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Growing your Instagram account, strategy and discussion

Xeon

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Think of a product first, create it and then start your Instagram

I'm afraid I started the wrong way. Because it took almost one year for my product to be ready, back then, my plan was to start IG to gain all these followers for my specific niche, and then in future, insert my products occasionally into my feed. But then again, when I eventually launch officially, I won't be changing the content much, so maybe it won't have a big impact on me. The idea is "build an audience first, then market the product to them".

mentioning bigger accounts

Does this have any effect? Tbh, from my heavy usage of IG this one year, I can honestly say most of these bigger accounts (100k and above) don't give a rat's a$$, unless you're their personal friend in real life or something.

is of course very important- I read that if you don't post at a time, when your followers are awake and free to react, then your post won't get a high traction and won't be featured on the feed page of most of your followers, because Instagram "thinks" you may be a bot and the more followers you have and less reaction on your posts, the worse the algorithm is to your account.

Don't quite understand this paragraph. Do you mean we should post consistently at the same time each time?

Soon you can start using bigger accounts for shout outs (paid)

Have you tried this before? If so, mind sharing how much their rates are? e.g: account with 20K followers charge US$50 for 1 shoutout?

Would you memorise it by reading the captions
"Just the cactuses in my room- a memory from my ex girlfriend."
or...
"A live pic of me and my girlfriends chilling, periods synced and not shaving for a week."
or a caption like
"Aren't they beautiful"?

Do you think people still read captions, or just skip over after looking at the image? I always have this idea people nowadays don't have the time to read anymore, in this fast-pace society.
Btw, that 4th line above is funny and epic AF lol
I always admire everyone who can come up with such witty comments. It's like a natural to them.

Thanks for your valuable insight!
 
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YOUR QUESTION: I'm afraid I started the wrong way. Because it took almost one year for my product to be ready, back then, my plan was to start IG to gain all these followers for my specific niche, and then in future, insert my products occasionally into my feed. But then again, when I eventually launch officially, I won't be changing the content much, so maybe it won't have a big impact on me. The idea is "build an audience first, then market the product to them".

MY ANSWER: This works best if you are using pics, very closely related to your product. If you are going to sell your own branded sneakers then better while you're creating the product use pics and videos of sneakers only. I used to put pictures of jackets and t-shirts too, turned out people were more interested in the latter. Stick with the shoes only, you can mention the brand too or not. (*The shoes are just an example, I do not know what your product is :) )

YOUR QUESTION: Does this have any effect? Tbh, from my heavy usage of IG this one year, I can honestly say most of these bigger accounts (100k and above) don't give a rat's a$$, unless you're their personal friend in real life or something.

MY ANSWER: Contact them via email and DM- multiple times if needed. Make your message professional and offer something in return. No one does work for free.

YOUR QUESTION: Don't quite understand this paragraph. Do you mean we should post consistently at the same time each time?

MY ANSWER: Post regularly every day, not just once a week or a month. If you can stick to the best time, that works for your location- read, more activity for you then. Experiment with different hours first, write down the date and the hour you posted and how many likes and comments you got within 3 hours and after 2-4 weeks of experimenting different times on different days, choose the best ones. Remember that a timing on Monday won't work the same way as on Friday.

YOUR QUESTION: Have you tried this before? If so, mind sharing how much their rates are? e.g: account with 20K followers charge US$50 for 1 shoutout?

MY ANSWER: I would't pay Instagrammers with 20k followers. I would chase their followers until I am capable of paying $50 for a shoutout for a few hours on a feed, that attracts 100k-400k likes/views. Always think this way: "If I pay for my feed to be featured, is my product good enough and in stock, in case I get a great traction from its ad?"!

YOUR QUESTION: Do you think people still read captions, or just skip over after looking at the image? I always have this idea people nowadays don't have the time to read anymore, in this fast-pace society.
Btw, that 4th line above is funny and epic AF lol
I always admire everyone who can come up with such witty comments. It's like a natural to them.

MY ANSWER: If my 4th line from the pic wasn't funny, you would not have noted it ;)

YOU: Thanks for your valuable insight!

Sorry for my reply appearing this way, I haven't commented on TFLF since ages...
 
D

DeletedUser052

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EDIT: I’ve got 80 followers? How did that happen when I’ve never posted anything? Is it somehow linked to my Facebook account?

