Ask an Expert: How to Boost Your Engagement and Build a Following on Instagram
Engagement isn't what you think!
We’ve been spending a lot of time at Create & Cultivate HQ discussing how we can best show up for and support our community during this uncertain time. Community is at our core, and connecting with others through one-of-a-kind experiences is what we love to do. While the world has changed, our mission has not. We’re committed to helping women create and cultivate the career of their dreams, which is why we’re proud to announce our new Ask an Expert series. We’re hosting discussions with experts, mentors, and influencers daily on Instagram Live to cure your craving for community and bring you the expert advice you’ve come to know and love from C&C. Follow Create & Cultivate on Instagram, check out our Ask an Expert highlight reel for the latest schedule, and hit the countdown to get a reminder so you don’t miss out!
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Have you ever found yourself on a rollercoaster of emotion when it comes to Instagram? One day you’re flying high and people are clamoring to engage with your content—and the next? You’re shouting into the void with only crickets to respond. It’s time to ditch the not-so-fun ride and cruise into sustainable growth, engagement, and community building.
In this installment of our Instagram Live series Ask an Expert, Dre Fox, the CEO and founder of TimeOfDre Media, lays out a framework to follow to boost engagement, build sustainable growth, and cultivate a community on Instagram. Scroll on for her tried and true tips and be sure to follow Create & Cultivate on Instagram to tune into our next Ask an Expert Live.
Why Does Engagement Matter?
Instagram is a fickle platform that judges success by your ability to create conversation and interest amongst your online community—a.k.a. you keep people on the platform. So IG favors those that receive high engagement as a way to incentivize that creator to keep going, but also the platform reaps the rewards of your community building.
In short, the more engagement—likes, comments, and shares—you get, the more Instagram will push you in front of new eyes.
Engagement Is Not What You Think!
Creating an online community is not a product of spending 10 hours a day on the platform dropping “cute pic” comments on everyone that you see, it’s the product of alignment.
Here is how I like to break it down:
When your message, your audience, and your content are all aligned, you can easily boost your engagement, your following, and your impact within the online space.
So, Let’s Break It Down
Find Your Niche
The specialist advantage or “your niche” is the most critical piece to nail on your Instagram page, because if your profile is hard to understand, most won’t click “follow,” which results in lower engagement.
So ask yourself, what topic or area can I provide the most insight or help to someone else in the online space? This doesn’t mean you need to be an award-winning expert or a top person in that space, but where can you draw the most insight and knowledge?
We want you to be a “go-to” or a wealth of knowledge to one group of people!
Attract People Who are Invested in You
If you truly want more engagement, you’ll want to have an audience of people that are invested in your content and inspired by your words. That can’t be created when your audience is filled with the wrong people.
So your first task is to revamp your bio to be geared towards your new topic and the people that would be interested in your niche. The goal here is that once you’ve made over your bio, you can hand your phone to a stranger and they’d be able to clearly state what you do and what you talk about!
Create Valuable Content
Think back to the best friend or mentor you ever had. They likely helped you, made you feel good about yourself, made you think deeper and pushed you to be better. This is your job on social media as well!
People are HIGHLY attracted to those that add value to their lives, for free.
So, identify the top 10 problems someone in your niche is having and break it into the following categories:
Tips
Example: 3 tips about (problem 1)
Advice
Example: Ways to avoid (problem 2)
Resources
Example: Struggling with (problem 3)? Here are some apps for….
Once you start creating value-driven content for your aligned audience, engagement will naturally increase without having to spend hours a day engaging.
Be a Champion of Others
Picture this, you get a nice comment, a thoughtful comment on your post from someone, you take a look at their profile and realize they’re speaking about topics you have interest in—you are clicking follow and bingeing their posts.
Conversely, you get a “cute pic” comment from an account that has nothing to do with your topic. You’re not going to follow them, right?
It’s pretty simple really, engagement is most effective when your heart is actually in the game and you’re trying to build an audience of like-minded people, not collecting likes.
Some best practices around active audience building is to comb through related hashtags and competitor accounts for people that will LOVE your content. Reach out, leave them a nice comment, engage with their stories and encourage a future relationship!
