How to Grow Your Instagram With Authentic Content
Authenticity on Instagram is all about being true to your brand voice and not being afraid to speak openly about the topics you care about. The power of authenticity on Instagram is massive. And when you commit to it, you have the opportunity to grow your Instagram account into a community of engaged followers.
Whether you have 500 or 500,000 followers, staying true to your brand will resonate with your audience and help you grow. Here are 5 ways to grow your Instagram with authentic content.
1. Engage with your community
Get to know your audience.
- How often are you replying to DMs and comments?
- Are you interacting with other accounts?
- Do you reply to other peoples’ Instagram stories?
In an 8-hour workday, commit 4 hours every single day to community engagement. This includes commenting, replying to DMs, commenting on other people’s posts, replying on yours and actively engaging on other pages similar to yours.
2. Share your story
One of the best ways to show more authenticity on Instagram, is by opening up with your audience. Whether that’s talking about the struggles of owning a business or your step-by-step skincare routine, when you’re honest and open with your audience, your followers sense it.
When you make your followers feel like friends, they will feel a natural pull to share your content with their own community of followers. When your posts are shared, it will bump the post up on peoples’ feeds, if it sees that it’s getting a lot of action.
Monitoring what your followers are sharing is also a great way to understand what resonates with your audience. You can easily track and measure how many times your grid posts have been shared to stories, so you can see what content is performing best.
3. Put value in written word
Even though Instagram is a visual app, the words you share in your captions are just as important as the visuals. The average caption length has more than doubled with an average of 405 characters — which averages out to be 65-70 words!
TIP:
Try writing your captions before choosing an image. You may find your post performs better.
4. Understand what content resonates with you
Gaining a deep understanding of what resonates with you on social media can help guide your content strategy. The next time you’re scrolling on social media, make note of what type of posts catch your eye and which ones don’t.
5. Stay true to your core ethics and set boundaries
The clearer you are on your values, the easier it will be to stay true to them and chase those negative thoughts away.
If you work in social media, whether you’re a small business owner or an influencer, the lines between work and life can sometimes be blurry, making it difficult to set healthy boundaries.
SOURCE: Later