Most of IG users want to have huge followers. So, they use follow/unfollow technique.

They follow someone at random and hope that they'll follow back. They unfollow once they reach a certain amount of followers (some forget that too).

But, I am not sure if our FB accounts are linked to IG.
 

jon.M

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Most of IG users want to have huge followers. So, they use follow/unfollow technique.

They follow someone at random and hope that they'll follow back. They unfollow once they reach a certain amount of followers (some forget that too).

But, I am not sure if our FB accounts are linked to IG.

FB can be linked to Instagram, and in that case you'll get spammed with recommendations for which Facebook friends you can follow.

Screen-Shot-2016-03-22-at-5.20.51-PM.png
 
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Xeon

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For those folks interested in engagement pods, then in addition to the WolfGlobal and BoostUp ones mentioned in above posts, here's a website that keeps track of the latest pods you can join:
AllEngagement.com - The Instagram Engagement & Growth Guide: March 2018 - Full List of Telegram Engagement Groups for Instagram (8,754+ Members)

The list is not exhaustive, I know there's others out there and I'm hunting them down when I'm free.

It's 6 hours after I made my post and it has 24 comments (a few are by me). By the 24 - 36 hour mark, I expect that no. to hit 40 comments or more.

UPDATE: I just bought 5 custom comments from Buysocialmediamarketing.com to test out stuff. AVOID THESE GUYS! Basically, they let you fill out 5 boxes with your own comments and then they use fake accounts to post these 5 comments on your posts. All is good, until there's a glitch in their system, and they repost the same comment on my post with different accounts. That looks funny AF and it's a good thing I immediately removed those duplicated comments. :rofl:
 
Last edited:

jon.M

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I've been hitting the comment pods hard during the last two days. It's time intensive as hell but I feel it will pay off way better than just getting loads of likes.

And you know, the fastlane forum's own social media rockstar uses them... so why shouldn't I...
 
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Xeon

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I've been hitting the comment pods hard during the last two days. It's time intensive as hell but I feel it will pay off way better than just getting loads of likes.
And you know, the fastlane forum's own social media rockstar uses them... so why shouldn't I...

LOL, same here! By the way, I don't think it's that time intensive. I'm doing about 4 pods currently and it takes only about 35 mins max. The time consuming part is where you copy and paste links from telegram into the browser window. I feel it's worth it though.

The current post has 49 comments, I expect it hit near 60 by end of tomorrow. Looks decent for a 4.6k follower account lol

How much time are you spending on the pods for commenting?
 

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Hey all,

Appreciate all the good tips on here...and there are A LOT.

The best I've figured out so far is using Growbot. I'm still on the free trial, and have made about 500 (about to hit the big 1k) followers in less than a week. What I do is find someone that I follow and admire, load their followers (about 700 each time), and hit "follow all". Then I just let it cruise while I work on other things. I make sure NOT to play on Instagram and post anything during this time.

Initially, I was letting it sit for about 24 hours, then unfollowing whoever doesn't follow me (an option.) I'm probably going to let it cruise to around 1100, then unfollow everyone until I'm down to the original 300 or so.

Then maybe repeat.

What I wish it DID have was to unfollow anybody new in the past few days. It does the opposite actually, and unfollows anyone before a specified number of days.

Additionally, I've been loosely playing with Everliker with mediocre results. What I do like about it is that I can simplify it to multiple hashtags and slet it go.


I'm also working on beefing up my activity - meaning creating a bunch of highlight stories, and then setting up posts through Preview. It's a service (subscription based - $8/month) where you can edit and prepare as many posts as you want, make them look all pretty and shit, then it will remind you when to launch them. Check it out when you get a chance. Here's a nice new article from them too.
Top 10 Favorite Insta Story Tricks
 

Xeon

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Hey all,

Appreciate all the good tips on here...and there are A LOT.

The best I've figured out so far is using Growbot. I'm still on the free trial, and have made about 500 (about to hit the big 1k) followers in less than a week. What I do is find someone that I follow and admire, load their followers (about 700 each time), and hit "follow all". Then I just let it cruise while I work on other things. I make sure NOT to play on Instagram and post anything during this time.

Initially, I was letting it sit for about 24 hours, then unfollowing whoever doesn't follow me (an option.) I'm probably going to let it cruise to around 1100, then unfollow everyone until I'm down to the original 300 or so.

