A Guide on How to Get More Followers on Instagram
Instagram is tough, but you probably already know that if you’ve tried it. Because it doesn’t support sharing, it limits the spread of content between accounts and thus the chances of discovering other interesting or useful accounts to follow. Hashtags, practically the only decent and controllable discovery tool, are somewhat problematic, especially in our small “Czech” pond. Facebook’s influence in the form of eliminating the chronological feed and limiting reach doesn’t help either.
What should you do on Instagram to gain followers? And what else should you know in this regard?
Hashtags, hashtags, and hashtags are the first and most essential thing you need to start with. If you don’t add them to a post immediately upon creation, forget about the post having any chance of being discovered (no, adding them as additional comments later really isn’t enough). A post without the necessary hashtags will only be seen by a fraction of your followers and won’t bring you new ones.
Hashtags are covered mainly in How to Find the Right Hashtags for Your Instagram Posts. A Complete Guide and keep in mind that English hashtags attract a lot of foreign users (as well as Czech users), while Czech hashtags will only attract Czech users, but with weak results. Don’t leave out hashtags in your Stories either.
Choose the right language for your posts and perhaps consider posting in multiple languages. It will all depend on whether you really want to stick to Czech and Czech fans, or if you simply want the biggest numbers possible and don’t mind followers from around the world.
Choose your account name, username, and account description (bio) carefully so that people can find you correctly. These are the only places where regular text is searched. Instagram does not search post texts or comments for text, only for the presence of hashtags. Discoverability is important.
You can also find tools to support your Instagram here
Use Stories and use them a lot — don’t be afraid of them at all. You can find out how they work in How to Use Instagram Stories and don’t be discouraged by the fact that things from a Story disappear after 24 hours. You can still turn them into permanent posts, but that probably won’t be necessary. The important thing is that Instagram itself loves Stories and favors them, so you have a greater chance of getting into recommended content. Plus, young users love them too.
Connect with other people, accounts, and influencers and help each other out. Through liking, commenting, mentioning, and resharing content. This is where What is an Instagram Comment Pod (Insta Pod)? How to Beat Restrictive Algorithms? will come in handy, as well as Is It Legal to Use Repost? What’s the Deal with Sharing Other People’s Photos?
Show yourself. Even better, show your own face. You might be surprised, but a post featuring a face generates tens of percent more engagement. Beyond your face, this also means showing yourself as a whole.
Make use of content from your customers or users, show their stories and feedback, give them a chance to be seen. Especially those who have Instagram accounts — they will reward you with further visibility.
Dive into live streaming. Instagram Live is found as part of Stories and, just as with Stories, Instagram favors live streaming here as well. It will give a boost to accounts that use this feature.
Tag accounts and add geolocation (tag locations), because that is the only way you can let a brand, company, or personality know that you have a post that concerns them. Geolocation doesn’t help as much, but it’s still good to use it. Don’t forget to tag other accounts directly in the photos as well as in the accompanying texts and comments. Stories also allow tagging, so don’t underestimate this either. When tagging accounts, however, make sure it is not unnecessary and not too frequent.
Tools to support your Instagram can also be found here
Use your followers to tag, ask them to tag their friends and attract them to some content. But don’t do it often, and when you do, it must make sense.
Switch your account to business mode, this will give you access to basic analytical information and you can find out how your posts are performing and what sociodemographics your users have. You will also find out when your followers are online and can try to adjust the days and times when you post. Don’t overdo it though, as the algorithmic timeline works quite against that. It may help to check When is the best time to publish posts on social networks (but also blogs and websites)? and How does scheduled publishing of posts on Instagram work. Later, Buffer and the others
Hold contests, give things away, if you are looking for a short-term boost in engagement. As with all contests, however, be aware that this way you won’t gain relevant and quality fans. Here you will find it useful to read What is the contest mafia on Facebook? And what to watch out for when organizing contests?
Comment and like on other people’s posts if it makes sense, if you can add some value or help. It won’t have a dramatic effect, but it is definitely another way to make yourself more visible. Don’t overdo it, because this can also harm you.
Showcase your Instagram in other media. Share photos on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, VKontakte. Transfer selected photos to your blog. Here, don’t forget that Instagram itself can handle some of the cross-posting (Facebook, Tumblr and VKontakte for example), and for others it is worth (or necessary) using something like IFTTT. See here How to get a photo from Instagram to Twitter so it’s visible? and similarly you can send posts from Instagram to your blog using a hashtag (e.g. #blog).
Use content that your fans want to see. Content they will also react to. Don’t count too much on comments, but a high number of likes (hearts) is useful — algorithms love accounts with active posts. You can pay attention to copywriting, but visuals are decisive. Adapt everything to your target audience — young people, for example, love emojis, while older people don’t know their way around them.
Pay for post reach if you have enough money and find it acceptable. However, this should be the very last option, which you should only pursue if what you are doing on Instagram is truly a business.
Tools to support your Instagram can also be found here
If you want results right away, you can get Instagram followers right now.
Michal Záruba is a digital marketing specialist and a consultant in social media and SEO. For more than 8 years, Michal has been helping brands grow online through strategic content, search engine optimisation and effective communication on platforms such as LinkedIn, Instagram and YouTube.
On the blog, Michal shares practical tips on how to combine SEO, social media and brand building into one working strategy, focusing on how companies can use modern tools and algorithms so that their brand gains not only reach but also trust.
Alongside creating content, Michal lectures on digital marketing, trains teams and follows new trends in AI and search.