Having a large online following is an important measure of success for businesses — not just influencers. In my opinion, Instagram is the most critical platform for engaging with your audience, whether you’re marketing a product, a business or your own online persona. The fellow sisterhood of social media includes: YouTube and Facebook. Don’t forget Twitter or LinkedIn, as they cater to a more niche audience. Lucky for you, The Doc Is In! I offer the following to get you to the masses:
Heed the Hashtag: This is by far the most important element to get right if you want to start building a serious online following. Be it on Instagram, Twitter, or another platform, hashtags are the primary way in which potential new followers can find your content. But what’s meant by the right hashtags? The hashtags need to meet two requirements: First, be relevant to your content and second, belong in the “trending,” or popular category. Creating regular topical posts is one way to get this right – commenting on current hot topics or posting images in line with current trends. By looking at up-to-date online analytics, you can find out what the trending hashtags are at the moment and try to get your content to match those topics. Do your research.
Follow the Leader: Quid Pro Quo is the name of the game in amassing followers. Even as you’re working on growing your own follower base, you should also follow other people with similar interests, content and target audiences. This makes you a part of a community and makes it easier for your target audience to find you. Engage with the community as much as possible to get your name out there and generate interest around your account. Commenting on your direct competitors’ posts and images is one of the best ways to drive traffic to your own profile. Eventually, new visitors will come to you, and if your content is engaging enough, at least some of them will turn into followers.
Post Regular, Only High-Quality Content: To show your potential followers that you have a lot of original, high-quality content to share, your posts should be regular and consistently engaging. Yes, there’s an element of hit-and-miss in the early stages of experimenting with what works for you and your target audience, but once you have this worked out, try to keep a consistent style and format.
Timing is Everything: There’s general information available online on the overall “best” times for posting, and these guides can certainly be helpful when starting out. However, once you start generating followers and engagement, it’s better to look at the data from your own posts and profiles. Your target audience might have slightly different habits and preferences than a typical account. Trust me, they will. Analytics tools such as Instagram Analytics for Business, which you can find on Instagram under the Followers section, can give you insights into engagement with your posts. The graphs are really cool, definitely use them. One of the most helpful is a timeline that tells you when your followers engage most on Instagram. From there, you can work out when is the best time to post your content, both in terms of time of day and day of the week.
Drive traffic from other Platforms: This isn’t an innovative technique, but people often forget to take advantage of it. Even if you’re primarily active on one platform, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t use other outlets to drive traffic to your main profile. Let’s say your primary platform is Instagram. Links to your Instagram page need to be everywhere possible. This includes your other social media – like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest even LinkedIn if that’s how you roll – as well as your website, if you have one (and you should have one)!
Well, we are less than 30 days to 2022! Build that business, push those products, grow your audience and wake up to do it all again the next day!
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About the Author: Eager, Effervescent and Engaging describe this Globetrotter. As a Professional Educator of more than 14 years, she realized there was more to do. So, she dropped everything and moved to China for the Self-Discovery of a lifetime. Visit her website at www.SheIsDrDenise.com to see how she earned her nickname. Join her podcast “Self-Discovery on Sunday w/ Dr. D” every Sunday at 5PM EST, streaming everywhere.
