Instagram is a great way to help build your business, it's basically on online portfolio and helps you connect with potential clients in a faster way then ever before. Since the demonic Facebook take over, it's been harder to build a following. If you're sitting on struggle street... read on. 

Any who here is an odd number of tips that have helped me with the old Insta-G:

  1. POST NEW CONTENT ON THE REG: But, remember quality over quantity! I try and post at least once a day, to stay connected with my audience. The max number of posts I will do in a day is 3 (I sometimes go a little wild on the BTS) You don't want to use all of your good content in the one day AND you don't want to annoy the f%$k out of your followers.
  2. QUALITY, QUALITY, QUALITY: Never post shitty pixilated images. If you do, get out of town.
  3. USE HASHTAGS: Yeah, I know... people who go OTT on the hashtags are losers (that's me). BUT, they work! Use hashtags that are relevant to your work and that will drive traffic to your profile. Do some research on the top tags for your genre and save them on a notes page in your phone so you can just copy and paste them every time you need them!
  4. RESPOND: I have been super shit at this part lately! However, responding to messages and comments are super important. It builds relationships and encourages your followers to continue to comment on your shit!
  5. ENGAGEMENT PODS: So, basically the idea is that a group of (internet) friends within a similar genre to you create a group in DM. There you can notify each other when you have a recent post, that then sparks them all to go like and comment on said photo or video. In turn this builds more comments and likes from heavy users to push more people to see your posts in the feed. I am a part of 2 Pods & can 100% say they work! Not only do they work, I have a really great/talented group of photographer friends that I can bounce ideas off & just generally talk shit with!
  6. BTS: Give your followers a backstage pass into how the magic happens! Post boomerangs, use the Insta-story & Do live videos. It gets everyone excited to see the final product!
  7. TAG ERRBODY: If you've posting a shoot, tag everyone involved - this is more of a common courtesy tip. Don't be a dick, everyone deserves recognition. ALSO, tag labels (if you used them) or online mags, you never know you could get a repost!
  8. BE YOURSELF: The internet is fake as it is, make your social reflect who you are, not who you want people to think you are. THAT'S LAME AF
  9. BIO: Keep your bio looking fresh & make sure you have your contact details ESPECIALLY EMAIL!  There's nothing more annoying than not being able to find someones email!
  10. ENGAGEMENT OVER FOLLOWERS: Honestly, when I look at someones profile and they have 100k followers and get 400 likes per picture and like 1 comment, I'm immediately suss on them. That's like 0.4% engagement rate & it's pathetic. The average engagement rate on Instagram is around 3-6%. SOOOO if you have 24k followers you need around 700-800 likes per photo to have a decent engagement rate. Holy shit... that was math. I googled every single bit of that bullshit... I can't be trusted... Anyway, try using Engagement Pods & all the other tips above to help!

12.CONSISTENCY: I actually want to die when I see people posting pictures that are landscape and portrait with the white/black border. It kills my soul.... keep your feed consistent pick one of the other! preferably with no border, cos they suck and your less likely to have your image reposted.

LAST BUT NOT LEAST.... Don't just rely on on Instagram - use other social platforms. Because when that asshole prude reports your photo for having a BUM in it and Instagram bans your account and you find out when you're in a public place. Not falling to the floor and having a 3 year old tantrum is really hard! TRUST ME I KNOW!

This was me when Instagram took away my account

This was me when Instagram took away my account