Building an Instagram community without any engagement is impossible. Instagram engagement is what boosts your social media numbers and improves your popularity. It gives your brand a voice that people cannot ignore. However, you may have noticed that your Instagram posts fail to attract many likes.
Perhaps your videos or photos take hours before they get one appreciation, or maybe your current audience doesn’t feel like leaving comments on your content. Even your follower count may struggle to grow. You can buy Instagram followers fast delivery, but what other methods can you use?
Fortunately, there are a few effective ways to increase Instagram engagement in 2024 and end up with a large and loyal community. Let’s take a look at some effective methods to raise your Instagram engagement rate and attract new followers.
Why Are Interactions from Instagram Users So Important?
Whether you’re a business or just someone who hopes to become an influencer, you cannot neglect Instagram engagement and its importance. After all, don’t most famous social media stars and brands have tens of thousands of likes?
Now, you shouldn’t strive to boost your interactions solely to see that high number there. Instagram engagement has more than one role, including promoting your page.
The algorithm works in magical ways. It picks up on content with numerous likes and pushes it to more people’s pages. Having more likes is considered a sign of quality. After all, there wouldn’t be so many people liking a post and leaving comments if the content was bad, right?
Figuring that more people might like to see the post with thousands of likes, the photo or video will pop up for more users. They may also interact with your posts by liking, commenting, or sharing, boosting them even more.
And that’s not all – good Instagram engagement also strengthens your credibility. Just think about it this way – you are looking for a new, waterproof eyeliner. You check out the different business pages that promote their products via Instagram posts. During your search, you stumble upon businesses that get up to a few hundred likes and some that get hundreds of thousands. Most likely, you’ll be more inclined to buy from the one with more likes, as these interactions probably mean that people like these products and they’ve tried them without issues before.
How Do You Calculate Your Instagram Engagement Rate?
Engagement on Instagram involves the way people interact with your page. It comes in different forms, respectively:
- Likes
- Comments
- Saves
- Shares
- Profile mentions
- Profile visits
- Story views
- Story reactions
- Instagram live interactions
All of these things are taken into account by the algorithm, which then recommends your posts to specific users based on their searches and preferences. The more interactions you get on your Instagram account, the more likely your page will get pushed towards more popularity.
But how can you analyze your engagement on the social media platform? Calculating engagement rates can be done with the help of different formulas.
You can start by calculating your account’s engagement overall. This will tell you what the interactions were for your profile during a specific period. The formula goes like this:
- Total interactions/follower count x 100
Another thing you can do is calculate the engagement for specific posts only. These interactions can include things such as your comments, saves, likes, and story likes. Here’s how you calculate it:
- Interactions/post reach x 100
What Is Considered a Good Instagram Engagement Rate?
Good engagement rate on Instagram varies from account to account and niche to niche. Not to mention that the ideal rates for accounts keep changing now and then. What the Instagram algorithm considers a good engagement rate depends on things like your activity on the platform, your industry, your follower count, and what type of content you make.
On average, experts think that the ideal engagement rate sits around 3%. At the same time, things may be different in your niche. The excellent news is that you can boost engagement with various tricks.
How to Increase Your Instagram Engagement?
Growing your engagement might sound challenging, but a well-established Instagram marketing strategy could help. We have a few tips that will make your posts blow up:
1. Take Advantage of Instagram Stories
The Instagram stories option gained immediate attention following its launch. Despite being available only for 24 hours, they let you share more exclusive content that only your biggest fans can keep up with. With your stories, you can let your personality shine, interact with your followers, and even share special news about account changes or product launches.
What’s great about stories is that they can be personalized with a series of features, including music and stickers. The latter category represents an excellent way to encourage your audience to interact with you, as it includes quizzes, questions, and polls. You can ask your audience to send you questions or even ask them things about themselves and their preferences.
2. Don’t Forget to Add a CTA
Adding a call-to-action in a post’s caption is an easy yet often forgotten or underestimated move. This simple trick is enough to encourage users to react to your posts in one way or another, whether by just liking, commenting, sharing or all of them.