Then maybe repeat.

What I wish it DID have was to unfollow anybody new in the past few days. It does the opposite actually, and unfollows anyone before a specified number of days.

Additionally, I've been loosely playing with Everliker with mediocre results. What I do like about it is that I can simplify it to multiple hashtags and slet it go.


I'm also working on beefing up my activity - meaning creating a bunch of highlight stories, and then setting up posts through Preview. It's a service (subscription based - $8/month) where you can edit and prepare as many posts as you want, make them look all pretty and sh*t, then it will remind you when to launch them. Check it out when you get a chance. Here's a nice new article from them too.
Top 10 Favorite Insta Story Tricks

I checked out growbot.... isn't it a mass follow-unfollow tool? I thought IG is now picking up on these and also more importantly, it really messes up your feed and you can't keep track of the people you genuinely follow, because it's like here today, gone tmr due to the constant follow-unfollow.
 
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TYLER WALL

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I checked out growbot.... isn't it a mass follow-unfollow tool? I thought IG is now picking up on these and also more importantly, it really messes up your feed and you can't keep track of the people you genuinely follow, because it's like here today, gone tmr due to the constant follow-unfollow.
Hi Xeon,

For sure. Thats the primary issue is the feed gets flooded with noise, and following the people I want to follow gets challenging. I just hit the 1k mark, and might continue for another couple hundred then call it at that and focus on other methods.

The great thing is I can follow the followers of other more prominent accounts that fall into the same focus that I do. Its just an easy way to get some traction for now, and like I mentioned - I plan to unfollow everyone (a button for this) and stop it when I'm down to around my original 300. Does that make sense?
 

Xeon

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Hi Xeon,

For sure. Thats the primary issue is the feed gets flooded with noise, and following the people I want to follow gets challenging. I just hit the 1k mark, and might continue for another couple hundred then call it at that and focus on other methods.

The great thing is I can follow the followers of other more prominent accounts that fall into the same focus that I do. Its just an easy way to get some traction for now, and like I mentioned - I plan to unfollow everyone (a button for this) and stop it when I'm down to around my original 300. Does that make sense?

Yup, if you're using that as a short-term strategy to get social proof, why not? But using it long-term is another matter altogether lol
 

jon.M

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LOL, same here! By the way, I don't think it's that time intensive. I'm doing about 4 pods currently and it takes only about 35 mins max. The time consuming part is where you copy and paste links from telegram into the browser window. I feel it's worth it though.

The current post has 49 comments, I expect it hit near 60 by end of tomorrow. Looks decent for a 4.6k follower account lol

How much time are you spending on the pods for commenting?

Yeah I timed it yesterday, and it was pretty much the same for me. About 40 mins for I don't know... 4-6 pods? Not that bad after all, if it gives a return on the time invested.
 
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I have also tried the $1.80 strategy by Gary Vee. I have not done it a lot, since it took up a lot of time and it didn't seem to work for me. Also everyone is doing it, hard to get noticed in the comment section.

Although he is a genius. Like his 60 second club hashtag strategy as well. But of course it only works when you make it big. He gets crazy amount of comments in the first 60 seconds, with that hashtag strategy.
 

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For you guys wanting to do DM Engagement pods, check out socialtools.io

It automates sending the DM and returning L/C
 

Xeon

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Btw, I'm not sure if this has been mentioned before here in this forum, since there's quite a no. of IG threads here. Maybe it already has, but.....

With regards to the Follow-Unfollow method, there's one big issue which struck me just now. We all know that when you make your post, IG will take a small portion of your followers and show your post to them. Based on the no. of likes and comments you get within that 10 - 30 min time frame, it then decides whether your post is shown to a wider audience (Reach).

The problem with having too many fake followers is that, most of them will have no or poor engagement with your post, and when these uninterested fake followers make up a large portion of that sample group which IG will show your post to, it ends up reducing your Reach even more.

For you guys wanting to do DM Engagement pods, check out socialtools.io
It automates sending the DM and returning L/C

I wonder how they'll automate the engagement pods though, unless it's limited to IG pods (not telegram ones). Website still looks very new with "Coming Soon" throughout the site.
 
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I wonder how they'll automate the engagement pods though, unless it's limited to IG pods (not telegram ones). Website still looks very new with "Coming Soon" throughout the site.