Once they are able to pop over to your page and see that you have amazing and helpful content, they’ll click that “follow” button and become a long term fan.
So What Does This All Mean?
It means that engagement is not about working more or working harder to scour the internet, it’s about being intentional and thoughtful with the relationship we are building. Having that narrow focus and an audience full of excited fans will carry your account much further than one full of thousands of dead accounts.
It’s time to niche down, create more value for others and spend your time creating relationships—the true secret to increased engagement!
“T
he more engagement—likes, comments, and shares—you get, the more Instagram will push you in front of new eyes.”
—Dre Fox, Founder and CEO, TimeOfDre Media
About the Expert: Dre Fox is the founder and CEO of TimeOfDre Media, a Forbes and Washington Post featured social media agency located in Austin, Texas. After many years of helping Fortune 500 companies improve their social experience and brand awareness online, Dre was inspired to focus on building the brands of small businesses and public figures. Her core passion is helping people just like you, realize their dreams online.
Right now, TimeOfDre is offering 30% off The Elevated Instagram, a foundational Instagram course using code: CC30 for all readers of Create and Cultivate. Please check out Dre over at Instagram for more free social media advice each day.
Psst… Want more intel on how to build a following on Instagram? Buy your ticket for C&C’s Digital Beauty Summit on Saturday, July 25th to tune into Dre Fox’s IG workshop.
MORE ON THE BLOG
4 Creative Ways to Announce Your New Engagement
Make it pop.
Are you one of the 40 percent of people that get engaged between Thanksgiving and Valentine's Day? The holiday months are some of the most popular when it comes to love.
It makes sense after all. Family and fun, eggnog. Mistletoe… the New Year’s Eve capital K Kiss. There’s a lot of smoochin’ going on lately. And we love it. So does Simon G Jewelry, the leader in engagement rings and bling. But announcing your love to the world can feel more overwhelming than the wedding. How do you make sure your announcement is equal parts sweet and creative?
Here are some ideas!
MAKE IT COLORFUL
The recently engaged blogger Color Me Courtney wanted an IG announcement that popped as much as her ring. (#SimonGSparkles.)A couple balloons, a bright pink monochrome, and the #onbendedknee Boyz to Men style swagger from her now fiancé, it was picture perfect. It didn’t hurt that she was rocking a gorgeous yellow diamond stunner.
IT SHOULD BE OUT OF THIS WORLD
This couple took their proposal to the moon and back. To recreate this amazing announcement, find yourself a creative partner and get to work. No one said marriage is easy, but this couple has the moon (and likely the world) on a string.
SMILE BIG.
OK. Maybe it’s not the most creative but you don’t have to have a paint war engagement photoshoot (yes, those exist) to show your true happiness. Sometimes the best thing you can do is smile big and flash a little ring.
And look, it’s not only about the proposal. You have to pop the question to your best gals as well, so why not make it ‘grammable with bridesmaid proposal cards from Etsy! We love the scratch off "Will you be my Bridesmaid" cards.
Have other creative ways to announce? Let us know below!
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A New Diamond Trend Is Taking Over (& Unexpected Perks Come with It)
Mom, more oval-bling please.
“Let's face it, every person getting married wants something unique to them...not something they see coming and going,” says Brooke Brinkman, Vice President, Marketing & Communication at Simon G. The fine jewelry brand has been around for over three decades, witnessed alllll of the diamond trends, and really pride themselves on combining old world design with modern tech to create stunning and unique looks. So why wouldn’t we look to them when pouring over diamond pics and options?
The good news: you can follow trends and still be unique. And there is a new trend on the rise. “While we’ve seen round diamonds take center stage as the most popular choice for engagement rings for years,” the exec shares, “we are so stoked to see oval diamonds increasing in demand.”
The bling boss knows what she’s talking about. According to Rare Carat, "Ovals are the breakout star of 2017, rising 40% in just six months.” This isn’t surprising to Simon G., which offers an array of engagement rings to suit every bride’s desire.
“The oval diamond is a classic shape with royal roots, but offers many benefits for the person who wants something a bit different, but not too trendy. At the end of the day you want to enjoy your ring for years to come, so trendy is good, but not if it doesn't allow your ring to be timeless,” says Brinkman. Adding, ‘Oval diamonds are the current trend, but they also provide the bonus of longevity. i.e. they’re not just an “of-the-moment” piece.
