Instagram promotion for free- 5 things that you are doing wrong

In digital times, sky is the limit and so are our goals. Instagram pages of brands, bloggers, services & products are rudimentary and the first step to your digital presence but the answer we all are searching is Is having an Instagram page and just posting on it enough?
I have been witnessing so many promotions on my Instagram account from pages like recipe, career, customized gifts, fitness, makeup tutorial, lifestyle, fashion to nutrition and it is an accomplishment in its own way but while auditing these pages there are 5 common mistakes which most of you are doing while doing Instagram promotion for free on Instagram(by free I mean organic posting you do for your own brand)

1. Promoting your brand from your personal page

Just because you are going for organic (free promotion) you can not choose informal attitude. Having a specific page for your brand/product/service is vital. Imagine yourself looking for some renowned brand like Zomato and instead of getting to know more about the brand you are seeing the founder’s picture with family. Therefore, it is necessary that before adopting a strategy for your own brand try to put yourself in the same shoes.
Another important thing is user before following the page looks at the bio of your page. Mention details about the brand before mentioning contact details is important. One of the good example is shown below

2. Know the difference between friends & followers

Goal you set decides your success. Many of you have limited your pages just to your friends as a followers. This could be due to your strategy of first targeting your acquaintances and increase the followers number and eventually targeting your actual audience. But mostly when it comes to targeting the actual audience the enthusiasm vanishes for some of you. Key to success in digital is consistency. Target your known to create a base to target your customers.

Just to check if you are correct at the free instagram promotion step, check two points – Likes & followers. Having followers in 3 digits(above 500) whereas average likes on post are 2 digit indicates the engagement is really low. Your posts are not reaching to the audience that matters to you but just friends. Some people also gain followers through paid promotion(we will talk about this in another post) and this simple test applies to them too. Find below one reference for better understanding

3. Build a proper calendar for your Instagram account

Segment your audience and prepare your content specific to each segment.

(Content: In an agency language content is what you are posting on channel- it can be posts, videos, testimonials, IGTV etc on social media)
Let me explain this as an example: you own a career guidance company and you offer guidance to the undergraduates from all streams. If I as a follower(from B.com) will keep seeing the content related to engineering will that make sense? All you can expect is one less follower.
Strategy should start with basic segmentation – Know who you want to target through free promotion.

Let’s say for the above example, it should be science undergraduates, commerce undergraduates, Arts & one promotional. Dedicate one day in a week to one specific segment and post. Post content that your audience is looking forward to see. Create curiosity and see the engagement.(will post one specific post on how to make social media calendar)

4. Sometimes listen to your audience

Ask your audience what they are interested in. Once in a while post on similar line will not only boost your brand credibility but also will give you loyal customers.
Ask about the challenges your audience face and beside being promotional try to genuinely help them. Advice for free is a part of free promotion on Instagram. No brand got big just thinking about the output.
Check below one of the best example I have seen recently.

5. Engagement is the key! No body likes one way communication

Nobody is a fan of one way communication so engage with your audience. Now a days, when Instagram is gifting us with a new feature every second day make use of that in your free promotion on Instagram plan. I have come across so many pages who are regularly posting on Instagram but their posts are one sided. To implement the engagement post regular contest & quizzes as a part of your page. Notify people about the contests before hand. Create curiosity among the audience and do keep giveaways.

How to promote Instagram Page for free?

We all want the best promotion for our brand/service/product but beside doing so many things at our level we don’t get the good engagement. Let’s tweak your promotion strategy a bit basis the above points discussed. Will soon post the complete guide to Instagram promotion for free which will focus on increasing the engagement & followers. Stay tuned

Every Sunday a new blog post is published on ahead with digital. I write about the digital strategies which new businesses(small/medium) can adopt on digital mediums to scale up the business. Get answers to all your queries through my blog posts(Know details on About us). Do subscribe to stay connected. Happy Reading!