Knowing your target audience is the first goal that every creator must set to be successful on all social platforms.
“How old are my followers?”, “Are there more women or men?”, “What are their main interests?”, “How do they communicate on social media?”. These are questions that are useful to ask yourself to start intercepting potential followers.
Once the target audience has been identified, it is essential to plan a social communication strategy that continuously involves and entertains the audience, to ensure that one’s following does not decrease, but rather, that it grows more every day.
Below are the most useful tips to be able to find and engage your target audience on Instagram.
Define Your Audience
The first useful thing to do is imagine the typical audience member or “fan.” As anticipated, this can be done by asking simple questions, such as, for example, “who cares about my content?”, “what does my ideal audience do?”, “what can I do to benefit them?”.
In this way, you will put yourself directly in the followers’ shoes, and you will collect useful information for planning your content.
Use the Right Hashtags
Since the target audience should have interests consistent with those in your field, it is plausible to think that the hashtags used are also the same. In fact, hashtags are the first useful tools to use to start looking for the most relevant audience members.
In addition to the “evergreen” hashtags, it is important to take advantage of those related to industry events. Using them will make it easier to get noticed, and at the same time attract new followers.
Take Advantage of the Insights of Instagram Business Profiles
If you work with social networks, you must always be ready for change. Monitoring the results achieved and possibly deciding to change strategy is essential. This can be done through Instagram Insights, an analysis tool created directly by the platform to allow business profiles to monitor the actions of followers. You will also have information on user demographics and the times of day when there are more interactions.
In light of this, an effective strategy is to publish more in the time slots where there is greater engagement.
Practice Social Listening
Another way to be able to intercept your target audience is to practice listening, literally “social listening”, which consists of following the topics of greatest interest in your community. If you know what interests your target users the most, it will be much easier to engage them.
Take Advantage of Polls on Instagram
Surveys can be really useful tools to improve your targeting. Introduced in 2017, these allow you to ask your followers direct questions: you can then ask them what content they prefer or what they expect, for example. After taking a photo or video, you can place the poll sticker anywhere in your story. Just like Stories, polls disappear after 24 hours.
Correctly Set Story Highlights
Featured stories are nothing more than stories fixed on your profile, therefore always visible. They are a great way to highlight the content that is most important to you.
To optimize your profile, you can take advantage of them in various ways. For example, featuring photo shoots or performances will be attractive to those looking to hire a dancer or model.
“Stealing” from the Competition
By taking a look at the Instagram profiles of your competitors, you will easily find people who are also interested in your own brand. You can observe the followers of competing profiles, read the comments and see the likes. The next step is to interact with these users to try to attract them to your profile.
Furthermore, by observing the profiles of the competitors, it is possible to get some ideas for the development and setting up of one’s own account.
Tips for Engaging Your Audience Engage in interesting conversations
Interaction on Instagram is essential, as well as on all other social networks. Participating in conversation, commenting and replying to comments remain fundamental actions to be taken in order to always attract new followers.
Choose a Style to Stand Out
Being recognizable and standing out from the crowd is essential. In fact, competition on social media is very high, and boasting characteristics that make people immediately recognizable is certainly helpful. This will also help build trust with your audience.
Publish Regularly
The more consistent your posts are, the more an audience expects to see, therefore looks forward to seeing work from. Publishing regularly also builds a regularity within the socials’ algorithms that enable a wider audience to be reached.
With time and practice your audience will grow if you implement these tips into your social media strategy!
