If you're using Instagram, then you're probably on a mission to connect with the right people who you care about. Maybe you're looking to get prospective customers to find you. Maybe you're looking to build up a group of fans who care about your music, art, or brand. Regardless of the reason, here are a few easy ways to get followers on Instagram.
In general, we recommend a follow to follow back strategy. This Instagram growth strategy is typically at the centert of any large account. It really just means that you follow a large number of users who match your target demographic, you engage with them by posting good content, and giving them comments and likes, and you periodically unfollow them to keep the number of users you follow minimal. If you're unfamiliar with what we're talking about, you might want to read about the basics in our article on the 4 easy ways to get followers for free here.
This can be a lot of work, however. Here are some tips and tricks to executing on this strategy.
Care about how many people you follow
When it comes to successful Instagram Growth, you need to make your followers feel special. Make sure they don't think you follow any and everybody.
When someone looks at your account, they're going to look at the number of people who you follow and the number of people who follow you. This matters. People think an account is very legitimate when it has a high number of followers, while the number of people being followed is small. If someone sees your account, and you're following much more people compared to who is following you, they will assume it is a low value account.
Make sure you're only following:
- People who you recently followed because you want them to follow you back
- Important followers who you want to ensure keep following you
This is a tough balance, but in general we recommend that you un-follow anyone who has not yet followed you back within a week. There is obviously a lot of flexibility for this rule (ex. if you're targetting an industry leader), but it's also really easy to let the number of users you follow get out of control. There is not value in following people who do not care about you. Unfollow them to ensure your number of followed accounts is minimal.
Care about who follows you
Every industry has leaders, and the people within an industry care what the leaders do. If an industry leader follows you, your account could easily explode within days of them doing so, especially if the industry leader doesn't follow a lot of people.
Similar to the above, people on Instagram care about the web of social relationships. If they see someone important following you, they'll consider you higher value, and be more likely to follow you.
Getting high-value follows on Instagram is probably the most effective way to build an extremely quick following within the demographic that you care about. Do you have any contacts in your industry with individuals or companies that have a big following, or who are well respected? Build these followers first- they'll provide legitimacy and more followers for a long time.
Consider a follow/unfollow app
There are many apps available that will help you manage your Instagram follows and unfollows.
It can be really tough to manage follows and unfollows. If you followed someone a month ago, and they followed you back, but they just unfollowed you today, would you know? This might not seem like a big deal, but once you get thousands of followers it adds up.
There are a variety of apps out there that will help you manage follows and un follows. They show you any users who recently unfollowed you (allowing you to quickly unfollow them and not include them in your followers), as well as any users who recently followed you (so you can quickly follow them back and keep them).
Apps are one of the most effective way to manage everything if you want to build your following yourself. They'll help you quickly and effectively:
- Engage with new followers to ensure you keep them
- Know who unfollows you, so you can unfollow them if you would like
- Track users who you don't follow back (to ensure your un-follows aren't costing you your audience)
Use a "tag your friends" promotion
People love promotions, especially ones that their friends would like too. With that being said, this only applies to company accounts who have over 300 users following them. If you don't have 300 followers, we'd recommend doing more following and unfollowing first.
Essentially, you want to offer a prize that your target market cares about. If it is related to your products or brand, that is best. After picking the prize, follow these steps:
- Pick a 5-10 day period that you will have the promotion
- Prepare 2-4 posts that will promote the promotion
- Set-up a way for someone to pick a winner
- Get a spread sheet or other method to be able to store the users who comment
When you launch the promotion, you will require users to tag or comment with their friends names to participate. It is important to make multiple posts, so you get as many users involved as possible.
Here is an example that Social Network Elite has done in the past:
"We are offering a FREE month of our services to one lucky winner! That's 1500-4500 Instagram followers for your account! All you have to do is make sure you're following us, and tag/comment as many friends in this post. We'll pick one winner on DATE based on who is commenting. You MUST BE FOLLOWING us to win. Good luck!"
In the above example, we did posts after the first one that were included in the contest. We picked 20-30 people who commented the most, and did a random drawing for the winner. Because the people who commented wanted the prize, the people who they tagged were also likely to be in our target market. We received an additional 1,373 followers for a two week contest!
CONCLUSION:
In the end, growing your Instagram with new followers is going to take time and work. In general, by caring about the quality and number of people who you follow, you'll make great progress on the quality and number of people who follow you. What are some of the strategies you've used to grow your Instagram? Let us know in the comment section! We hoped you enjoyed this post on easy ways to get followers on Instagram!
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