Now, just remember that this must be worded carefully unless you want it to have the opposite effect. Make it clear and straight to the point. It’s also up to you to choose the type of call to action you include in the description.
It can either be something simple like “Check out the link in bio for more details” or a question, such as “What are some of the most pleasant moments you’ve experienced at concerts? Share them in the comments below!”
If people are encouraged to check out a link in your bio, you must also optimize your account’s bio section to include it so it’s easy to find and access.
3. Use Video Content Regularly
People love to watch Instagram reels and videos. So, aside from posting photos, you can also create videos, especially as long as you ensure they align with your niche and your strategy.
More video content leads to more engagement. Many audiences, especially younger ones, prefer shorter videos that get straight to the point. Videos that are too long often bore viewers, although it depends on the topic.
Don’t hesitate to mix your photos and stories with Instagram reels regularly. And don’t feel intimidated when you see all the big names in your industry with the most beautifully edited videos. It’s not that difficult to edit videos anymore, as the Internet is filled with Instagram apps that make the editing process smooth and enjoyable.
4. Take Advantage of User Generated Content
What do you prefer – a business/influencer that never interacts with the audience and focuses on looking professional or one that shows a more human side and isn’t afraid to communicate with fans by responding to their comments and sharing their content? If you choose the latter, you’ll probably like the idea of user-generated content.
Individuals love to see content generated by users who follow the same pages and have the same ideas and tastes. So, why not encourage people to give you more likes and comments by sharing user generated content? Even better, you can tag all the users you share content from to keep them loyal and attract their followers.
5. Always Pay Attention to the Quality Aspect
It should go without saying that high-quality content is a priority. After all, you cannot expect Instagram users to like your posts when you barely make any effort to make your photos and videos look good and spark the viewers’ interest.
Great content involves materials that are relevant to your target audience and provide value. They must look good aesthetically and be enticing enough to make people want to watch them and read the description. They must also encourage fans to spread the content around and interact with it by liking and commenting.
To make sure the content is good enough, use the right editing programs and effects to improve the look of all photos and videos. Also, create content that is either funny, informative, or relatable.
6. Introduce Hashtags
Using relevant hashtags in a post’s description is one of the most common techniques influencers and brands use to boost their content. But adding a few random hashtags won’t necessarily help you much – you must make sure they are related to your brand and content and that you add the just right number.
The Instagram algorithm uses hashtags to classify your content and help people find your posts more easily. If someone interacts a lot with a certain category or follows a particular hashtag, adding it under your Instagram photos and reels will increase their chances of popping up for potential followers.
Research will help you find hashtags that would be relevant enough for your content. You simply need to analyze your competitors and check out the most popular hashtags in your industry. If you are a company selling clothes, hashtags like “fashion” or anything related should help you reach your target audience.
7. Use Carousel Posts to Share Information
Did you know that carousel posts may provide better results than single images when it comes to spreading information? This type of content is visually appealing and makes people want to learn more. This is why it works for a wide range of scenarios.
To use carousels, you have to choose the right type of content. They could work with repurposed images, educational content, tutorials, and even user generated posts. If you do this right, you can easily increase your page’s Instagram engagement.
8. Don’t Forget About Your Bio
People can judge the quality of your account and your dedication from your bio. A boring bio section that adds no value will keep potential followers away. On the other side, a professional bio will encourage them to follow and browse your posts, even liking and sharing them in the end.
After all, the first thing people see when they open your profile is the bio. So, make sure it’s short and clear while saying something about you and who you are. You can use a few hashtags and add a call to action and a link to your website.
Final Thoughts
Are you ready to take over Instagram using the tips in this article? Make sure that your Instagram profile features compelling and visually appealing content that your audience and potential followers can relate to. Also, write a captivating bio, use hashtags, and share genuine user generated content. Take your time to apply these tactics, and slowly but surely, people will start engaging with your content.
