Forgive me for being blunt but I’m going to come right out and say it…

If you want to increase your Instagram followers for the purpose of increasing brand recognition, visibility and sales, and you don’t want to do so in an organic manner that may take some time, read no further!

Leave now.

Having learned from, and followed the best of the best social media marketers and brand developers over the years, I have learned that the truest way to achieve the success you want is to do so in a manner that takes time and elbow grease - the old fashioned way.

• A little hard work and time will pay off.

• You must focus on the content more than the numbers.

• Content has always been and will continue to reign king.

• Success does not happen overnight.

• More often than not those who do get to the top overnight won’t stay there. The numbers prove this over and over again.

Social media, after all, really is all about the numbers. But NOT in the way you think.

We know that the algorithms across all platforms change on a fairly regular basis. Keeping up with these nuances is important. Worry less about the number of followers and more about your engagement.

I’m of the old school belief that quality is more important that quantity, because there are good numbers and there are bad numbers. These numbers I am referring to have less to do about your followers and more to do with your overall engagement.

And you don’t want to attract followers simply for the sake of having more followers.

You want to convert your followers into clients, your likes into sales.

So how do I attract the best followers?

In order to do this in the most effective manner, you must dedicate the time to curate your followers. This means hand-picking those you want to follow with the hopes that they will follow you back. Then, based on those you’ve selected, more will follow.

Now they’ve followed you back now what?

• Once your new followers have followed you back, or found you from alternate methods, YOU NEED TO KEEP THEM ENTERTAINED AND INFORMED.

• In order to do this you need to create the best content copy and visuals you can. (If you find your strengths are elsewhere you may decide to hire someone to take care of your visuals, copy or teach you how to how to do so with some tips and best practices techniques.)

• If your content isn’t the best it can be, you will either lose your new followers or worse, they’ll linger but they won’t engage! A poor number of followers to engagement ratio can actually hurt you and prevent you from being found by potential new followers! Engaged followers are going to directly impact your sales down the road.

What about hiring a service that promises to significantly increase your engagement overnight?

Have you not heard anything I’ve said??!

A couple of years ago this was a wildly popular way to grow one’s instagram account. Now it’s very much frowned upon. The main reason why these engagement services are a no-go is because they employ bots, those pesky fake accounts created solely to make yours look larger than it is. When this happens these fake followers or off-brand accounts will likely ever engage with yours. Some however will, and you’ll notice by their comments (irrelevant) that they’ll never be a potential client. Ok, you say “so what?” These fake followers may prevent relevant followers and potential customers at bay.

Why is that you ask?

Quality followers and potential customers want to follow accounts that have great content and engagement.

All they have to do is glance at your feed, who’s following you and who you are following. If they don’t like what they see, they will quickly move on to your competitors.

Instagram is a visually inspired platform, because of this only the best will do. This doesn’t mean you can’t use your mediocre pictures, you certainly can and they’re the perfect way to populate your stories! But your main feed must contain the very best images and copy.

It’s a jungle out there. You need to stand out from the rest.

Think of your social media platform as your own advertising and marketing platform.

What the general population sees and how they react can make or break your bottom line. Put your best work forward. Don’t settle for mediocrity!

I’m sharing this with you because I was recently hired by a small national company to overhaul their social media campaign. Theirs was boring, visually unappealing, lacked engaging content as well as the tools necessary to help grow the brand’s presence. I created a detailed plan of what I would do. I was steadfast in my tactics and my desire to improve the account organically and consistently.

Unbeknownst to me, in conjunction with my start date, the company hired a service that riddled the account with bots and fake followers. I watched as the numbers of people they were following soared at an alarming speed while the number of their followers didn’t change much. All the while, they continued to post subpar content without any tactics whatsoever. Hashtags aren’t meant to be tossed into a post haphazardly. (There’s a proven methodology involved that’s partly science and partly art.) I voiced my concerns.

Clearly this partnership was going to dissolve. I couldn’t, after all, approve of or stand by something that I vehemently disagree with. Like any artist, if I am going to put my name on a project I have to stand by the quality of the work, at the end of the day we need to have the same vision. If it’s not, there’s nothing wrong with walking away.

Success doesn’t happen overnight, but I can help you get your campaign up and running and well on the road to success in a way that is healthy, honest and created to get you the long-term recognition and results your brand deserves.