Yea, it is for IG DMs/DM groups only. I think the majority of larger page stick to IG, as most telegram groups suck. I do use my own custom bot for when I did telegram groups tho.

And yea the program is in beta. It's currently free to use until they finish their licensing system.
 

Xeon

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Btw @jon.M, do you mind sharing what telegram pod you're using? The one that Damian Pros is also in? I doubt think it's WolfGlobal/BoostUp/IGainz as I don't remember seeing his account there. Must be a pretty big pod.
 

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Btw @jon.M, do you mind sharing what telegram pod you're using? The one that Damian Pros is also in? I doubt think it's WolfGlobal/BoostUp/IGainz as I don't remember seeing his account there. Must be a pretty big pod.
I'm not sure which one, but it actually must've been one of the WolfGlobal/BoostUp/IGainz groups, as those are the only pods I'm a member in.

Maybe this one from IGainz, since it's specifically for entrepreneurs?
 
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When I think there is nothing more to learn about Instagram there are always new strategies arising, as in this great thread. Thanks everyone above!

Here are my 2 cents:

- Patience!
Big accounts (with good and real engagement) took a long road we do not see at this moment. I looked this up, the majority already exist at least 3 years.
And there are a lot of big accounts with mostly fake bought followers, keep this in mind. This won't help your business so do not touch that.

- Follow/Unfollow For people starting on Instagram I do recommend to use this strategy until you have 1000followers. You can't ignore Social Proof. So this will speed things up.

- Everliker
Like hashtags that are within your niche.
Like followers of influencers that have the same targeted audience as you.
Like followers of competitors.

Question: I never reach the number of likes a day I ask Everliker to make for me, do you guys experience this also?

- Engagement groups (L&C).
Look for the top 3/4 groups who give you the best results.
(But this strategy won't work forever). Also keep in mind the follow/like ratio. If you have 1000 followers and 500 likes there is something untrustworthy about that.

- Reach out to friends of new followers.
With every new follower coming in you should like 3/5 photos of every friend/follower that liked their most recent post! Yes this will be time-consuming.
Social proof, because they see that their friends is already following you.

- Qualitative Unique Content.
Sadly I'm no good student of this rule.
I also do reposts because I can not make enough great content to post consistently. And always tag the person from whom you repost, this is just Instagram Etiquette!
If you're a good photographer etc.. you have a big advantage!

- Post consistently.
2 posts a day is desirable, i.e. 3pm and 7pm. yEveryone of us will have unique popular timeframes, check your stats).
This will take discipline which is a good attribute!
Little shortcut: I use Hootsuite.

- Commenting on posts of influencers within your niche the moment they have published it is also not a bad strategy in my opinion. You can only hope their followers will see your comment, start recognising your name and click on it.
(Preferably a comment with value.)

- When you reached the explore page, it helps when you have 'weird' coloured text on your photos or coloured objects. People will more likely click on it. You have to stand out on the explore page!

- Videos
This is up for debate. On Instagram some get more followers when they post great videos and other won't notice anything special. You have to try this for yourself if this works or not with your page.

- Feed
I find this as important as everything above, but this can be because of my niche. But you should try to have a good looking feed. You can find a lot of videos on youtube on this strategy.

- Bio
Make a very brief and clear intro on who you are.
As you have already read in this thread. Symbols in your bio is a big win!

- Stories
Can do big things for you, but I'm not good at this so can't say much here.
Youtube is your friend! The polls and swipe up features are my only friends here (so easy and engaging).

- Competitors
Look at what your competitors are doing regularly and adjust your strategy.
Sam Walton would do this all day.

- Keep the accounts that you are following as low as possible. This is in conflict with the follow/unfollow strategy. You do not want to unfollow your best (future) client.

- Tag popular brands in your photos, they say people who follow those brands will get to see your posts easier this way.


This list is in no particular order of importance.

I was not planning to make this as extensive as it is, but I still probably forgot something.
Hope this helps even a tiny bit!
 

Xeon

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Question: I never reach the number of likes a day I ask Everliker to make for me, do you guys experience this also?

Depending on how much likes you set for it to like, you may need to let the PC run the whole day.
My Everliker is set to like 1300 Likes per day, and it starts from somewhere around 5 - 6 AM and works till 11.45 PM - midnight or so, whereby it sleeps for 4 - 6 hrs after that.

