With 800 million monthly active users, billions of photos uploaded, Instagram is a monster of a social media platform that has a heavy influence on the daily lives of most. While there’s those who just like to post their latest meal or a good looking gym selfie, there are others who have captured the attention of the masses, accruing hundreds of millions of followers that a ready and waiting to like and comment on the latest post. It’s come to be known as being “Instafamous” and it’s something that many instagram users hope to and try to achieve on a daily basis.
So why would you want Instagram famous? Well, many of those people who have gained a huge following have been able to create a living for themselves solely through the platform, or use it as a tool to boost their own brand. For someone like actress and singer, Selena Gomez, she is paid $550,000 for a sponsored post (basically a paid advertisement for a brand) that reaches her 122 million followers. Then there’s brands like Adobe, that have a more modest following compared to Gomez with 523 thousand followers, but post content that is all user-generated using their product, giving them the perfect opportunity to highlight their software’s capabilities to their audience.
So let’s get down to business. How do you or your business become Instafamous?
This one’s pretty simple, since the more followers you have, the more people you will reach with every post that you make. This is a necessity if you’re looking to monetize your account, since advertisers will be attracted to how big of a chunk of their target audience will you be able to reach with a sponsored post for their product. The same things goes for those who are trying to build up their brand. In the end, the more eyes you get on the content that you’re putting out there, the better off you'll be.
Followers aren’t everything, and it’s a common misconception that a lot of people make when trying to grow a big-time Instagram profile. You always have to remember that if your content flat out sucks and doesn’t engage or interest the people that are seeing it, then the number of followers you have doesn’t mean anything. You’ll notice that any famous Instagram posts the content that their followers want, raking in vast numbers of likes or starting discussions that flood the comments section. Good content is also the way to gaining more followers, because if you entice people with your posts and leave them anticipating the next great thing you’ll put out there, they’ll surely follow you to make sure they don’t miss it.
Posts may seem like a simple concept, since all you have to do is snap a picture and you can put it on display for the whole world to see with minimal effort. However, Instagram’s posting platform has tools that can be easily overlooked, but can make all the difference between a post with 2 likes and a post with 20,000. There’s a science behind posting that you need to familiarize yourself with and master if you want your account to continue to grow, which includes utilizing hashtags and posting at the right time. Latching onto a trending topic via a hashtag and making that post when most of your audience is online will boost your content’s visibility, and your profile with it.