How to succeed on Instagram Part 2 - Why am I invisible?

Part 2 – Why am I invisible?

I will start with this caveat, everything I type here is what works for me, if you follow these strategies you will see an improvement but there is also the Instagram randomness factor.  One day, one post may just blow up randomly and go viral, this can still happen.  We'll talk about shadow bans etc in later episodes but generally the advice I give will work for most people but it IS hard work, I say that a lot.  This very article is part of my ongoing strategy, I'm (hopefully) creating stuff that people will like and engage with and share, it takes a lot of time to write this stuff but I am willing to put that time in to help my platform grow. Of course you don't have to write stuff like this but if you aren't prepared to commit then honestly you've failed at the first hurdle.

If I Instagram was a person, they’d be that guy that you have to be friends with and invite places but he always shows up drunk, pisses everyone off and leaves without paying his share of the tab.  Instagram of 2023 is not the Instagram of pre-2020, or even 2015-2020 – those were the golden days for the platform, if you posted something cool people saw it, and not even people that were following you but definitely the people that did follow you saw it.

Now we have the situation where you have 1000 followers and you post something and 10 of them see it, and 4 of those like it and well it’s just a vicious circle of depression and losing your feeling of self-worth.  Why IG decided to take a platform that worked so well and screw it so badly I will never know, I suspect as Tik Tok is so popular and they think the mindless scrolling of that is what people want these days.  Well to be fair I think to a certain extent that’s true, people are just doom scrolling for hours, so how the hell do you get people to see your stuff these days?

Well, I’m glad you asked that. There are two options open to you a) by making sure as many of your followers as possible do indeed see your post and b) by ensuring your post is shared outside of your own page to as many people as possible.

A short diversion before I jump into specifics.  To Instagram we are basically lab rats, when we do what we’re told and follow how they think we should be using the platform they reward us with the cheese that is reach, likes and followers.  When we don’t do as we’re told we’re left in a corner with some poison and instructions on how to mix it in the right quantities.  This is a simple one, Instagram rewards you for being what is calls “authentic” and for using as many features on the platform as possible.

Being authentic means genuinely using the platform (no bots, fake followers or likes, no mass following, unfollowing, all those dumb “gimme $5 and I’ll help you grow” tricks.  Use the platform like a normal person, engage with your followers, engage with the people who are following you, create a sense of belonging and community (their words not mine).  You do that by commenting on posts (always more than 5 characters / emojis don’t count), replying to comments on your posts within the first hour (always more than 5 characters / emojis don’t count).  Try to reply with things that start a conversation, “nice post”, “hey thanks so much for your support, did you see my post yesterday?” as an example, anyway, to get your followers talking on your posts will give you cheese.

People that regularly interact with you, talk to them on DM, send them a thank you, go on their pages and like and comment on some of their stuff.  Go to other people they are following that will be likely be in the same niche as you, go follow them and like and comment – see how you start to build the community IG talks about so much.  This is pretty critical, if you sit back and just post and cry no one is liking your stuff, it’s a two-way street now, to build your reach and engagement requires effort on your part and not just passivity.

As for using features…use em all, everything new available to me I use.  Reels 1000% will get you more engagement than static posts more of the time, not always, not most of the time.  And you don’t have to post video, IG offers you templates to use still images set to music, use those – IG will reward you.  Mix your posts up, static one day, reels, the next a carousel post with a still and a video the next, keep changing up what you post.  Now of course you’ll see pages only ever posting the same stuff doing spectacularly well – and that’s the point – they are already doing spectacularly well so none of this stuff im typing out matters to them, it matters to you, as you’re reading this hoping to grow.  Don’t compare yourself to what other big pages are posting, it’s pointless, they’ve already grown, you can’t drop into that in a week, reminder this all takes effort.

