As a Virtual Assistant, one of the many tasks for my incredible clients is managing their social media accounts. Whatever the platform I have tons of time-saving, low-cost strategies that keep the ball ticking over on your socials without eating into the precious time you have for the core purpose of your small business.  

Today, we’re going to look at Instagram. An ever-changing platform that constantly requires new methods to gain and maintain followers.

Before we get stuck in, I want to clarify one thing. Though my emphasis of this blog post is to save you time, ultimately what you have to accept, is that using any social media platform effectively will always require a good chunk of time, especially if you’re just at the beginning of setting up your account.

1. Work Out Your Why

It seems obvious, but you’d be surprised how many small businesses miss this first crucial step before they start posting and sharing to their heart’s content. Before the posting commences, grab yourself a piece of paper or open a new document page and ask yourself these 3 questions:

2. Why am I on this app specifically?
3. What do I want to get out of using this app?
4. How am I going to get to my goal?

2. Plan Your Content

For Instagram, consistency is key. My top tip for all my clients is to start the month with 2 scheduled posts per week. Of course, there is always space to post more- in fact the more the merrier. But for those weeks where the days run away from you, you can rest assured that with little effort, you’re still interacting and engaging with your audience.

3. Keep it simple but different

Instagram has evolved rapidly since it first began in 2010 and in this current climate, video content has become the most recent and effective way to gain and keep connected with followers. 

But what’s most prominent amongst successful Instagram users is the varying content. By this, I mean business accounts that have posts that don’t necessarily link to their product, but to the company’s ethos and passions as well.

Perhaps one post will be promoting your latest podcast release, and then the following will be you sharing a sunset walk you did last night. This allows the audience to become engaged and connected with not only the product but the person behind the product too.

4. Choose One Day to Engage.

This is possibly the most important point. Without engagement, everything else I have written above goes to waste.

Let me repeat.

Without engagement, everything else I have written above goes to waste.

Why? Instagram knows when users are actively using the app, rather than simply posting and leaving again. It rewards interactive behaviour as that’s what they want their users to do.

The most effective forms of engagement are simple; Reply to people’s comments on your posts or stories, follow and engage with other people’s posts on Instagram, and create stories that have interactive polls and questions for your audience.  

Still Need Help?

If you’re reading this and don’t have the time to manage your own social media accounts then I’m always happy to discuss the best strategy for you moving forward, please reach out at oliver@olivergallen.com