There’s no question what has everyone’s attention to: Instagram is changing the game. It’s where everyone is a marketer; everyone is a blogger; everyone can be an Internet celeb.
And just like everyone else, I’ve been pouring time into figuring out the formula for making it work for me. How does this fit in with my marketing strategies? What does it accomplish? And because I run a call-to-action business, the biggest question: can it bring me leads and sales?
Let’s get technical: Instagram is an excruciatingly simple platform that shines a big neon light on 2 things: Your images and your followers.
And because of that, if you say you don’t care about follower count, you’re absolutely lying.
The reality of the platform is that everyone knows roughly how many followers they have. It’s just something we make space in our brain for. It’s important to us, right or wrong.
I also would go one step further and say that those looking to actively grow their Instagram accounts also know roughly how many followers their competitors have.
And then there’s the term “growing your Instagram.” That just actually means growing your followers, am I right? It’s has little-to-nothing to do with growing your reach, cultivating your audience, and gaining sales leads. It means getting people to tap that “Follow” button so your numbers go up.
Right?
So, as it pertains to my business, in this world that is so obsessed with the number of followers, how valuable is each follower? Will more followers inevitably mean more likes, more leads, more sales? Especially considering the new Instagram algorithm that is now taking user engagement into account – I am also interested if more followers will then organically bring MORE followers, simply by engagement? And will those new followers then turn into leads, sales, etc?
Following me?
Basically, I want to know if more Instagram followers will equal more sales.
Specifically in the online boutique space, I look at my competitors who have 1,000’s and 1,000’s of more followers than my business, and I have to ask: are those followers actually customers? Or is this a brand awareness play?
So, I needed to run my own experiment.
If I increased my Instagram followers, would I increase my sales?
A little background:
- My current online sales primarily come from those on my email list. If I get them on my email list, I am exponentially more likely to make them a customer.
- Instagram has been mostly a “brand awareness” game for me and I haven’t had much success with lead generation or a call-to-action. For instance, I don’t regularly see immediate purchases when I post pictures of items, nor to I get a substantial amount of web traffic from the links in my Instagram bio.
- I have never bought followers and my Instagram has grown organically with real and relevant customers and fans.
What I wanted to know;
- Am I not getting a lot of web traffic simply because my sample size is too small? If I increased my follower count, would that translate into more traffic? Simply: Is this just a “numbers game” ?
- Will more followers mean more comments, likes, and ultimately more organic followers? Do followers bring more followers?
So, here’s what I did to conduct this experiment:
I invested in an Instagram Growth Hacker for 1 month, and I watched closely.
The growth hacker used the same strategy that I have been using for years that I like to call the “follow back strategy.” Basically, you follow a whole bunch of people that you think would like your account and hope that they follow you back. It sounds kinda desperate and needy, I know, but surprisingly it works. Actually, it works really well. Why? Because people care about how many followers they have. So when they see a notification that they have a new follower, they get excited. And most people are compelled to check out that new follower, even for just a second. If they like what they see, they follow back.
The last “follow back” part is important because I have seconds to impress them. So for the past month I made sure my profile was ahh-mazing. The growth hacker really kept me accountable and cognizant of my posting habits and I was actually proud of myself – this past month my Instagram profile was a perfect representation of my brand. High five, Kristi!!
But back to the experiment.
Another important piece was to make sure that the growth hacker was following relevant people. Like I said before, I’ve never bought followers, but this certainly skirts the line because I did buy service that helped me target people that would then increase my followers. I think I’m on the white side of this grey area. What do you think?
So I created a list of similar accounts: my competitors, popular bloggers, and basically any accounts that I would think my ideal target customer would likely follow. I gave this list to the growth hacker and let him do his thang.
The Results:
I watched closely, like very very closely throughout the month. I was nervous that the growth hacker was actually just going to send me a whole bunch of irrelevant followers, or worse, fake followers. I was pleasantly surprised that the quality of followers was top notch. Of course there were a few questionable profiles in there, but as a whole, my target audience was represented in about 80% of the new followers (Note: I pulled that number out of my ass, but it feels right.)
