5 Powerful Instagram Tricks to Make You an Instant Success

By Brittany | November 10, 2017 |

This blog is brought to you by the letter T… as in Tracy! My bestie in biz and life contacted me yesterday asking me some questions about Instagram… (you can see the text she sent me ????). Tracy is a beautiful and artistic soul. She has recently been trying to grow her fashion and lifestyle blog which you can check out at www.intentional-mom.com. Tracy has also been working hard to grow her Instagram presence (you can follow her @intentional_mom). She wanted me to talk with you all about some of the tips I have given her to help her grow her following and brand her boards. I LOVE when people ask me questions like this. It literally shapes my blogging strategy. So if you do have a question like this for me feel free to send it to me!

#1 Set Up A Business Account

Some of you may be asking, “Why this is important?” Rather than tell you, I am going to show you. The first picture below shows you what my business account (which is public) looks like and the second one shows what my personal one (which is private) looks like…

See the difference? One is more styled and has a clear purpose. My personal account has lots of family pictures and selfies… ???? So, why would I even bother with making two accounts and trying to post to both of them? Because my life is BORING… I mean I have my days that are filed with excitement. On the whole, my days are filled with a LOT of sitting around with a computer and a good cup of tea. I don’t have tons to show off in my day to day monotony of scheduling posts, writing blogs, and doing client projects. I do, however, have tons of amazing and useful information I want to share with my business friends that not all of my personal friends want to see.

I want to give my audience what they want; and you should too. It doesn’t matter how many followers you have on any given social media channel. It matters how many engaged followers you have. If you have friends who don’t like your biz posts on your Instagram, it will ultimately lower your engagement rate. Then you will create content for your audience based on false negatives with engagement statistics, which can lead to you getting frustrated. Ask me how I know that…

#2 Set Up Multiple Instagram Accounts on Your Phone

Here are step-by-step, how-to instructions on how to add an Instagram business account and have it on the same phone without signing in and out. Yes, it is possible to be signed in to multiple accounts at once.

First, go to your Instagram app and open it up. Once you are looking at your profile, click the account icon in the lower left-hand corner.

Now, click the settings wheel at the top left-hand corner.

Scroll to the bottom and click “Add Account”

Easily Switch Between Instagram Accounts

This will prompt you to either start a new account OR log into an account that is already set up.

Please keep in mind you can ONLY add 5 accounts. For some of us that manage client accounts as well, this can pose a problem, so keep it in mind. You may need to get a wi-fi only device that you can use use for client accounts. I use an old iPhone I had from one of my many upgrades!

Once you have added your account you can easily switch between them by going to your profile page and clicking on your name in the top bar. All your signed in accounts will appear there, and you can switch accounts to your heart’s content!

#3 Schedule Your Posts

There are quite a few apps out there for scheduling posts to Instagram. I have used a few so I will cover what I love (and don’t love) about all the ones I have tried. It is important to keep in mind that any valid app you use will not be able to automatically post for you at your scheduled time. You will have to manually post because Instagram has yet to release an API (application program interface) for developers of the apps to connect the two tools. The best apps can save the image to your phone, and copy the text you have written already. There is one app that I know of, named Grum, that does post for you. However, I am not a fan, because if Instagram catches you using such a tool, they will actually delete your profile and you will have to start all over, which is not worth the risk in my opinion.

CoSchedule

While on the pricy side at $40 a month, this is by FAR my favorite scheduling app for social media. It does it all: Facebook posts, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram, Linked in, Google +, and even WordPress! Yep, you can write and schedule blog content, social updates, and put it all in one easy-to-use calendar. This is especially nice if you have multiple clients and want one tool to rule them all!

Hootsuite

This one is a great tool because it does, like CoSchedule, do almost everything. Hootsuite has huge benefits for social media monitoring and reporting that are not so easy to do with CoSchedule. If you need something for keeping you ear to the ground, this the tool for you.

In all honestly, I have only used this app on iPhone, and I don’t know if the app has anything for android. This is, however, one of the best strategy tools you can find! It has some awesome features like scheduling, board rearranging when you batch schedule your posts, and even spying on your competitors profiles. But, all those features do not compare to my favorite feature … the saved hashtag group feature. Basically you can save groups of hashtags and when you are writing your post language, you click one small button and all the hashtags in that grouping are automatically applied to your post, without you having to type them over and over again! You can also easily repost from other people’s Instagram accounts with this as well! Sweet right?? The best part is that is is totally FREE!!

Buffer for Instagram

This is the tool I currently use, and at a cool $10 a month this tool is totally worth it. I love to schedule all my blog, affiliate, and personal content in one short buffer session. It automatically goes out on my other networks, and I get a handy alert for Instagram.

#4 Keep Your Instagram Story Beautiful

So most people use stories for little things that happen or daily inspirations, but you can also use stories as a way to promote your brand and new products you have. One easy way to design your story is to use the free Canva app on your phone and design a perfect and professional story. As long as it has been saved to your camera roll in the last 24 hours, you can post the photos to your story using the method below. Scroll through the slideshow below to see how!

You can also add links to your story once you have over 10,000 followers and a business account. So if you can do this, make sure you read this awesome article on how to add links to your Instagram story. Can anyone say monetization??