The right way to grow your business with this powerful brand, audience and content marketing tool

We’ve been talking about how to boost your business marketing with Instagram lately. Contrary to what many people still believe, Instagram isn’t just a fun app where you can post food, vacation, and family photos.

Instagram has evolved into a powerful branding, audience building, and content marketing tool for businesses. It has over 200 million active monthly members sharing 60 million pictures and 1.6 billion likes per day.

A note of caution: there are many people out there promising to add thousands to your Instagram followers, but be careful. Most of them use fake accounts created by bots to inflate your numbers.

These types of followers have no value. followerfabrik In fact, they can even be dangerous if they want to steal your password, photos, or infect you with sa virus.

According to data security company Imperva, these bad bots make up 28.9 percent of bots on Instagram.

The best way to build your Instagram followers is to be authentic to your brand and audience.

Here are 3 tips to help you get real Instagram followers:

1. Tell a story using hashtags

Using your company name as a hashtag is great, but you need to think beyond that.

If you want to use your Instagram posts to gain followers, use other hashtags that tell the story of the image you’re sharing. You want to start a conversation when you share posts for things like:

• Events
• Promotions
• Competitions
• Product launches

A good example of a brand doing this well is @Tostitos. They use the hashtag #GetTogetherAlready to encourage people to get together and share their chips, and also use the hashtag when sharing photos from their meetings.

By using engaging, relevant hashtags, you can get discovered in Instagram searches and hopefully build followers on Instagram.

2. Get creative

Instagram is all about photos, so many people think the caption is an afterthought.

Don’t neglect the caption! You can generate engagement and encourage sharing by using descriptive words that engage, inspire, and entertain your followers.

Here are some ideas to help you build followers on Instagram with your posts:

• Use questions in your caption. Write your question at the top of the post so people see it first.
• Get personal with your post. Tell a story about yourself or how your product helped or inspired someone else.
• Ask people to tag others. Asking people to tag three of their best friends or tag someone they’re grateful for brings other potential followers into the equation.

A great example of a brand that is good at personal posting is the @NatGeo Instagram account.

They create stunning Instagram Stories with informative captions to educate the user about the plight of animals around the world.

Remember, when it comes to using Instagram posts to gain followers, it’s all about being authentic. Don’t use questions in every single post or tell a personal story that isn’t real.

3. Go local

One of the best ways to build your Instagram followers is to get to know your neighbors!

Whether you want to create Instagram ads or promote your event in a specific area, you can see what’s happening near you by going to the search page and clicking the “Places” tab.

Enter the location to view the geotagged posts for that space. Then visit relevant and recently starred posts – not those of competing companies, of course – and leave a comment or even an emoji and follow the person if you like what you see. Hopefully this will be the start of an organic interaction.

For example, if you offer life coaching services, you might enter your location followed by “entrepreneur.” Local entrepreneurs may be looking for more work-life balance or help with life goals or career challenges.

If you have a physical location where people have checked in on Instagram, comment on the images of those posters to make sure they’re aware of your Instagram presence, and then follow them.

These are some of the best ways to build Instagram followers the right way: no bots, no shortcuts, just tried and true ways to engage with your audience and convert them into followers!

Susan Friesen, founder of award-winning web development and digital marketing company eVision Media, is a web specialist, business and marketing consultant, and social media consultant. She works with entrepreneurs who are struggling with the lack of knowledge, skills and support needed to create their online business presence.

6 reasons why some people have more followers on Instagram than you

You can’t ignore the power of Instagram. It’s a social media giant and a fantastic place for businesses and brands to connect with their followers and maximize sales.

But for every person or business that has a large, receptive following, there are thousands more that don’t. Instagram can be powerful, but you have to be smart about how you use it.

1. Share eye-catching images

Instagram is a photo sharing website. So most of all you want to invest more followers on Instagram to make sure your pictures are really good. Also, post interesting content and well-composed and eye-catching photos.

2. Like photos

Don’t forget, Instagram is a social network, so it’s important to interact with others. To get more Instagram followers, start liking lots of images in your market to get people interested in following you. Leaving comments also helps. But make sure they are real and not spammy! And don’t forget to follow accounts you like too!

3. Time your images correctly

Research shows that the best time to post on Instagram is 5 p.m. on Wednesdays. This may or may not be right for your site. Based on your niche, your followers demographics, and other things specific to your niche and content, Wednesday might or might not be a good day for you. Finding the best time to post for your audience takes time to learn, so track the likes and comments on each photo and look for trends that occur at different times of the day.

4. Use hashtags

Using the right hashtags can really help you gain followers on Instagram. A lot of people search for certain hashtags and your pictures have that hashtag, it will be waiting for them there. Hashtags can help your content reach a wide range of people who may not be related to your account, in other words, they don’t specifically follow you. By simply using a few hashtags, you can significantly increase the reach of your content.

5. Host a contest

Post an amusing or fascinating photo to your account and offer a prize to a follower with the best caption. Use apps like Heyo, WishPond and AgoraPulse to run your contest.

6. Link to other social networks

If you have followers on other social media channels like Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest, invite them to follow you on Instagram. Make it easy for people to connect with you in multiple places.