My overall followers increased from 2887 to 3477. That’s +590 in 30 days, or approximately 19 per day.
So, that’s cool and all because now I look more popular by 590 points.
But are these followers worth anything else besides popularity points?
Let’s see…
Did I Gain Any Organic Followers?
Not really. I was hoping that more followers would equal more engagement and more engagement would mean more followers. I was envisioning that maybe there was some “popularity” waterfall I would tap into, where people follow simply because the profile seems popular(?) Ok I feel dumb writing that. But I know I’ve personally followed bloggers simply because they have a lot of followers and I’ve thought, “Wow, I should know these people.” Do they have an artificial popularity? Possibly. But it worked for me. However, I didn’t see any real increase in my organic following as a result of the growth hacker.
I verified this because Instagram shows that I was already following most of the accounts that recently followed me. Meaning, all of those new followers were a result of the growth hacker’s “follow back” strategy.
What about Engagement:
The great news is that my engagement has increased with an increase in followers. This is exciting because it proves that the followers I gained are the two R’s I was most concerned about 1) REAL and B) RELEVANT. It is pointless to have a whole lot of new followers if they aren’t actually interested in my content, so for that I am happy.
*Note: the increase engagement probably is a combination of the followers increasing AND me spending more time on making my profile look great. I did make the conscious effort to make sure the people I was following would like what they saw and want to follow me back. Happy that it worked — yay!!
And Finally: Did I see an Impact on Leads and Sales?
Now for the real results!!
Although, they aren’t exactly exciting. An increase in leads and sales are still a big Nope.
Even though my followers increased and the new followers are all within my target audience, and my engagement increased, my online sales did not reflect any direct correlation to my Instagram changes. Bummer.
*Side note: I know that it takes several interactions with my customer to turn them into buyers, so capturing a new follower on Instagram and immediately turning them into a customer hardly EVER happens. It’s not that easy. But could I get them to at least go to my website and turn them into a lead?
Well, I was pretty surprised by this one: I didn’t really see an increase in web traffic driven from Instagram. I thought for sure that even if I didn’t see an increase in sales, I would be able to get these new followers to my website. But… nope.
So, What is the Conclusion?
Now, overall I can’t say I didn’t expect these results because I’ve been using Instagram for business for about 3 years now, and regardless of all the different strategies I’ve tried, I haven’t ever had a great call-to-action response. However, I thought at the time maybe my sample size was just too small, and maybe it still is. I don’t know. But I figured by adding 500+ people I would have at least a little bump in traffic, leads, and maybe even sales. And I essentially got nothing. Nil.
Everyone in my industry (retail) is using Instagram in some form and the new trend is to sell-sell-sell directly on the platform. So I had to find out: if I seriously invest in building my audience, will that actually translate into $$$$$$$??
And I’m really sad to saying, I wasn’t able to prove that. Boo.
The Good News:
Of course, there is a lesson learned. For me, this experiment is all about how I should be thinking about and using Instagram as it pertains to my social media strategies.
The best lesson: Instagram will continue to be a brand awareness tool.
- I will use my Instagram profile to display the mood, personality, and lifestyle of my brand and my target audience.
- I will continue to use hashtags that my tribe loves so I can be discovered organically through search.
- I will continue to comment and interact with other brands, accounts, and bloggers and throw my name into the conversation in an organic and relevant way.
I guess that’s all I can really expect from SOCIAL media. Despite my growth hacker’s best efforts, I didn’t find the real hack to instant leads or sales — it kinda just reinforced what I anticipated all along.
So that’s a no: I didn’t find any instant or direct correlation between an increase in followers and sales. But I did find clarity about my usage of the platform.
Homework: Do you have an Instagram strategy, or do you just post when you feel like it? Write down 3 things you should do MORE on Instagram, and 3 things you should do LESS on Instagram. Try to establish what your Insta-goals are, and make sure you “MORE & LESS” lists speak to your goals.
In the comments, let me know one strategy you use on Instagram that is working for you!