Oval diamonds have a few other bonuses as well. “Oval diamonds carry most of their weight on the surface, so compared to their round counterpart of the same size, an oval diamond will appear larger. Another perk with choosing this on trend cut is that because of their shape, Oval diamonds can give the effect of an elongated finger. Lastly, and maybe the most important plus, is that Oval diamonds are cut the same way as a round diamond, so you won’t sacrifice on sparkle and they shouldn’t cost much more --- any trend that doesn’t sacrifice shine or budget, count us in!”
Shop a few of the best options for this new trend from Simon G.’s collections. And then if you like it, go ahead, put a ring on it.
From the Delicate Collection, this engagement set features an oval center diamond.
A .18 ct oval center diamond in a halo is the focus of this darling set of rings, while .37 ctw of pave set diamonds are the final perfecting touch.
From the Passion Collection, this stunning option has a classic style setting features a double halo design built for an oval center stone. It contains .40 ctw of side diamonds.
Also from the Passion Collection, this is a classic halo design engagement ring made for an oval center stone contains .45 ctw of white diamonds.
Would rock an oval rock? Let us know in the comments below!
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Exposing Engagement: Why You Need This Instagram Tool
Dig deep and analyze what matters.
Around 2.5 billion photos and videos are liked on Instagram every day. It is the ruling King, Queen, and Court Jester of social media. And if you have a public Instagram, you have a brand-- whether you are conscious of this or not. Your brand is who you are to the world. Now whether you choose to market this-- AKA tell people what you do, is a personal choice. However if you want to be successful on Instagram you have to understand your engagement.
It is the best way to build awareness, drive traffic to your blog, brand, or brick-and-mortar, and ultimately, grow your business. Figuring out your engagement is what separates successful grammers from the mediocre, and there's a new tool simplifying the process.
Peoplemap is an Instagram marketing tool that features: profile analysis, list building, campaign tracking, and statistics. If you are an individual with multiple accounts you can manage all accounts on a single platform; if you are a brand or a company, your entire team can access the account and information.
You can search groups, communities within a specific geographical region, and it exposes engagement numbers that are important to brands and individuals.
WHY IS THIS USEFUL TO BRANDS?
One: list building. Peoplemap has created a way to analyze Instagram marketing efforts and strategically build a targeted community. They make it easier to sort, filter, and analyze any user so you can create "the most comprehensive and strategic Instagram rolodex for your company".
Now let's chat about exposing engagement. Say you're building a list of beauty influencers, but you want to filter those with the highest engagement, you can do that. If you want to only hire influencers who have 2% engagement and up, you can do that. There is also an option to "analyze" a profile. If you click "analyze," in about an hour Peoplemap will send you a report that highlights who recently, liked, commented, or who was tagged. It's a way for brands (as well as individuals) to really understand the audience.
These are tools to really help brands understand the who, what, and why of the influencers they're hiring.
WHY IS THIS USEFUL TO INDIVIDUALS?
As with brands, understanding what performs well and what doesn't is key to growing and engaging your followers. When you analyze the posts that are not performing well vs. those that are, it will help you create a more robust, comprehensive strategy. The higher your engagement, the more money you'll make from brands who are looking for influencers.
"Understanding what performs well and what doesn't is key to growing and engaging your followers."
Tweet this.
It also helps you easily compare your engagement to others. While they say comparison is the thief of joy, in this instance it could also be a thief... of dollars. When you understand your engagement in comparison to others who are working in similar categories, you might be able to charge more. Let's say you have 200k followers less than an Insta-famous fashion blogger, but they have a .89% engagement and you're clocking in at 5%. You may have fewer followers, but you can make the case to a brand that the ROI is better with you.
You can also build a "competition" list in Peoplemap and compare your engagement to others. If your engagement is lower, use this as a means to analyze your content vs. someone who has high engagement and change your strategy.
When it comes to IG, knowledge and understanding is power. Peoplemap is putting the knowledge in your hands. It's up to you to understand your engagement, the numbers, and ultimately, your business.
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