’s talk about engaging with others content
This is just like engaging with other accounts to grow on Twitter
Commenting on other pages in your niche gets eyes on your profile
Commenting also establishes you as a player in your community
👉Like posts often
👉Leave good comments*
*Leave good comments by making the original post relatable, finding the main point of the topic and addressing it, or asking a question
👉Try to become the pinned comment *
The new pinned comment feature (cont)
If you can become the pinned comment on a big accounts post, you’ll get a LOT of exposure
📍How to find content to comment on
You can find big accounts/hashtags in your niche and comment on the most recent posts
Instead, turn on post notifications and try to be one of the first comments
This will allow your comment to generate a lot of likes and rank higher
📍Remember that you are generally not speaking to the account when you are commenting
They are too big to notice you
Instead, gear your comments to the other people browsing the comments section - that’s your audience
Using the story feature well is critical to a good account
Most people associate the story feature with promoting products or services
This is because the story feature makes it easy to direct your followers to links
👉Engage with your audience
👉Direct engagement to a post
👉Conduct shoutouts
Engage with your audience by conducting polls and QnA
Direct engagement by linking a new post in your story
And this brings us to my favorite growth strategy: conducting shoutouts
There are two types of shoutouts:
👉Mutual shoutouts (free)
👉Paid shoutouts
I prefer mutual shoutouts because you can do them more often, and I’ve found they help you grow faster
👉Contact pages in your niche around your size
👉Ask to exchange shoutouts
👉Create a shout-out story post for yourself
👉Send the other account your shout out post and receive theirs
👉Both of you shout each other out on your stories
Either way, one this is very important:
📍It must include a short call to action
I see a lot of posts saying “I highly recommend you follow _______” which I really don’t like
👉Firm
👉Not overused
👉Not a suggestion but a command
Something like:
“If you’re a fan of (topic), you need to follow _______”
Or
“Go follow my friend ______ right now if you’re a fan of (topic)!”
Paid shoutouts are pretty simple.
Instead of doing a mutual shoutouts with a similarly sized page, you just pay a big account to shout you out on their story.
This is also a good growth idea, and if you have some money to spend, can help you grow.
A shoutout group is similar to a retweet group on twitter
Related accounts choose which account gets a shout out on each day, and every account shouts that account out on their given day
This is another really great way to grow
Lastly, do NOT do feed shoutouts
This is spammy and will hurt the aesthetic of your account
Stick to stories for shoutouts
📍This is another growth strategy that can work well, but it can be annoying to your followers
Basically, a collaboration is when you split a post “in half” with another account and each of you feature your half on your page
You feature 3 on your page and tell your audience to visit the other account for the remaining 3
The account you are collaborating with does the same
You can upgrade this idea by making the post a carousel, and telling your followers that the remaining content is on your friends page on the second slide
That’ll be all for this thread!
Recap:
👉Your goal with every post should be to get on the explore page
👉Engage with other accounts content to get noticed
👉Use the story feature to engage with your followers, promote your content, and conduct shout outs
👉Use shoutouts to grow faster
👉Use paid promos to grow extra fast if you can afford them
Tomorrow, we will finally get to the best part: MONETIZATION 😈
In the meantime, make sure you are following my friend @PascalGrosz. He’s a master of Instagram growth and has an excellent book too