I use my office PC for Everliker as I don't want my own home PC to be overused lol.

- Engagement groups (L&C).
Look for the top 3/4 groups who give you the best results.
(But this strategy won't work forever). Also keep in mind the follow/like ratio. If you have 1000 followers and 500 likes there is something untrustworthy about that.

I've been looking at the comment quality from my engagement pods. 3 are from generic pods and 1 is from my niche. Majority of the comments from the generic pods are crappy as F*ck, as expected:

"This looks cool!"
"Nice pic!"
"Love this hahah"
"Awesome shot you've there"
:D:D:D:D:D:D:D
"Oh my god so cute"
"Hahahahahah"

This is a turn-off, considering that when I post comments on their posts in return, it's well-thought out comments and definitely not generic crap like what they're posting.

The comments from the niche pod is a lot more genuine and sincere, as expected (but the pod is small).
 

PetePreneur

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Depending on how much likes you set for it to like, you may need to let the PC run the whole day.
My Everliker is set to like 1300 Likes per day, and it starts from somewhere around 5 - 6 AM and works till 11.45 PM - midnight or so, whereby it sleeps for 4 - 6 hrs after that.

I use my office PC for Everliker as I don't want my own home PC to be overused lol.



I've been looking at the comment quality from my engagement pods. 3 are from generic pods and 1 is from my niche. Majority of the comments from the generic pods are crappy as f*ck, as expected:

"This looks cool!"
"Nice pic!"
"Love this hahah"
"Awesome shot you've there"
:D:D:D:D:D:D:D
"Oh my god so cute"
"Hahahahahah"

This is a turn-off, considering that when I post comments on their posts in return, it's well-thought out comments and definitely not generic crap like what they're posting.

The comments from the niche pod is a lot more genuine and sincere, as expected (but the pod is small).

1300 likes a day does sound pretty spammy. Surely that’s risking your account?
 
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Xeon

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1300 likes a day does sound pretty spammy. Surely that’s risking your account?

From what I read on articles, the IG Like limit per hour is 300 - 350. That's actually a lot. If you divide 1300 Likes over multiple times, multiple logins throughout the day, it's not actually that crazy. It might be on the higher side of things, but nothing a real IG-obsessed human cannot do.

I'll be bumping it up to 1400 max by end of this week.
 

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I agree with Xeon, when I like manually the system allows me to like approximately 160 posts in one round (maybe 1-2 minutes). From then on I can't like anything new for 30 minutes.
So keeping that number in mind I think we won't get any sanctions.

But that said, it is possible the algorithm can work against us behind the scenes if we are categorised as 'spammy'. Who will tell, this is up for debate..
 

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We should preach legitimate ways on growing an Instagram account and following. Instagram doesn't allow automation tools to auto follow/unfollow, like, comment, etc. I'm surprised no one has been banned yet. Even myself, using these tools have crossed my mind a few times, but I don't want to risk my account being banned/deleted.
 
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@ddzc I totally agree with you but... I have tried it, and it's almost impossible to grow. Started my page last June, and I am not even at 2k followers yet. Last fall I got discouraged and left the page alone for a little while, since I was not growing at all. I started posting again at the end of January. I do get messages from people that they like my content, so I don't think content is the issue.

All the big pages have it figured out. They have their system. It is so easy to buy followers and such. How do you compete with powerlikes? All of the pig pages getting 3-5k likes at minimum. No way with 50-100 likes you will make it to the explore page and get exposed. Most people say shoutouts don't even work anymore. Got to be careful who you buy shoutouts from.

I still only use very little automation. Auto follow/unfollow and auto likes. I do engagement groups manually. I also comment meaningful comments on bigger pages, but I get very little exposure with those. The $1.80 method is used by everyone now, so you barely get exposure with that.

Don't get me wrong I hate it, but you can't really do anything. Hashtags are over saturated too. The only thing you can do is engage with the followers that you have and build up trust. But it will take a long time to build up a big following with that. Although I take quality followers over quantity followers any day.
 

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@ddzc I totally agree with you but... I have tried it, and it's almost impossible to grow. Started my page last June, and I am not even at 2k followers yet. Last fall I got discouraged and left the page alone for a little while, since I was not growing at all. I started posting again at the end of January. I do get messages from people that they like my content, so I don't think content is the issue.

