There is a question I am asked often.
What social media network should I be using? And guess what? They want a black and white answer.
The reality?
It is shades of grey. But there is another thing. The goal posts keep moving as the social networks change the rules, the type of media they offer and their secret algorithms.
It is often confusing and overwhelming.
What all digital marketers need to do
But there is something that is an absolute core tactic for all marketers and entrepreneurs in a digital world.
And many don’t focus on this.
“Growing digital media distribution networks“.
This is one of the 10 commandments of any successful media company. It is also what all brands and digital entrepreneurs should be doing. Because we all need to think like publishers.
Without this the content will not get the attention and engagement that it deserves. Without distribution, content is often hidden in the nooks and crannies of the web and is never seen, heard or viewed.
My initial tactic to reach the world with my content and get noticed was to use Twitter.
In the last 7 years I have focused on building a large following and tribe on Twitter and now we are approaching half a million followers.
How important has this been?
It has been the difference between anonymity and high global visibility.
The power of having hundreds of thousands of people being able to share your content for free is what made social media so exciting. It was the key to my success.
Crowd sourced marketing!
This was not available before the rise of the social web. It has been my secret sauce.
New kids on the block
But that was then and there has been a fast evolution of choices. More revolution than evolution. Shiny new social networks. And they are often visual and mobile.
We all know how overwhelming it can be to jump into a new social media platform, considering how rapidly new ones appear, and how competitive they can be. On top of that, to master your new channel — as you’ve probably learned, can be really frustrating if you don’t have a clear guide.
But you have no choice if you want to remain relevant and not end up in the social media backwater.
The Instagram kid
Ever since Facebook acquired Instagram, it’s quickly evolved into something more than just a photo sharing app. And it has over half a billion active users.
With all the noise on Facebook and other social media platforms… Instagram still manages to keep it simple and elegant.
That’s part of why people migrated to Instagram so quick, and use it so regularly — it’s beautiful, fun and engaging.
These deeply engaged users make great customers, if you can captivate them.
And since your website link is in your bio, increasing the number of eyes on your account equates to more website traffic.
So, if you can master how to attract your target audience to your account, it not only leads to increased traffic, but also conversions.
So why do so many people have trouble getting momentum on Instagram?
First, let’s debug one big misconception: You don’t have to set an advertising budget to grow your account. And you don’t need a large budget to doInstagram marketing well…
Where to start:
Study your target market and industry on Instagram.
- Which accounts do they follow?
- What hashtags are they using?
- What are the most popular hashtags in your niche?
Get involved.
- Join Instagram engagement communities where you exchange comments with each other.
This alone can 10x your engagement rate.
Choose a theme for your Instagram.
- Pick a specific color palette that matches your brand image
- Stick to the same type of filter style for every picture.
Next, gain your audience’s attention
I have an intimate understanding of the frustrations with working really hard and long on these channels, and not seeing results.
So I studied the trends and most successful Instagram accounts, and developed a scientific approach to hacking audience growth.
Let’s be clear: Optimizing your Instagram shouldn’t mean you simply put more hours into it.
Liking pictures, following people, unfollowing in a targeted and strategic way can consume hours of every day. It’s tedious, and frankly not a great use of your time.
Whether it’s you, or a social media agency that handles your account, this type of thing should be outsourced.
You and your agency know your brand best and for this reason, content should be your #1 focus.
It’s competitive, seriously.
Instagram is at about 500 million monthly active users and growing. This means you need an aggressive activity strategy to stand out.
Does the task of following and unfollowing hundreds of accounts in a day sound overwhelming? It is. I know because I used to do this manually on Twitter until I discovered how to do it via automation.
So let me show you exactly how to overcome this time-suck with Instagram with what till now has been a little known Instagram growth hacking platform.
Use an Instagram growth hacking service
Finding a reliable service for Instagram growth can be tricky. However, through a friend, I heard about a service that not only saves me a bunch of time, but can growth accounts 10x — in a very real way. Not spammy, not shady.
It essentially puts Instagram to work for me by gaining me real followers in my niche. It worked for me on Twitter so I decided to start testing it.
The results?
In just 7 days I have grown my Instagram account by nearly 1,000 followers using an Instagram growth hacking service. At this run rate I will hit over 55,000 followers in the next 12 months
>>>> Grab your FREE trial now
It does this by automating the monotonous activity of choosing users to interact and engage, but does so in the most targeted manner.
How do you use it?
Let me introduce SociallyRich
The best part about their Service was that unlike other Instagram services out there, there’s no confusing dashboard to interact with.
You just provide your hashtags of interest, and the usernames of accounts to target, and they take care of the rest.
This saved me so much time to the point I no longer had to go on my Instagram, other than to post images.
