Following on from our last blog! What is the Instagram Algorithm?
When it comes to engagement, Instagram is light-years ahead of Facebook. Brands’ content on Instagram gets a 1.6% engagement rate. Let’s look at how business owners utilise Instagram.
How this social media algorithm works
The Instagram algorithm has the following characteristics:
· Prioritises posts with the highest number of likes
· Favours the very recent posts (created within minutes of a user logging on)
· Prioritises posts from profiles that the user engages typically with more regular
· Favours posts from hashtags that the user follows! Are you following hashtags?
· Occasionally shows posts with great engagement from a profile and using hashtags that the user does not follow
· Is believed to treat brands’ content and consumers’ content equally
· You can ‘Favourite’ users and creators to make sure you never miss their updates
Updates for 2022 & 2023
Instagram is a powerful platform for businesses. It’s also a competitive one. Because of the increasing number of users, it’s more important than ever to ensure your content stands out from the crowd.
While there’s always a concern that Instagram will start to downgrade content from business profiles, there’s still evidence of this being true. In 2023, even more users see content by profiles that they don’t follow (not in the Discover tab but their main feed). To increase your chances of that happening, focus on getting engagement from your core followers.
Instagram has announced on what basis they decide whether they recommend your content or not.
The most important points are:
· Posts with clickbait or engagement bait don’t get recommended
· Contests or giveaways don’t get recommended
· Repurposed content from another source without added value doesn’t get recommended
Tips for winning on Instagram in 2023
How can you master one of the most challenging social media algorithms in 2023?
Let’s see:
· Experiment MORE with Instagram Reels to engage and captivate your audience.
· Engage with followers’ content during the first hour after you post something.
· During the first three hours after you post something, immediately respond to every comment.
· Write more meaningful captions.
· Ask questions in your captions to engage with your audience better.
· There’s no one way to apply hashtags, so experiment with different hashtags and hashtag strategies and see how many bring people to the content in your insights
· Utilise Instagram Stories to get more organic reach with your audience without affecting your feed’s cohesive style.
· Stay consistent! This algorithm will downgrade you if you post randomly. You should post once a day, once every other day, or at least two times a week (whatever you can manage).
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