In this guide I'm going to be teaching you how to grow an Instagram audience starting from zero followers.

So you’ve created an Instagram page and you have one follower, yourself. Now you’re wondering… how do I build an audience. Where do I get started? It can feel like a daunting task, but don’t worry! With the right strategy you’ll be on your way to building an authentic community in no time. Before we get started, please understand that this is a strategy I’ve created to build a genuine, engaged community and it takes work. If you’re looking to gain 1K followers overnight, then this is not for you. In order to have success this requires time and effort, and how quickly you grow depends on how much of both you're willing to put in. But if you’re dedicated to doing what it takes, then you will be on your way to building a solid community of people who care about your business.

October 2016 – Ground Zero – @thenomadnextdoor was created

A quick insight into my Instagram growth journey... I started my travel page @thenomadnextdoor in October of 2016, and have grown it to over 27K followers to date. For the first 9 months, I grew my community like it was my job, posting daily, creating new content 2-3 times per week, and spending 3-4 hours per day on the app, using the strategies I outline below (mainly #2). During these 9 months, I gained over 15K followers. Refer to the screenshots integrated throughout this post to see my initial growth journey.

If you are brand new on Instagram and haven't set up your page yet, read How to Set Up an Instagram for Your Business, as you will want to complete these tasks before starting to build your community.

Now, let’s get started!

1. Tell People in Your Personal Network

December 2016 – First 1K Followers (1.5 months in)

The first thing you'll want to do is tell your friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, etc., about your new Instagram business page. There is a feature that connects your Facebook friends to Instagram and allows you to follow them. You can use this, or you can also create a post on Facebook to let people know about your page, or send direct messages. And of course emailing, texting, and word of mouth work wonders too!

However, there is one instance when I would suggest skipping this step and doing it later, and that is- if you’re making a big lifestyle change and feeling nervous about how people will react to it. For example, when I first created my travel page @thenomadnextdoor, I was going to be quitting my job, selling everything, and leaving the U.S. to live a nomadic lifestyle. I was nervous about what friends and family would think of the big change, and didn’t want to be criticized or judged for my decision early on. And I certainly didn’t want to post content while having these thoughts in the back of my mind, wondering what they would think of it, because I knew this could potentially influence what I posted. So, I made the decision to keep my account quiet, and I simply focused on growing a community of other like-minded travelers who were on a similar wavelength as I was. Months down the road, once most everyone I knew was aware of what I was doing, I decided to reach out and connect with them on Instagram. In hindsight, I’m happy I started out this way, because it allowed me to post content without reservation and speak my mind without worrying about judgment from those who knew me in a different light.

2. Outreach: Liking, Commenting, Following Strategies

In my opinion, this is the fastest method to build an audience, and should definitely be used during the initial growth period!

This is about niching down, and finding your community that already exists out on Instagram. There are a number of different methods within this strategy, so I will try my best to break each one down for you.

There are a few ways to dive in and find these people in your target audience.

Find Similar Accounts to Yours

If you haven't already, identify which accounts are similar to yours and also in your niche. For instance, if you are selling handmade jewelry from Bali, you may want to find other brands that are selling handmade jewelry from Bali, or handmade items from Bali, or handmade jewelry in general. Essentially, your aim is to figure out where your potential customers are "hanging out" on Instagram.

Once you've identified a few of these accounts, you'll want to pay attention to who is engaging with them. You can go to their follower list, but this usually isn’t their most engaged group. I recommend getting even more targeted, and going to their most recent posts. Look to see who is liking the posts, and also who is commenting (ultra-engaged). Then, visit these individual accounts, check out their photos, and like and/or comment on a few that interest you. I usually recommend leaving at least 3 impressions (likes and/or comments) on each profile so that the person is aware that you stopped by and doesn’t miss you in their Activity Feed. This is the first step in building a relationship, and is a way of letting people with similar interests know that you / your brand exists. I generally find that commenting on posts that genuinely interest you is a good way to capture someone’s attention, as it shows you are interested in their content. The number of accounts you engage with each day is totally dependent on how quickly you want to grow. Obviously the more people you engage with, the better your chances are that people will discover your content and become fans, and in turn, you will quickly grow a community.

Keep in mind, since Instagram has a history of spammy bots and fake users, people can be leery of accounts that go liking dozens of their photos, as they question if there’s a genuine human behind the screen. Another thing to keep in mind is who you decide to follow. Personally, I am not a fan of the follow-unfollow game, but to each their own. When I do follow someone, it's because I genuinely want to continue seeing their content in the future.

