Outsmart the Algorithms
Yes, Instagram changed their algorithms again, but don’t worry! You may have noticed likes and engagements have decreased lately. This is happening due to Instagram wanting to promote their advertising system. We are here to help you navigate how to outsmart the algorithms. You can’t afford to target everyone, so finding your niche is key. This will come by building relationships with your customers and aiming to become a subject matter expert in your industry through pinpointing conversations no one else within your niche is tapping into. In this guide, we’ll deliver a quick break down to show you how to survive the ever-changing patterns, while diving into strategies and tactics we’ve noticed, in order to maximize on your organic engagements as the algorithms continue to evolve.
Stop obsessing over how many followers you have and focus your attention on creating authentic connections with people. The “power visual” you’re looking for to boost your brand is built through authenticity. Shoot for real - realistic lifestyle shots. A view that is simply an unfiltered look into someone’s day-to-day life makes the audience feel you care about them getting to know you on a first-name basis. This is what the Instagram style audience can’t get enough of. Seeing your product in a daily use setting or applied to daily tasks has more impact than constant bombardment of repetitive snapshots or redundant content. The quality and versatility of your content will be visually appealing and better decoded by your intended audience. By humanizing your brand, you showcase the people that make the brand what it is. They see who cares about making their life more functional by way of the product or service you’re offering. Your goal on Instagram is to capture attention through your post, built on brand awareness, which will prompt your audience to then Google who you are, what you do, if you have more products they’re interested in, and why you are worth it.
Instagram’s “Top Posts” take into account the speed of interactions to engagement ratio. What does all this mean? It means it’s not all about the number of likes! What we’ve found is Instagram has defined “Top Posts” as posts with a high level of engagement and rapid engagement speed. It goes beyond likes because people are sharing it in private messages, tagging friends in the comments and adding this content into their “Stories.” All these factors attract more traffic to the post and increase reach. These features of Instagram allow for more interactions with your content, allow you to cultivate your audience and promote your brand mission.
Here are two simple pointers we will give you to arrange opportunities for interactions:
First, aim to extend the lifecycle of your post. Instagram content is known to maintain relevancy for only a few hours during the peak of the post’s life. Gain inspiration from hashtags and counter the content to grow reach. The use of hashtags surrounding you niche, not just anything, will increase engagement on that post and consistently have your audience bring in new people who can lengthen the lifecycle.
Second, to bring more traffic onto your page, encourage your audience to interact. This could be in the form of a giveaway, a collaboration with another brand or a riddle to solve. Offer options for them to tag friends to be included in the conversation. This allows for those who may not have been a part of your audience to be exposed to who you are. This way, your audience works for you as they promote you to others.
Hopefully, with more information on Instagram’s methods, you can solidify a way to navigate your brand to the top.
Let’s talk more about the art and power in the simplicity of hashtags. They are the minutest piece of your post, yet act as a leg up on the competition in gaining reach to target your intended audience. They work in a way where you can overlap interests without straying away from your niche. With overlapping interests, this technique allows you an opportunity to operate in more product-specific categories. Getting attention is only half the fight. You’re ultimately trying to drive them to your website in search of the product or service, to make a purchase and to get them on your newsletter so you can keep them as a loyal customer. Slowly but surely your brand visibility will increase with potential customers and you will be dominating the search rankings. Using various hashtag analytics generators like Hashtagie, will help you keep tabs on the top trending hashtags, so you can gauge what’s taking off, what’s trending, or falling out of popularity. There’s a real utility behind hashtags. They aren’t meant to be just trendy and cute. Make them work for you.
Now, remember the elements we discussed to help you on your road to the top. Even if there wasn’t a direct ROI with the giveaway itself or other tactics you tried, those are connections you made that will easily end up covering the expenses in the long run. Gaining a large following on Instagram is not the only benefit to the platform. You will have massive increase on your brand through new visibility leading to potential customers researching you.
Mastering Instagram takes a combination of different techniques over time that will help build momentum towards your goals for exposure. However, we are not just aiming for likes or comments, we are going beyond for new searches and sales, too.
Have fun exploring the new expansions on the platform. What brings you joy when converting your brand voice to Instagram will shine forth as you curate content and gain a larger audience. Find a better way to brag about your offerings and it will turn over into tangible assets.
These updated platform features can be difficult to grasp, especially when you are trying to find your niche on social media. Even digital agencies stress about making sure they understand how to have optimal productivity for a client’s brand online. Here at Skyline Media Group, we manage the social media platforms of our clients by mastering various creative production methods and materializing the brand’s mission with their media assets.
If you are ever in need of help building an exceptional online presence or just have questions about how to start, feel free to contact us at info@skylinemediainc.com or call our office located in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma at (405) 286-0000.
Share with us what Instagram hacks you’d like to learn to get more people discovering your brand.
Written by: Dejaih Smith, Content Writer @ Skyline Media Group