Jason’s Notes From the Lab
…So, I started Instagram.
Long-time readers of my work know that I recommend choosing two social media platforms and owning them (as opposed to spreading yourself thin across all the platforms available). For the longest time, for me that was Facebook and Google+.
But then Google+ stopped operating. Which left me looking for a second home. I kept trying Twitter and LinkedIn, but honestly kept sucking at both of them. I have not yet figured them out. But I seem to be getting some solid traction with Instagram. For better or worse, here’s five things I’ve learned so far.
- Use Video. My videos are performing 2 to 3 times as well as my images alone. Whether that’s a posted video, something on my story, a Reel, or IGTV. In June I’m challenging myself to post a video a day, to see what happens with that.
- Daisy-Chain Your Follows. Follow your colleagues, but also look at who they follow and who follows them. You’ll find a network of influencers and fans that you might never have otherwise connected with.
- Use the Hashtag Cloud. On most social media platforms, it’s bad form to end your post with a whole bunch of hashtags…but this is SOP on Insta. So research some good, trending hashtags and apply them to the ends of your relevant posts.
- Planoly is nice. Planoly is a content scheduling autoposter with free and inexpensive for-pay versions that lets me load Insta content once a week, then spend my day-to-day time engaging with people who found the content nifty. It’s another version of Hootsuite, Tweetdeck, etc, and so far my hands-down favorite.
- Post Pictures of Books. They get a lot of love. And definitely tag the author. Much of the time, they’ll share the post on their own feeds, drawing you to people’s attention.
That’s what I’ve learned so far. Please email me if you have any questions and I’ll see what answers we can come up with.
Thanks for listening. See you next time.
***
Jason Brick is the Editorial Consultant Barista here at The Fictional Café. You can find some of his work here.
