How to become an Instagram influencer

Since its launch in October 2010, Instagram has grown into a social media explosion across the world. If you are one of the millions of people who regularly scroll through their Instagram feed, you’re probably familiar with the term, “Influencer”.

Who are Instagram influencers?

It’s right there in the name. Instagram influencers are credible people who influence an audience by promoting brands and products. Having an influencer promote a product or brand that you own is a great opportunity to increase your brand awareness, pull in significant sales, grow your follower base, and standardize your entire Instagram marketing strategy.
If you are interested in becoming an Instagram influencer, we’ve got you covered. In this article, we will be sharing six tips that you can use to develop your Instagram career.

1. Don’t beat around the bush—identify your interests
2. Create an outstanding bio
3. Stick to a consistent posting schedule
4. Understand your audience, and make them the heart of your marketing approach
5. Utilize tags and #Hashtags
6. Collaborate and connect with brands in your domain

1.  Don’t beat around the bush—identify your interests

To compete on one of the most happening social media platforms, it’s important to stick to a niche. Discovering what you are passionate about will take you far, and help you stand out.
Whether you’re documenting your everyday routine or shooting photos of exotic locations, having an engaging audience is all you need for brands to collaborate with you.

How do you build audience engagement?

Sticking to a subject you are passionate about and adhering to a consistent theme with your posts will help you appear authentic and target broader audiences. Whether your focus is travel photography, food blogging, beauty, fitness, or fashion⁠—anything that zeroes in on a strong subject and excites your audience will likely be a hit.   

 2. Create an excellent bio 

Now that you have established your niche, it’s time to start tweaking the finer details of your Instagram account. An important thing to focus on is creating a bio that immediately grabs people’s attention. This is your first chance to voice your story in a way that woos people, triggers interest, and entices them to follow your content. So, the second step in becoming an Instagram influencer is to have a noteworthy bio that stands out.

 3. Stick to a consistent posting schedule 

Alright, it’s time to start putting out your content. Once you’ve started connecting with your audience, it’s essential to have them glued to your Instagram grid. One tried and true method is to publicize content regularly and often. It can be twice every week⁠—say Mondays and Thursdays⁠—or four times a month, depending on your process. The key to a perfect posting schedule is to have a calendar that does the work for you. Having said that, Zoho Social’sCalendar can come in handy by helping you organize and plan your posts well ahead of time. It also suggests the best posting time using the SmartQ slot based on your audience engagement. Boom!

 4.  Understand your audience, and make them the heart of your marketing approach

Social media is all about people. How you engage with them and recognize their likes and dislikes is the first step toward attracting them to your brand.

Bonus point: The Reports feature on Zoho Social digs deeper into stats, helping you analyze your audience engagement.

Research conducted by Small Business Trends says that 88% of people will follow an influencer’s recommendations. With that being said, to emerge as a successful Instagram influencer, it’s essential to know your audience’s demography, the type of brands they follow, their interactions with different kinds of posts, and more. It’s not just a news feed that you keep scrolling through but constant communication and trust. How do you get that? Responding.
A simple gesture, such as liking or replying to your followers’ comments, writing back to them in their DMs, following them back, and posting polls on your Instagram Stories are effective in building your relationship with your audience.

 5.  Utilize tags and #Hashtags

Once you’ve reached a certain number of followers organically and gained a decent level of audience engagement, you can start working on brand promotion. One of the simplest ways to begin is by tagging relevant brands on your pictures to get on their radar. If you’re lucky, some brands may feature the posts you’ve tagged them in, giving you huge visibility. You can also directly connect with brands you think are relevant to your niche via DMs.
On the other hand, hashtags help make your posts searchable. Keep your audience in mind, and select the hashtags that best fit your niche when drafting your captions. The rule of thumb is to keep your hashtag usage under control. Don’t overdo it⁠—use 3-5 hashtags on average, include tag lines and SEO words relevant to your niche and create attractive posts.

 6. Collaborate and connect with brands in your domain 

Collaborating and cross-promoting other influencers who share the same interests as you is a great way to seek attention. Pooling audiences will benefit you and your collaborator with twice the attention, resulting in a larger overall audience for both of you. Over time, when your relationships start to grow, you will eventually find opportunities to collaborate. This will give you increased exposure and a chance to connect with a larger community of influencers within your area of interest.

The  bottom line 

We hope these tips come in handy in kick-starting your journey as an Instagram influencer. Remember, success does not happen overnight. It happens day by day with consistency and patience. It won’t be easy at first, but it’ll be well worth it.
Let us know in the comments below what strategies you’ve used to further your career on Instagram. We’ll be happy to hear from you.