Tips to improve your Instagram account

Instagram is an important but sometimes overlooked social media platform. It’s a fun way to communicate with your customers, without being as serious as posts on Facebook or LinkedIn.

Sometimes, it’s a bit of a struggle to gain a following on Instagram. Sometimes it doesn’t get used effectively for leads or conversions.

So what can you do to your Instagram account to increase followers, leads and conversions?

1. Improve your Instagram Profile

Make sure you have a photograph - if you’re running a business, that’s generally going to be the logo - and have filled out the bio section. When you’re filling out the bio section, you’ll be able to add a website link. That way you’ll be able to direct anyone that comes to your Instagram page to your website.

You can always change this link. If you’ve got a special or promotion on, consider posting that link on Instagram instead. You can even promote this by posting a new photograph and politely ask your followers to click on the link. This way your followers will know you have updated it.

2. Include a call to action

It isn’t enough to just post a good photograph. You should always include a call to action so your followers know what you want them to do.

This can include posting a link within the caption of your photo. You can even ask a question and get people to double-tap if they agree - this will result in the business getting more likes. Another strategy is to ask people to tag their friends - posting a compelling photograph or even meme is a sure way to get more likes and tags.

3. Use hashtags

Hashtags aren’t as big on other social media platforms, but they’re still alive and well on Instagram. They’re also one of the easiest ways to ensure your photograph will be seen and get more likes. Hashtags mean you’ll also be seen by people who aren’t following you yet, meaning you can grow your following and find potential customers.

The great thing about hashtags is you can make them whatever you want. However, if you want to ensure people will see your photograph, you can use hashtags that are already established, such as #TBT - Throwback Thursday. These hashtags are popular and have a lot of people using them, meaning there’s more chance people will see your post. This is a simple and easy way to boost your engagement levels on Instagram.

4. Respond on the web

Instagram is mostly accessed through an app on your mobile or tablet. But you can also use Instagram on your desktop. This means you can still login to Instagram even when you don’t have access to your mobile.

Through your web browser, you can:

• Like photographs
• Leave comments
• Delete spam

5. Use Text Overlays

You can make your photographs unavoidable by posting a text overlay on your images. This is particularly helpful if you’ve got a sale or promotion coming up that you want people to be aware of. Instead of posting a photograph and relying on the caption to convey your message, combine the two with overlayed text.  

There’s a bunch of apps that you can use to help create photos with overlayed text. Consider:

• Over
• Percolator
• A Beautiful Mess
• Mextures

6. Promote Instagram

You’ve made an Instagram account, but nobody knows it. It’s important to let your followers know you have an Instagram account. Add social media buttons to your website so people can easily see, access and follow your accounts. You can even add a button or link to your email signature.

Instagram also does cross-promotion. With the click of a button, you can easily share all your posts to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Flickr. This will easily make your followers on other accounts aware that you have an Instagram account.

7. Post at the right times

As with every social media platform, you need to ensure you are publishing content at the right time. You’ll need to know when your followers are online, and publish your content during that timeframe.  

Quicksprout made a helpful infographic of what days and times are the best to publish on each social media platform.

Quicksprout found that engagement is fairly consistent throughout the week, with a spike on Monday. It’s also best to post your photographs out of work hours to get the most engagement.

This will change depending on your business - if you own an international business, majority of your viewers may be in a different time zone and therefore online at different times.

Using these tips will help you to not only improve your Instagram profile, but also increase your following and engagement.