Wake up your customers with a great coffee quote post!
#TuesdayTip – Every Tuesday
Post a tip related to your followers that really helps you or your business.
#WorldSmileDay – 2nd October
Post a fab photo of you smiling and tell us what makes you happy!
#NationalTechiesDay – 3rd October
If you’ve been thinking about using a new tool to help you grow your business, this is the time to get it! Or tag a great piece of tech you always use.
#WorldAnimalDay – 4th October
The perfect opportunity for a cute pet post!
#WorldTeachersDay – 5th October
Lets celebrate our teachers? Let your followers know how they impacted you!
#MadHatterDay – 6th October
Ask your followers to share their wackiest ideas! Or your favourite afternoon tea venue?
#WednesdayWisdom – Every Wednesday
Tell our community something interesting about your business @ SJPoole Network.
Extra important this year! Create a post that helps raise awareness.
#OwnBusinessDay – 13th October
Dedicated to all independent business owners in the world… Tell everyone about your business and why you set it up!
#WorldMathsDay – 14th October
A great opportunity to offer a 2 for 1 discount! Or buy 1 get 1 free!
#DessertDay – 15th October
You know what to do! My favorite is sticky toffee pudding! What it yours?
#SpreadsheetDay – 17th October
Are you a spreadsheet queen? How do they help your business? Or celebrate your VA or PA if they do this for you!
#WorldStatisticsDay – 20th October
Check in with with your followers and engage with new accounts that you are interested in. Analytics and insights are so important for your business and statistics can give you so much valuable information.
#MakeADifferenceDay – 24th October
How can you #makeadifference ? Ask your followers what they’ve done this year to effect change.
#HumpDay – Every Wednesday
Help your audience get through the week with an inspirational quote!
#ChecklistDay – 30th October
I love a ‘to do’ list and I love crossing it out when complete! What is on your to do list today?
#Halloween
Support small businesses selling Halloween goods! Share posts from great bloggers too.
As all platforms it really is best to start with a strategy. It is good to have a plan of what you want to achieve with your posts and know that this is another long game, as organic and natural growth is always the best way to grow!
Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms, and it can be used in a variety of ways to draw in customers to your business. You can promote your latest news, products, acquire new customers, and communicate directly with your existing followers. Couple those possibilities with the 1 billion plus monthly active users, and you can see why it’s so powerful for entrepreneurs.
1. It’s not rocket science! Grid and Stories is all you need to ‘get down with the kids’ in 2020.
There is a standard post where pictures appear on the user’s feeds and your grid. These pictures are posted permanently to your account and can be seen on your profile – It is good to think about what you would like this to look like. An easy ‘set’ grid layout is always the best way to start and choosing a colour pallet always increases its visual look. Great examples can be found @ https://www.business2community.com/instagram/ultimate-guide-instagram-grid-layouts-02031483
A grid layout helps you think about the overall look of your feed, based on each square on the grid. You can create a consistent layout by carefully planning each square like breakfast, lunch, dinner.
Instagram also has stories. These can be viewed for 24 hours and then they disappear. However, you can add stories to your Instagram highlights, and users can view stories indefinitely. My advice is to get your main post strategy with the right # and then start with your stories.
2. Create a great first impression & Post a link to your website in your Bio
The downside to Instagram is there’s only one link you can include in your bio so if you are like me and have several businesses, then yes, you need an account for each business on your social platforms. If you post a link anywhere else, like in a comment or story, you won’t be able to click on it. However if you are sharing that post to Facebook it will work there so you can still include them if it will be seen on the same Facebook post (will discuss this more in our next blog).
You can change this link address at anytime in the ‘edit bio’ area and this is great if you want to send your followers to a new blog article or a special offer. Use #linkinbioand this will remind them to check it out! The more you post the better you will get! My advice is to post at least once a day but follow a plan, study the trends and admire others work (do not copy), be personal and just grow 1 day at a time.
3. Provide content specific to your Ideal Target Audience – Who are you trying to attract?
What will catch their attention? This is where you really need to be clear on what you are setting out to achieve.
If you have a website or other social media accounts, you should create a common theme throughout your media. The theme should appeal to your target audience. Canva is great for this and Canva Pro is a must if you would like professional looking graphics for social media. If this skill is too much for you to learn on top of social? Speak to us and we can make you a 28 day graphics pack and email them over to you #outsourcing
Check out your competition, to see if they are successfully doing their social media. What posts have the most likes, are they running competitions, look at their followers and be inspired but please do not copy! Another great insight is to look at businesses that have a similar target audience to you. What are they posting? How are they standing out from their competitors?
Also, look for some influencers as this could elevate your brand very quickly. Instagram Influencers are those people that perform exceptionally well on social media. They typically have thousands of followers, and they rely heavily on creating messaging that resonates with their audience – including the Instagram hashtags that they choose. One of the best ways to learn which Instagram hashtags to use is to look at the top influencers which are relevant to your brand. You’ll be able to tell a fair bit from analyzing which hashtags they are using and the engagement that they are getting on their posts.
4. Follow Users& Gain Followers
It’s incredibly easy to find and follow users. Using Instagram’s search feature, you can find celebrities, brands, and friends. Additionally, you can search “Tags” or “Places”. “Tags” is particularly useful if you know what type of content you want to find, but you’re not sure who posts about it. Once you’re on someone else’s account, you’ll see a blue “Follow” button at the top. For public profiles, you can click and immediately begin following that account. However, if the profile is private, you may need to wait for them to accept you first.
A quick win is to check out your friends followers for mutual connections and other businesses that you could support. When you click on ‘following’ you will see who they are following and likewise – their followers.
When you can share more with your community through your Instagram posts, you can build a stronger relationship with your audience (both new and existing). It lets your audience be involved, and behind the scenes of our business so you might find you gain new followers, and better retain the audience you already have.
Instagram offers up a “Suggested for you” list when you visit an Instagram profile — you just have to click the downward arrow underneath the account’s bio: Instagram curates this list of Instagram profiles based on your interests, who you follow, but also based on that account’s activity.
5. Use Hashtags & How many?
An Instagram hashtag is a singular word, or a series of words, that is marked with a hash symbol (#) and is used in an Instagram post’s description, or comments section. The main purpose of these hashtags is to help Instagram organize and categorize content – they help the platform to let present the right content to the right users. If you’re a social media user already then it’s likely that you’ve already seen hashtags in action. Twitter is a great platform to understand the power of a # and you can find some amazing content on LinkedIn with the right # search too. #entrepreneurlife #mondaymotivation #wednesdaywisdom are a few of my favourites!
Hashtags are a way to make yourself searchable to new audiences that may be interested in your account. Google is your best friend for finding great # and a simple search on #Beautyfor example will show you all the experts in action!
You don’t necessarily need to use the most popular Instagram hashtags to increase engagement with your posts. I believe it can be very effective if you use the Instagram hashtags that have a lower reach, but are more relevant to your audience. Between 10k and 50k hashtags are great to use and max of 10 per post. The main reason we want to use hashtags for Instagram is to get increase the chances of people landing on our content – but we always want to think about who are the “right” people that we want to draw in.
Keep in mind that what works for one business may not work for yours, but Instagram is a great platform that offers lots of room for trial and error. Now that have a better idea about how to get started on Instagram and the types of content you can share, it’s time to put it all into action. Practice, Practice and more Practice is needed plus a huge glass of consistency!
The Social Entrepreneur 