When you’re first starting out on Instagram, the whole platform can appear a bit daunting. You post a few pictures and wait around for those likes to show up, but what if they don’t? What do you do next? How do you find followers and increase their engagement with your posts? Never fear, my friend, let me show you five easy steps to start building up your Instagram following!

How to Grow Your Followers on Instagram in Five Easy Steps

Step 1: Your Bio

Instagram only gives you three lines for your bio, so you need to make them count.

Use an emoji for each line, it can help really help you stand out.

You only get one link, so use it wisely. A great solution is to use linktr.ee or to link directly to a mobile friendly page where fans can find you wherever they congregate.

Step 2: Find Your Fan Base

No matter what your job or hobbies might be, there are probably people on Instagram with the same interests.

The easiest way to build your fan base is to search out the top 10 to 20 Instagram accounts in your niche and follow them.

Top accounts might not have a million followers, but the followers they have are posting comments and engaging with the creator. Those are the accounts you want to follow.

Look at what they’re posting and what fans are eagerly responding to.

Make sure you start commenting and actively participating in their comments and if your contributions are noteworthy, their fans will head over to your profile to check you out. This is your chance to shine!

Step 3: Create Quality Content

Use the ideas you’ve gained from following top creators to turn your posts into conversation starters that new fans will want to respond to.

Try to post daily, but if you can only post once a week, start with posting on Wednesdays. Demographics show that Wednesday at 11am is when Instagram is the most active, but this is a very generalized statistic. Once you have a steady flow of viewers you can check your insights and see which days you get the largest response from your target fan base.

Keep a folder on your desktop or a note on your phone and write down ideas for future posts when you run across something that you think your followers might appreciate.

Step 4: Hashtags are Still Important

The algorithm has advanced. It can now read your post or listen to your video and pull out the keywords to determine what the post is really about. For this reason, you need to be sure that your hashtags match your content so you don’t appear  “spammy”.  

Prioritize relevant keywords in your texts and comments which relate to your hashtags.

Step 5: Don’t Forget the Reels

After the explosion of TikTok, Instagram has started giving more weight to reels. You absolutely need to be uploading reels whenever you can.

Upload unique reels directly to Instagram, don’t try to share from your TikTok or Facebook page. Instagram wants unique content; it doesn’t want to promote competitors.

That’s it! As you gain likes and comments, Instagram will promote you more and you’ll gain more and more fans. Now get out there and start building your empire!

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Twitter might be a train wreck right now but try not to give up on the little blue bird just yet.

It’s important for you to be on the same platform that your target audience spends their time on. Twitter has over 396 million users globally, roughly 38% female and 61% male, between the ages of 18 and 29 years old. This does vary a bit between countries however, with the UK being closer to a 41/58 split, but all areas are male dominant.

While it started out as a micro-blogging platform, Twitter now ranks in the top 15 of social networks. What this means, is that if your target audience is male, you absolutely MUST be on Twitter.

So how do you write a Tweet which doesn’t get lost in the crowd?

Twitter can be an absolute battleground of wits. It can also feel very lonely if you’ve been posting day after day and your tweets aren’t being noticed.

Show Your True Self

Tweets that gain the most attention are the ones that make an impression. Stick to subjects that your target audience can relate to and inject your personality into the conversation. Find your voice. Use your humor, your unique point of view, to make your tweets unique. Even if people object to what you say, it will still start a conversation, which will get you noticed.

Retweet with A Purpose

It might be easy just to retweet everything that sparks your interest, but it could hurt your fan base. Your followers might be following the same people and have already read that same tweet. If you’re just parroting back information, they’ll unfollow you to cancel out the noise. Keep the retweets to a minimum. A better option is to use the reply button instead. Add your voice to the conversation.

Keep it Simple

Keep your tweets short and sweet. The ideal tweet is only 100 characters, although the platform will allow more. So, think about what you want to write and then refine it down to one or two perfect sentences.

Spellcheck And Scheduling

Just like everything else, it is a really good idea to spellcheck everything before you post. Plan out your posts with a word processer to be sure that your writing is clean. Then schedule posts to come out at key times. For Twitter, the best time to post is Monday or Thursday, around 8am in the morning.

Use Your Hashtags

Every industry has relative hashtags. If you’re a romance author, you might use hashtags like #amwriting #writerslife #writingpromt or #bookgiveaway. Just make sure that you are using the right hashtags for your tweet. If you use the book giveaway hashtag but you’re not giving away a book, your fans will obviously feel tricked and that will cause them to hit that unfollow button fast!

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