All the big pages have it figured out. They have their system. It is so easy to buy followers and such. How do you compete with powerlikes? All of the pig pages getting 3-5k likes at minimum. No way with 50-100 likes you will make it to the explore page and get exposed. Most people say shoutouts don't even work anymore. Got to be careful who you buy shoutouts from.

I still only use very little automation. Auto follow/unfollow and auto likes. I do engagement groups manually. I also comment meaningful comments on bigger pages, but I get very little exposure with those. The $1.80 method is used by everyone now, so you barely get exposure with that.

Don't get me wrong I hate it, but you can't really do anything. Hashtags are over saturated too. The only thing you can do is engage with the followers that you have and build up trust. But it will take a long time to build up a big following with that. Although I take quality followers over quantity followers any day.

Exactly my thoughts about all this. If you post without doing these tactics, you’ll be posting into an empty desert.

I just see it as a sort of automated version of going door to door. You have to shout about what you’re doing to get anywhere on Instagram nowadays. It’s too late to go completely organic.
 

Xeon

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Came across this 10/10/10 hashtag strategy from 2018 Instagram Marketing Magic—All the New, Cutting-Edge Sh*t They Don’t Want You to Know! | Jumper Media
TLDR:

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Introducing the 10/10/10 Hashtag Strategy…
Instagram allows up to 30 hashtags, so use all 30. Choose:
  • 10 Smaller Hashtags (10,000 to 50,000 total posts)
  • 10 Mid-size Hashtags (50,000 to 200,000 total posts)
  • 10 Large Hashtags (200,000 – 2,000,000 total posts)
Going “viral” is still statistically difficult. But if you use this method with the right content, and get a little lucky, you will be able to “scale up.” You’ll get a handful of likes from being on the top posts of the smaller hashtags, a few more from the mid-size ones, etc. etc. until you have so much engagement that the algorithm decides to try you out on the Explore Page.

When using this strategy, you’ll still need to do good hashtag research. The right hashtags can make or break your virality.

These are the three best ways to research hashtags in 2018:
  • Hashtag research tools – we like Display Purposes*
  • Find influencers in your niche that have hit the explore page and take inspiration from their hashtags.
  • Find one hashtag you like, search for it on Insta, then check out the “related hashtags” underneath.
One of the reasons we recommend Display Purposes is because it excludes banned hashtags from its search results.
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Xeon

All Cars Kneel Before Pagani.
Read Fastlane!
Read Unscripted!
Speedway Pass
User Power
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191%
Sep 3, 2017
2,427
4,628
Singapore
TLDR: Event pics + Product Pics + Influcencer Pics + Repost + Holiday Greetings + Giveaways = no lack of IG content again

DISCLAIMER #1
: I have not tried all these out myself BUT I'll be executing EVERYTHING written in this post after mid-Apr (once I've finalized things with the photographer)

DISCLAIMER #2: The purpose of this post is NOT to go viral and get 193,445 Likes & 50,000 followers overnight.
Only gurus know how to do that. This post is about sharing my own thoughts and goals:

i) get a steady stream of original content for my IG feed
ii) build social proof in the process
iii) get a REAL FOLLOWING who will engage with me

I'm sick and tired of having a graveyard IG account when my competitors are all slaying on IG (because they've content and I don't).

Here goes:

--------------------------------------------------------

I was rotting on the couch on Sat and surfing IG the whole afternoon aimlessly, daydreaming of what I can do to get original content for my IG.
What Fox said in the other IG thread made me realized that it's hard to get a loyal fan base and real followers on IG by just reposting others' content (as evident in my case).

After hours of "letting it go", I finally thought of a schedule which can be repeated every week, month and even years to come, with a steady flow of consistent original content. These might give some ideas to others who're also in the same boat as me. It will cost some money for the photography, and it might not be suitable for everyone.
It's best for "cool" consumer products, such as, but not limited to, fashion or fitness AND where there's related events with LOTS of people attending.

Below is what my upcoming plan for IG content looks like:

27ed037086e03816f26a404c63bbb54e.png


There's some IG content schedule templates online but I feel they're too overkill and complex.
Anyway, my plan is:

Mon: Event Pics
Tue: Rest (you can post Event Pics if you want)
Wed: Your own product pics
Thu: Pics of influencers with your product
Fri: Repost relevant content in your niche
Sat and Sun: No posting as engagement on IG is really low (for my case)

EVENT PICS

One thing I realize, is that Instagram folks love fun and crazy stuff. Beautiful colorful visuals.

