5 Mistakes You Could Be Making On Instagram!

5 Mistakes You Could Be Making On Instagram!

Whether you are a big corporation or a small business, you need to be on Instagram. There's a lot of potential for almost every single industry on Instagram. If you are not on Instagram at this point, you need to be. It's a great platform where you can get lots of engagement very quickly. The reason for this is that Instagram in general is a very visual social media site. Facebook and Twitter, are more text based, which in turn led to more people engaging on Instagram, YouTube, and now TikTok. If you are visual based brand (beauty, real estate, and food brands especially) will do amazing on these platforms.

1. Stealing People's Content

Not only is it unethical, and just not cool at all, stealing content is a HUGE no-no in digital marketing. If you are not sharing content, you have to be making original content. You can get inspired by other content, and create your own graphic. Hey, without inspiration we wouldn't have any content right? You can use the same ideas, you have to make sure that your content is your own voice and your own tone. Take a look at my last post. I am not the only one who has made a "top tools that social media managers use" post, however I made it my own.

2. Creating Content that is Off-Brand

Instagram loves brands that are not only aesthetically pleasing to the eye, but also a brand that sticks to one or two things. Lifestyle is huge for IG, and if you are promoting one lifestyle over another it's not going to go over well on Instagram. Let's say you are a beauty brand that promotes a sustainable lifestyle. It won't be out of place for you to post a vegan recipe, or talk about eco-friendly make-up bags. It would be out of place for you to talk about your belly dancing class.

3. Too Much Self Promo

While Instagram is a great platform to promote your brand and your products, too much of it will get your account blocked or shadowbanned. What's a shadowban you ask? A shadowban is a when your account gets banned from hashtags or blocked from being seen on Instagram. One way you can find out if you have been shadowbanned, is go to login to another IG account and checkout the hashtags you used from the other account (its best you use a hashtag that doesn't have that many people following it or a lot of posts). If you cannot find your account, you've probably been shadowbanned.

4. Not Taking Advantage of Name Optimization

If you go to my IG page, you can see that I put my name as Social Media Superstar, not Supriya Prasad. This is because I am trying to make my page searchable. If you are a fashion blogger, you can say Top Fashion Blogger in Atlanta! Lifestyle coach? You can say Superstar Coach for Lifestyle Brands! It's important to remember that your bio is the most important real estate on your page, so take advantage of it!

5. Using Hashtags That are not Consistent with Your Brand

When you are looking at hashtags for your brand, make sure you are using relevant and consistent brand based hashtags. If you are a nutritionist, that focuses on vegan/vegetarian lifestyles, it won't make sense for you to put a hashtag in your bio that says #fitmom. Fitness may be your thing, but if it's not consistent with your brand message, IG will start lowering your reach. A good hashtag bio for the nutritionist would be something like #vegan #animallover #fithealthylife

Bonus!

You aren't Getting Personal Enough!

You may be doing all of these things, but as a brand you may not be getting personal enough for your audience. Let's face it, if you want to become HUGE, as a brand especially on social media, you will need to get personal in front of your audience. This doesn't mean talk about the nail you pulled out in the shower! (Ew!) What are your biggest fears? What made you start your business? Did you thank your followers yet for following you? This is a good time to do it. Have testimonials? Show them off! Personally thank them in a video. This would do really well for all of your pages, not just IG!

Need some help?

If you are looking at all of this saying "omg, I am doing all of these things and I have no clue where to begin with my Instagram strategy." I can help! Instagram can be a complete beast to tackle if you don't know your way around it. SPB Productions can strategize and customize your Instagram page to fit your specific goals and needs for your business! Interested? You can schedule your FREE consultation today with me to find out more.