Discovery Through Hashtags

Another option for finding your audience is by searching relevant hashtags and engaging with posts from the “Top” or “Recent” sections. For instance, if we use the Bali jewelry brand as an example again, some of the hashtags I would be interested in are: #balijewelry #handmadejewelry #handmadeinbali, etc. This is a good way to niche down, as it connects you with other accounts that are either similar to yours, and also to consumers who are interested in the same topic.

The posts under Top will probably be from larger brands or influencers, and under Recent will be anyone who has recently used the hashtag. Start scanning through the posts, finding ones that include content/ product similar to yours. You can then click into these posts and essentially use the same liking commenting framework as discussed above. I typically find that in my product-based business, if I can find smaller accounts who are posting about similar products (not getting paid to), this is usually an indication that the person is very satisfied or passionate about the product. These are ideally the type of people you want to bring into your community, as they could potentially become an advocate for your brand.

June 2017 – 11K Followers – This was a crazy period of growth. From April to June (2 months) I gained 6K followers.

3. Encourage People to Tag Friends in Your Posts

This can be as simple as posting a photo of a product or experience, and captioning it "Tag a friend who would love this" or "Tag the person you want to take here". This is a great way to get your audience thinking about how your product or service fits into their life. It's also a great way for building your community, as every person tagged has essentially been referred to you by one of their friends.

4. Host Giveaways

Another way to encourage tagging is by hosting giveaways. This can be done by creating a post announcing that you are giving away (your product or service), and letting people know that they can enter by doing the following: 1) Liking the post, 2) Tagging 3 friends in the post, 3) Following you.

This can create a ripple effect... If each person tagged wants to enter, then they will also have to like, tag, and follow... and the pattern continues. As the post gets more likes and comments, it will begin to rank higher in the algorithm, meaning you will reach exponentially more people. This is a great way to get your community engaged with your brand, as well as grow your audience.

5. Encourage Customers to Post About Your Brand

*August 2017 – 20K Followers – Growth of 9K in 3 months!*

This is another great way to get people talking about your brand, as well as sharing about it with their friends. Ask customers to post photos using your product/ service and tag you in them. A few ways you can encourage people to do this are by:

-Including a message in their order encouraging them to post and tag.

-Offering a discount code to anyone who tags you in their post.

-Sending a post-purchase email asking them to post and tag.

-Creating an Instagram post asking them to post and tag.

-Sharing photos that previous customers have posted and tagged you in to motivate others to do the same.

The more people you have talking and sharing about your brand on Instagram, the more trust you will build within your community.

6. Posting Strategy

The last but definitely not least important way to build a community, is by implementing an effective posting strategy in which you can organically reach your audience. This can be achieved by posting quality photos, along with using the right hashtags, creating a visually pleasing page aesthetic, being consistent, etc. Refer to A Guide to Posting on Instagram for Business for a full breakdown of each of these strategies.

Now that you've finished reading the strategies and seen the growth journey of @thenomadnextdoor, you're probably wondering why, after 20K followers, the momentum tapered off. There are a couple of reasons for this. I have a few theories that I will share with you:

1) I got into the travel blogging community relatively early on when there were fewer travel bloggers to follow, and thus had an easier time amassing an audience.

2) After reaching 20K followers, I drastically reduced the number of hours per day I spent on growing my audience (using strategy #2), as other business ventures came into play that used up more of my time.

3) Probably the MAIN reason... The Instagram algorithm drastically changed. This was the talk of 2018 for brands and creators on the app, because it negatively affected almost everyone's growth and engagement rates. Instagram changed their algorithm to become more critical of the timing of posts, the hashtags used, the amount of initial engagement a post received, among several other factors which determines how Instagram ranks each post. You can see how this change affected people... by going back to posts done by larger influencers before 2018, and comparing the number of likes to their most recent posts. In many cases, the numbers will be similar, if not lower now than before.

However, this is NOT to scare you away from starting an Instagram now. I wanted to share this info to be completely transparent with you, but DO NOT think that this means you will be unable to grow an Instagram audience now. Although it may have come easier a few years back, it is certainly possible to have success if you use a combination of these strategies and commit the necessary time and effort. If you feel like you don't have the extra time to manage an account, you can always hire an Instagram manager to do so for you.

If you have any questions, feel free to post them in the comments below, and I will do my best to answer them.