Blogging 101: Instagram Tips 2019

I receive a lot of emails and messages from aspiring bloggers wanting to start a blog. I’m going to start sharing blogging tips as a new series on my blog. 🙂 If you find yourself constantly asking questions like: why your engagement has dropped? when should you post? should you buy followers? (the obvious answer is NO!), then keep reading. In this Blogging 101 post, I’ll be sharing Instagram tips that will help you grow your following, get more engagement, comments, likes, etc., and stand out in this over-saturated world of bloggers.

Tip 1: Your Feed

Consistency is key. This applies to anything in the blogging world. The first thing I look at when I visit someone’s Instagram page is their feed. If it isn’t aesthetically pleasing, I probably won’t stay on their page for long. The human eye is drawn to simplicity. How well you edit your photos and maintain your feed is going to have a strong correlation with your success. Quality over quantity. Make sure you are staying consistent with lighting. For example, don’t shoot one photo in bright sunlight and another photo in the shade. Also, pay attention to the temperature of your photos (warm v.s. cool). Choose one or the other, but you can’t choose both. Stay consistent with your filters. I cannot emphasize this enough!! Two of my favorite iPhone editing apps are VSCO and Snapseed. When I’m on my computer I use Lightroom. It takes some time to find your aesthetic. I’ve been blogging since 2015 and still haven’t found 100% mine, but it will come.

Tip 2: The Algorithm

Instagram has been playing a lot of games with us lately, and if there’s one thing I don’t like, it’s games. Don’t play with my emotions yo. The algorithm has been changing so much that most of us can hardly keep up, but don’t worry, I have some tips. When you share a post, Instagram is only going to share it with 10% of your followers. TEN PERCENT. This is why the engagement of even big name bloggers has dropped significantly since last year. If you have seen a significant drop, don’t worry, you aren’t alone. So after Instagram shows your post to 10% of your followers, and its does well (as a result of people engaging with it, commenting and liking it), then Instagram will show it to the other 90% of your followers. Gone are the days when chronological order worked in your favor. You now need to have people interact with your posts if you want the majority of your followers to see them.  However, I will say that I am slightly in favor of the new algorithm because it’s kind of a slap in the face to people that have purchased followers, but that’s none of my business *sips tea.*

Tip 2: Engagement

Engage with your followers on your post! If someone asks you a question, respond! Instagram is a COMMUNITY. Comments with less than 4 words, or just an emoji no longer count as engagement. Blogging is all about making connections, so it’s important to respond to your messages and comments if you want to continue to grow on both Instagram and your blog! Even by simply “tapping” the little “heart” next to a comment will count as engagement. It is also important to note that you want to respond to comments within a reasonable amount of time. You want to respond within the first hour in order to continue increasing the posts exposure, because Instagram judges how popular your post is during this time frame.

Tip 3: Don’t Purchase Followers

Speaking of purchasing followers, most of these fake “followers” are bots and inactive accounts. You can buy as many followers as you want to boost your follower count, but trust me, you aren’t fooling anyone. Brands and companies have gotten smarter, and are using websites to see dramatic increases and changes in follower counts. Gaining 5,000 followers a day might have been possible back in 2014, but now that it’s 2019, it’s probably not. Companies would rather work with a blogger with a smaller following of loyal followers, than a blogger with a huge following of fake accounts or followers who do not engage. The conversion rate will be much higher from this blogger with a smaller, more loyal following. You’re also only hurting yourself, because these “bots” and “inactive” accounts are not going to interact with your IG posts. Therefore IG is just going to keep pushing your posts to the bottom until it basically becomes invisible.

Tip 4: Take Advantage of Features

Make sure you are taking advantage of all of Instagram’s features. For example: sharing polls, asking questions, IGTV, are just a few ways you can take advantage of IG’s features. Instagram stories are a MAJOR way to engage with your followers. Also, make sure you are using hashtags, tagging brands and using locations for popular locations. You can do this on both your IG posts and IG stories. Instagram not only likes accounts that actively use all features, but this will also boost your account’s exposure. 

Tip 5: Insights

If you have an Instagram business account, you can check your accounts stats. These stats will provide you with insight on how many followers you’ve gained in the last 7 days, your post reach, profile views, etc. You can also see what percentage of your followers are women/men, their age range, and where most of your followers live. Most of mine are in Los Angeles, New York and London. You can also see what days and times your followers are most active. This will give you an idea of the best time to post. Instagram Insights are important to pay attention to and use to your advantage! They’re also being used a lot these days by brands to make sure you have an authentic following.

Let me know if you guys liked this post and if I should continue this blogging 101 series of Instagram tips and tricks. I understand how difficult it is to become a successful blogger or influencer, and want to help as much as I can. Feel free to reach out with any questions! And as always, thank you for reading xo