The idea is to hire a photographer to shoot lots of photos (about > 50+) at an event that is related to your niche, whereby the event has tons of people attending. This way, you'll get pics of many people within the same photo, and also snapshots of closer-ups. It's all for social proof.
  • If you sell beer for the young party crowd, get photographer to take pics of those huge public foam party events. They don't have to be drinking your beer (you can if you want), you just need to associate your IG account with FUN parties.
  • If you sell running shoes, get photographer to go to those marathon events where there's an OCEAN of people. Take pics from a distance away so you capture the crowd as a whole (6 - 15+ people in one shot). You can also get friends/family to wear the shoes you're selling and take pics of that, with lots of people in the background.
  • If you sell boring picnic mats, get photographer to go to those fields where tons of families have picnics. Those other families will be in the background, while your own picnic mat and friends/models will be in the midground / foreground. At one glance, the photo looks very SOCIAL yay! Associate your IG account with fun picnics.
  • If you sell surfboards. get photographer to go down to the nearest, most sunny beach, and take pics of surfer dudes doing stunts. Occasionally, beaches have very social party/music events. Shoot all those. Shoot a couple of beach babes having fun as well. Associate your IG account with the beach, sea and sun.
  • If you sell a boring pneumatic drill / hammer, tie in the product with popular culture/parody, dress yourself/or model up in a silly Thor costume with your sagging dad bod, and use your hammer to destroy all kinds of things, or abuse your pneumatic drill in wacky manners. Drilling paint and have it splash all over you. Capture the beauty in slow motion with a fitting soundtrack. Similar to the WillItBlend youtube channel.
These are just some random ideas but the thinking is the same.
On these photos, put your logo on the bottom-right corner. A small one.

The concept is that, when folks browse your IG account and see all these pics of tons of people engaging with each other and you're the one who took these pics / inside these pics yourself, it creates social proof that you're "part" of these highly social events.

Then you drip-post a couple of these event pics on Mon/Tue in your IG, so you don't use up the photo so fast.

My thinking is, would you engage with an IG account that has just product pics, or one with a wide variety of fun pics that are related to your niche/product, but not pure hardsell?

I say hire a photographer because their work will look WAY, WAY better than yours or mine, unless you're a photographer yourself. I can't take pics to save my life (I HATE USING THE DSLR CAMERA, F*ck that shit).
With a bit of photo-editing and filter, the photos can easily surpass the quality level of many of those small-time fashion models/influencers.

It's possible to hire one on Thumbtack or Indeed.
I found one who will shoot me the event pics for less than US$150 for > 50 pics.
50 pics can last several months until the next hot event comes. IMO, you just need about 3 - 4 events shots per year.

HOLIDAYS/FESTIVALS

In addition to the Event Pics, Product Pics, Influencer Pics and Reposts, you can also post your own greeting on every holiday/festival in your IG feed.

Easter Day is coming. You can use a free tool like Canva.com to wish your followers well on those days.
The greeting design needs to be consistent. One way I saw one of my indirect-competitor do this, is to hire a graphic designer to come up with a really simple mascot (no need for fancy illustration) for your brand.

E.g: Let's say you're selling bed sheets. You can hire the graphic designer/illustrator to come up with a funny, naggy-mom sort of mascot. She would have a base design in her normal clothes.
Then, on Easter Day, she would wear rabbits' ears. Post this in your IG feed.
On April's Fool's Day, she can wear a jester's hat.
On Independence Day, she can have the US flag design on some parts of her dress.

Her pose and everything will be the same, just add the relevant holiday/festive elements to some parts of her. This way you don't have to get the illustrator to redraw the pose, and you keep everything consistent.
It saves tons of money.

For my indirect-competitor who did this, it didn't pick off initially, but then gained traction and brand strength over time. For many countries, there's more than a dozen festivals/holidays, so that helps to fill in churning out even more content.

For even more content, host a giveaway every month/two months.

To get even more social proof, eventually I'll do what the Master, Fox himself, mentioned, which is to get shoutouts, brand reps and influencers!

Hopefully, in the near future, I can say good-bye to those days of having a pathetic IG account lol
 

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