So you have a business on Instagram, and you’re wondering how to boost Instagram engagements on your posts? Not to worry, you are not alone.
When Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger founded Instagram in 2010, they only thought of creating a photo app with photo-sharing features concentrating on pictures taken with a mobile phone. Little did they know that they were making what would turn out to be the platform where businesses and brands keep in touch with their customers and prospects. In fact, for many small businesses in Nigeria today, their only store (online and offline) is on Instagram.
When Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger founded Instagram in 2010, they only thought of creating a photo app with photo-sharing features concentrating on pictures taken with a mobile phone.
Over the years, Instagram algorithms have become smarter, and your competitors (especially the bigger ones) are investing so many resources into their Instagram content. How do you, as a small business with just a few followers, attract engagements to your posts? How do you stay above the waters?
In this post, we will be looking at 7 smart ways to boost engagements on your Instagram posts. But just before that, you may be wondering why you need engagements on your posts? Who cares about engagements when we all know what matters to you as a business is sales/conversion?
Contents
Why You Need Instagram Engagements
You must have seen some of those funny Instagram pages with thousands of followers but very few engagements on their posts. What’s the first thing you think of when you see such pages? Fake followers? Stolen account? Bought account? Scam?
Whatever you think is exactly what others think of your brand when they start noticing the same on your page. How do you explain having over 50k followers but an average of 50 likes on your posts? Something is definitely not right, right?
It’s pointless having all Instagram users following you if they are not going to engage with your content. This can only mean either of these two.
- They do not see your contents due to competitive Instagram algorithms
- They don’t “like” your contents
This post will show you how to make more people see and like your content. But before that…
It’s pointless having all Instagram users following you if they are not going to engage with your content.
How to Measure Instagram Engagements
Another question you may have is what constitutes engagement, and how do you measure it?
According to Pixlee, Instagram engagement refers to a person’s degree of social involvement as defined by at least a comment or like. In other words, likes and comments are the minimum metrics for measuring engagements. There are other metrics such as the number of views, “saves”, shares, profile visits, and website clicks.
Having talked about engagement, there is something more important than engagement, though; and that is the engagement rate.
At the end of the day, what matters most about your page is not the number of engagement. Instead, it’s the number of engagements against the number of followers.
And there is a formula for calculating the engagement rate.
Let’s try to calculate the engagement rate for a brand on Instagram
This is Rage Group, a “A Global Marketing & Integrated Creative Communications Agency”
At the time of writing this, Rage Group had 6,202 followers
Their most recent post has 86 likes and 6 comments.
Going by that formula, Rage Group Engagement Rate is:
Therefore, Rage Group Engagement rate is 1.5%
Is this low or high? You be the judge of that. According to Oberlo, however, the average engagement rate on Instagram is 1-3%.
7 Simple Steps to Boost Engagements on Instagram
Now that you understand why you need engagements on Instagram and how to measure it, it’s about time we got to why you are here – how you can increase Instagram engagements.
Here are 7 proven steps to boost post engagements on Instagram with real-life examples. Get your writing materials as the class starts now!
1. Always Engage with Similar Pages
One of the many algorithms of Instagram is that engagement begets engagement. When you interact with other users, you increase your chance of visibility. You also attract visitors to your profile.
But while engagement is important, the quality of engagement is importanter (more important). This explains why you should be selective in the type of account you engage with. Always go for accounts similar to yours.
If your business or brand is in the music industry, engage with contents from other brands in that industry. You are a fashion brand? Engage with fashion content.
2. Improve on Your Captions
Your captions shouldn’t be an after-thought. It should be well planned and strategic.
The more time people spend on your posts, the more the Instagram algorithms smile at you. And captions help to increase the time people spend on your posts.
Your captions shouldn’t be an after-thought. It should be well planned and strategic.
Apart from that, a good caption helps you to give a voice, tone, personality, and context to your post.
You can choose to write a long or short caption. Whichever you choose, make sure to include a CTA (Call to Action) at the end of it, telling people what you want them to do next. You can ask a question that they’d need to answer in the comments or direct them to take a particular action such as click the link in bio, share, among others.
3. Reply to Comments as Soon as You See Them
Business aside, Instagram is a social media platform. And what is the use of social media if there are no conversations?
Replying to comments helps to sustain conversations and push your content further up the feeds of your followers.
As more people respond to your content, Instagram sees it as valuable content that would be interesting/beneficial to others. So, they show it to them.
It doesn’t matter the length of your response. In fact, it could even be an emoji. Just reply, and be fast about it.
4. Use Instagram Stories to Draw Attention
Since Instagram added stories in 2016, it has proven to be an essential tool for businesses. In 2019, 50% of businesses on Instagram worldwide created at least one sorry in a month. Similarly, one-third of the stories that get viewed the most on Instagram are from businesses.
Stories are a great way of getting noticed on Instagram. While you can create content to share on your stories only, you can also use it to call attention to your latest post. Simply click the arrow icon just below your post and select share to story in the options that’d follow.
5. Engage with Other Contents Before and After You Post
We talked about engaging with similar content earlier. This is similar to that, just that it’s more strategic and timed.
This is how it works. When you get engagements on your post within the first 1 hour, the Instagram algorithm sees it as good content and pushes it in the feeds of more of your followers.
Engaging with other content just before and after posting would cause some of them to visit your page to return the favour by engaging with your most recent posts. And that automatically boosts the visibility of your latest post, which increases the possibility of engagement.
6. Use Long-tail keywords
Hashtags are another vital tool you can use to increase the visibility of posts and boost engagement on Instagram. However, the mistake most businesses make is they go for the short and highly competitive hashtags.
The problem with that is; your posts get quickly pushed off the explore as more people post with the hashtag.
So, rather than short-tail keywords that would end up being a waste of time, go for strategic long-tail keywords.
Instagram hashtag is a whole different topic on its own. Intag is a great tool you can use for your hashtag research.
7. Post More Human Photos
Take a quick look at the contents on your page. Don’t just stop there, go to other pages, and quickly scan through the engagements on each of their posts. You will notice a pattern; contents with real human face attract more engagements than those that showcase products or other forms of graphics.
Findings have shown that the contents that show faces have 38% more likes than those that don’t.
So, don’t just be about your products and services all the time if you want engagements. Sometimes, people want to see your face. They want to see the face of the person behind the brand. It even has a way of reassuring them that your business is legit. Put your face (and that of your team) out there more often.
Conclusion
Some other tactics you can use to boost engagement on Instagram include:
- Study what time of the day you get most engagements and try to always post by that time
- Post videos on your feed and story
- Use Instagram IGTV
- Collaborate with similar brands or businesses through guest posting
You have to be patient and consistent. All of these may not give the desired result instantly. That does not mean it’s not working; people (without even knowing it) want to see your consistency first before taking you seriously.
So, make sure you show up and put contents out there consistently.
Nice one
Awesome
Nice one
I really find this page of great use and if great value. Thanks for this.
Wow,I never found the need for Instagram but this is a whole new level, I will work on it to promote my band
Timeframe, consistency, targetting, niche… this is a very insightful contribution Ayanfe. Totally agree with you, especially on consistency. People want results but are not ready to put in the work.
Thanks for stopping by Ayanfe.