Use all the other IG features as well, Threads, Broadcast channels, anything new on offer use it, you will get rewarded the more of the platform you use, go live, do voice notes to people, comment with gifs… rewards, rewards, rewards.  Some things will only be available to you on a public account set as a creator or business, if you’re on a personal account and it’s private then you are massively hindering yourself and what you can do. Broadcast channels for example are only available to Creator Accounts.

Which brings me in a rambling way back to how to get your existing followers to see your stuff.  All the stuff above about community is relevant, post stories and get them to click on stuff, you know from your own scrolling – the more of someone’s stuff you see, the more you see.  So also you gotta make sure you are creating the content that your followers want to see and engage with.  This is where Business and Creator accounts again come in handy, you get post insights so you can be super nerdy and see which of your posts are doing well, you’ll quickly see the content people like more and what doesn’t get much traction.  The stuff that does well – do more of that – it’s not rocket science.

I am going to caveat again for a second here, everything I’m talking about here assumes you want to grow, it is definitely ignoring the extremely valid route of post what you like , what makes you happy and causes you zero stress.  Creating a balance with all of this is really important, your mental health is important, but I assume you are reading this far cos you know all that and you’re all “yeah yeah yeah… gimme likes, followers and more cheese”.

Consistency of posting is also super important, I’ve read a lot over the years of post X one day, then wait a day, then post Y, or post everyday, or don’t post everyday, or, only post on Wednesdays in June.  Frankly it’s all bollocks, you need to know when your followers are most active and just post then, it’s different for everyone.

For example I know my followers are most active around 9am GMT and 5pm GMT Monday to Friday, apparently they take the weekends off! I rarely post Saturdays and Sundays as the traction is low so I take the time to do other stuff.  Know your audience and post when they are around but do it consistently, taking the odd day out here and there is something I do and so should you but if I go away for two weeks then definitely my reach and engagement is down and it takes about the same time you’re off to build back to where you were before you left.  So just don’t be surprised or disheartened when and if that happens.  I do often instead of posting in my feed over the weekend just drop some stories instead, or maybe some engaging questions.

Golden tip for stories, at the end of each day clear your stories out, delete em all before midnight your time, start each day with clean sheet.  You’ll find that first post in the morning does pretty well, especially if it’s something with some engagement in it, poll, questions, etc Try it, you’ll thank me.

Broadcast channels are the new thing, this is an amazing way to get quick engagement from people who follow you.  They are a bit like Telegram, it’s a channel you can either just post stuff and people can react, or you can have it set so people can chat.  The first is more popular unless you have the time to manage and curate a chat channel.  You wont see the option to create one if you’re not a Creator and you’re not Public, also this is being rolled out to accounts as I write so that may also be a reason you don’t see it yet.  All I do is when I post something, I share it to that channel.  The people in that channel will get a lovely little notification that they have a new message, they click on it and boom there’s my post.  I am dropping the odd exclusive image in their too, to give people a reason to use it.  Mine is at a fairly low number but I know the people subscribed to it genuinely want to see my stuff and what I’m upto, so why wouldn’t I use it?  If you can get an early boost on your post then it will appear higher up in your other followers feeds, it’s a no brainer.  Again. I may have said this but it’s that first hour on your post that is THE most important In that post gaining traction.  People look, comment, like and IG goes “ooh, people like this, let’s show it to more people who might like it”.  

You have to understand that the Instagram algorithms sole purpose is to keep you on the app.  Like a slot machine at a casino they just want you to sit there, scroll, like and repeat, it doesn’t care if you eat, drink, take breaks, it wants you there 24 x 7, so a popular post will get pushed more, a popular or rising account will get pushed more, as the algorithm uses that to get other people to keep putting quarters in the slot.

Part 3 I will continue with how to get you stuff seen by non followers!  If you like this then please do consider subscribing to me here, my basic access is cheaper than a coffee and will get you access to all my photo and video content.   Any money I make from this goes straight back into my photography, it enables me to work with a wider selection of models at a wider selection of venues. So if you can spare some change guvnor I’m always appreciative.  Any comments or questions please post them too!

Till next time!