NEW WAY TO GROW ON INSTAGRAM PART 2 | Instagram growth tips | How to get Instagram followers

1. The Evolution of Hashtags on Instagram
2. Engaging Strategically with the Notifications Tab
3. Leveraging Instagram’s New Feature for Exposure and Growth
4. FAQ

The Evolution of Hashtags on Instagram

Okay, so let's get started by talking about hashtags and the new way to grow on Instagram by using hashtags. So if you are the same age as me, you might remember not disclosing what that age is, you might remember a day where people would use random hashtags like hashtags of celebrities, like #haleebury. And then they'd use these hashtags on content which had nothing to do with haleebury and somehow they would get all this engagement and followers as a result of it. Such a weird time to be alive, you know? That is not the case anymore. In fact, hashtags have gone through quite the journey, especially in recent months. And they've now very much evolved as a tool which is best used for categorizing your content. Okay, so whilst you can still get reach from using a hashtag because people still follow hashtags and on occasion people check hashtags, but most of the time if you're getting reach from hashtags, it's because someone follows that hashtag, right? So you'll still get reached that way. But what's becoming more important is that Instagram now uses your hashtags to basically categorize and figure out what your content's about. So if you're using hashtags about haleebury, and if you're using hashtags about haleebury and actually all of your content is about haleebury, like it's a fan page to her, then using that hashtag is signaling that to Instagram and it's allowing Instagram to really categorize and figure out what your page is about. And that's important because it feeds into your overall ranking on the platform. So how you show up in search, if you watch part one, you'll know about that. Whose explore pages you're featured on and all of that good stuff. So the method that I want to give you in regards to utilizing hashtags to grow in this day and age is to focus on relevancy, because this is the most important thing when it comes to hashtags these days, right? I've got a whole video on the recent changes which have come to hashtags and how you should update your strategy as a result of these changes.

Engaging Strategically with the Notifications Tab

The next one I want to talk about is the notifications tab. So this has actually changed quite a lot recently. Like, I don't know about you, but I don't even look at that tab anymore. If I want to see my notifications, I just scroll through my post and look at the comments and stuff, which I don't know, might be a weird way of doing it. But what I'm basically referring to is the section of your Instagram where you can look at your recent notifications with your account. Now, this is an old-school tactic, and what it basically involves is engaging with other people's channels and doing it for the sole purpose of that person seeing that you've engaged with their content and then them visiting your page and following you as a result. This is not always super effective as you've probably guessed. While it definitely does work, and if I'm being honest, it is one of the most effective ways for you to grow from zero, it is going to take a lot of manual labor. It is not easy. But when you have zero followers, that is one of the most effective ways to start getting in front of other people's accounts, because doing things like getting on the Explore page and all of that is going to be tough when you have a really small following. Okay, so doing your manual outreach does work in that sense. There is a problem with it, though, and this moves me on to the methods section in regards to how you should be utilizing this tactic in this day and age. What you should be doing is being targeted with the people you're engaging with. That's really important. So you should not be just engaging with anyone or engaging with big accounts. You want to be focusing on people who are likely to like your content. And how you do this is by finding a channel which is similar to your channel, right? Finding a channel which is similar to yours, has a similar following to yours, and produces similar content. You then want to go on their most recent post. You want to look at who has liked that post, and those are the people you want to engage with. And the reason why you want to do it this way is because the fact that these people have liked one of their recent posts proves that they are engaged followers, and they're not dormant. And the fact that they're engaging with this channel, which is so similar to yours, is a really great signal to you that they're possibly going to like your content as well. Because they're already liking someone else's content which is similar. So that is my biggest tip for really utilizing that method. But let's move on to the mistake when it comes to this tactic.

Leveraging Instagram’s New Feature for Exposure and Growth

I saved the best for last. This is a really exciting one. And this is all about Instagram's new-ish feature, which basically allows Instagram to share content from people who we are not following on our home feeds. I say new-ish because they actually trialled this back in 2018 and people were not happy. People were like, 'Oh, Instagram, what you doing, han?' People were not amused. And they were complaining. Therefore, it just kind of disappeared. And I didn't hear about it again. I'm guessing that was to a test group because I didn't see it at the time. And I did hear about this coming into play probably about three or four months ago, but I've only just got it on one of my channels now. And I'll put a screenshot so you can see what I'm talking about. But essentially, what's happening is Instagram's algorithm is trying to find content from other accounts you don't follow yet who the algorithm thinks you will like and positioning to you on your home feed. Now, when I first saw this, I was like, 'Sorry, I didn't follow this person. Why are they on my home feed?' I was like annoyed. I was like, 'This isn't... I don't want this.' I'm not gonna lie to you though. Once I got used to it, I've started to come around. Their recommendations are like... legit. Single post that I see, I'm like, 'Oh, no. This is fair. This is a great post.' And I even followed a lot of new people as a result of it. So I know some people won't like it. And I think it is such a risky move because it's so dependent on how good their recommendations are. If they get it wrong, people are going to hate it. But at the minute, for me, they've been getting it right. So I've got no complaints. Anyway, in regards to growth, you'll probably guess what this will mean. If Instagram's algorithm picks up your content and pushes it out to a new audience on their home feeds, your engagement and your growth are going to skyrocket. It's such a good way to elbow your way in front of someone's home feed, right? So it's going to skyrocket. It's going to be really, really great for your channel. So let's talk about the method of how to leverage this new feature. So let's assume that the algorithm, which is powering this new feature, is similar to the Explore page algorithm. I have to assume because Instagram has not come out and said how that algorithm works. And to be honest, I don't know if they ever will. They have come out and said how the Explore page algorithm works. So therefore, I'm going to use that as my example. Okay, so if that's the case, the way for your content to get recommended will be using two different methods. One way will be for you to ensure that your content is popular because as with most algorithms which power Instagram, in case you don't know, this already, there are multiple algorithms just an FYI. Most of these algorithms use popularity as a key signal to figure out how to rank your content. And popularity basically means how quickly and how many people are engaging with your content. So let's assume in order for us to benefit from this new feature, we need to make sure that people are engaging with our content and it's popular. And then the second thing that I recommend that we need to focus on is making sure that our content is well categorized so that Instagram's algorithm can easily figure out who should see our post. Because there's a two-way street here. It's not just about how good our content is, it's also about how much someone else should see our content. The two have to be paired together. So we need to make sure that we are doing things like using relevant hashtags, using keywords to make sure that Instagram's algorithm can really easily read and understand what our content is about. Okay, so that is the end of this video in my two-part series. Let me know if you wanted me just do it in one video. I just felt extra. So that's the end. If you found this interesting, which I really hope you did, I recommend checking out this video. It's all about my top five things that I recommend you do today, which is going to really help grow your Instagram account. Thank you so much for watching, as always. I will see you in.

FAQ

Q: What is the evolution of hashtags on Instagram?
A: Hashtags on Instagram have evolved from being used randomly to now being best used for categorizing content and signaling to Instagram the nature of your page.
Q: How should one utilize hashtags to grow on Instagram?
A: The emphasis should be on relevancy when using hashtags for growth on Instagram, focusing on categorizing and signaling the content accurately.
Q: What is the strategy for engaging strategically with the Notifications Tab on Instagram?
A: The strategy involves engaging with targeted accounts similar to yours, finding engaged followers, and avoiding engagement with random or large accounts.
Q: What is Instagram's new feature for exposure and growth, and how can it be leveraged?
A: Instagram's new feature involves showing content from accounts not followed on the home feed. The key to leveraging this is by ensuring popular, well-categorized content to benefit from the algorithm's recommendations.