Are you using Instagram as part of your business or personal brand growth?
Instagram is a powerful tool that can be used to boost your online visibility and bring likeminded people towards your profile and community, and into your conversations.
But in order to this, you need your profile and your posts to reach more people – which is where this article comes in.
Why is Reach Important on Instagram?
Your Instagram reach essentially equates to how many individual users see your posts and content as part of their own Instagram experience. The more people see your posts, and the higher your reach, the more engagement your content will get and the more credible and valuable your profile will be ranked by Instagram.
And as regular users will know, the higher that Instagram ranks your profile in its algorithm, the better for your ongoing reach and success.
Without further ado, here are some of our top tips on how to expand and maximise your reach on Instagram.
1. Share Your Posts on Stories
Many users follow hundreds if not thousands of other profiles, which means it’s highly likely that your post or update will sometimes get lost in a flood of other posts from other users.
In order to maximise the chances of followers seeing your posts, share them to your stories as well as your main feed.
2. Create Valuable Posts That Are Shareable
Another way to maximise the number of eyes that see your posts is to make them shareable, thereby encouraging your followers to engage with and want to share your post for their own followers to see.
This means both enabling your post to be shared in settings and ensuring that the content is valuable enough to be compelling.
3. Use Reels
Not only are reels popular with users but they are also given prominent placement within Instagram’s main feed. This means that if you can start sharing reels, Instagram will be more likely to prioritise these in the main feed and maximise the reach of your post.
4. Post at The Right Time
This will depend on your profile and your target demographic or audience – but most of us know that there is a window in which our followers are most likely to be active on Instagram.
While you cannot be sure who is browsing and when, posting at a sensible time for your audience will maximise the chance of as many users as possible seeing your post organically.
5. Consider Instagram Ads
There is no better way to boost your reach quickly and effectively than with paid ads and boosted posts. Yes, this costs money – but the results are undeniable and will help to connect your Instagram profile and account with an audience that is interested in your market.
6. Be Engaging
Instagram as a platform is all about community and engagement, and so taking the time to respond to comments and create CTAs which encourage comments and responses is a great way to solidify your reputation as an account worth interacting with.
Users want to enjoy a personalised experience when they use Instagram, especially when communicating with brands and creators. And there is no better way to do this than by talking to your followers directly.
7. Use UGC
UGC, also known as User Generated Content, is great for showing followers that you appreciate their content and feedback, and for highlighting your credibility through the words of real users and customers.
UGC often enjoys high engagement rates when compared with other forms of marketing content on Instagram, and so helps to boost the reputation of a profile and its chance of being shared with a wider audience.
8. Explore Collaborations
Another powerful way to boost the reach of your account and posts is to collaborate with other likeminded users in the industry, market, or with the same core demographic. In the simplest terms, collaborating means opening your profile up to their entire follower base – and vice versa – delivering a benefit to both parties involved.
Provided you connect with the right accounts through collaboration, this can be an excellent way to increase your reach and the exposure of your profile.
9. Optimise Your Profile
Last but not least, if you want to expand your reach then you need to optimise your profile. That means thinking about your bio and profile image, connecting valuable links to your profile, and revising your use of hashtags.
It also means curating an aesthetically pleasing grid of posts, and really emphasising your value proposition as a brand, business, or creator.
How Do You Monitor Instagram Reach?
So, with all that said and a plethora of tips to follow, how do you know if it works?
Tracking your reach can only officially be done via a professional account and dashboard – though private users can get some idea of their reach by looking at whether their engagement and following increases.
However you use the data, and whatever you hope to achieve via a heightened and expanded Instagram reach, following these tips should help to put your profile and account at the forefront of your chosen industry or market.
