Let’s face it: Out of all the users and organizations dominating today’s social media landscape, Instagram may just be the most challenging platform on which to establish a distinctive personal brand.
Last December, Instagram announced it had registered more than 300 million unique users since its inception in 2010, boasting 12 million more users than Twitter. Fifty-seven percent of those users access the application at least once per day. And with more than 90 percent of its user base in the 18-35 age group, Instagram is an essential tool for brands hoping to forge connections with millennials. But simply having an account isn’t enough; users are looking for something genuine, consistent, and unique.
Here are five ways to better establish a more cohesive personal brand on Instagram:
Confidently Be Yourself
Something that is frequently overlooked when planning out an Instagram strategy is the importance of genuine content. Even more than on other social media platforms, users in the Instagram community tend to be more subconsciously aware of posts that don’t register as “real.” If your audience doesn’t feel like they’re making a connection with you through your posts, they’re less likely to be engaged with your account.
Instead of attempting to gain followers or likes through more contrived photography efforts or even services that generate free followers (NEVER use these), try to develop a conversational and relaxed tone with your copy. Your image feed should serve as a window into your life that someone could use to learn about who you are. Instagram functions best when it’s utilized like a digital scrapbook; the images you post should be of things that speak to you, not just something you think would generate a lot of likes.
Set a Calendar
While authenticity is vital to a successful account, if you’re serious about beefing up your game on Instagram, at some point you’ll have to start paying attention to your account in a more intentional and strategic way. Free services like Iconosquare offer advanced analytics and metrics for your account and suggest hashtags and ideal posting times for your content. All of the data is aggregated from your personal account, so your results will help you optimize each of your posts to get better feedback from your audience.
It’s also wise to create a content calendar for your account to help spread out your content publishing and make sure that you’re always working ahead. Keeping a weekly calendar can be the difference between a well-managed account and a sloppy one. You can also use applications, such as Schedugram, that will schedule and publish your posts for you. This will allow you to build your posts in advance and schedule them for an optimal day and time. When it’s time to publish, the application will send your image to Instagram for you!
Don’t Take Time Off
It’s been said that social media is “the beast that never sleeps,” and this certainly rings true on Instagram. It’s easy to fall into a trap where you post more frequently for a week, only to find you don’t have any more pictures to post for a day or two. Unfortunately, these interruptions in regular content flow tend to have adverse affects on the average number of engagements you receive per post, and it usually takes a day or two to rebuild that rapport with your audience. The best advice here is to never give your followers a chance to forget why they started following you.
Develop a Style or Maintain a Theme
Generally, accounts on Instagram tend to be more successful when there’s some type of theme or unifying trend that brings the account together. Ideally, the best strategy is to find something about your personal life that lends itself to photographs, and then develop a content strategy around that idea. When you have an established theme in place for your content, you’ll start to attract people to your account who are following you for that specific theme — and those people will then be more likely to engage with your content. This could be anything from a mother posting pictures of her children to an account dedicated to posting photos from around the workplace. Your theme could even be something as random as the one created by @symmetrybreakfast (one of my favorites). The account features daily symmetrical pictures of breakfast meals prepared by a couple in London.
If your account isn’t the type that lends itself to being confined by a strict theme, developing a specific style instead can help bring your photo collection together. Try to create consistency in the tonality of the image caption, and in how you choose to edit your picture. If you need a little style inspiration, check out @AlexKolbo (a local Instagrammer from Hurrdat’s home city of Lincoln).
Tell a Story With Each Post
This concept is probably the hardest thing to master about Instagram, because it forces you to really think about your posts before you share them. Everything you post should have a story behind it — something that pulls the viewer into the frame and allows them to understand what’s happening. It’s easy to fall into a rut on Instagram where we just take pictures of things that don’t actually tell a story (we’ve all seen those accounts where someone is a little too eager to share pictures of what they ate for dinner). Unfortunately, content like this tends to be significantly more interesting to the person who posted it, rather than to the audience.
The best Instagram posts are the ones where users can feel something was happening before and after the pictures were shot, like in @Makhorov’s posts. This account frequently features pictures where the photographer has climbed to the top of a very high building or structure and snapped a few pictures of the view. Posts like this mean something to both you and your audience members. Posting each photo with that idea in mind is sure to help you cultivate a style, theme, and dedicated audience in no time.
Did we miss any major tips for establishing a strong brand presence on Instagram? Share with us in the comments.
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Hurrdat is a Lincoln, Neb. digital marketing agency specializing in social media and content marketing. The company was founded in 2010 and merged with B² Interactive of Omaha, Neb. in 2014 bringing even more digital marketing specialties to both firms’ clients. Together they provide a full range of social media, SEO, and website development services to both national brands and local clients. The companies employ more than 75 people in Nebraska and have won multiple awards for their business efforts, company culture, and clients’ campaigns.
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