Instagram has been my biggest headache.

Whilst managing so many different social media accounts, the last thing I want to do in the evening is to sit down on the sofa with a cup of tea and log into Instagram for another hour to increase my own engagement, followers and likes. 

Let ALONE manage all the unfollowers that day!

I find it a tedious process for a small business so I have 3 tips below that are guaranteed to increase your growth, engagement, followers AND the development of partnerships with other brands.

Turbogram

If like most founders, you have time constraints AND a tight budget then Turbogram is for you. Yes, it is a follower and engagement bot, but unless – as a busy founder -you have at least an hour every evening to spend liking hundreds of photos in your niche and commenting on them, then this could be PERFECT for you. 

First of all I have to say I am stunned with the amount of apps out there charging extortionate amounts of money to auto like, follow and comment on photos. Some are charging up to £90 a month! It seems Apps are really taking advantage of the downfall of instagress.

Turbogram is based in Ireland and charges just £10 a month. You can pick hashtags to target your niche and follow them and you can also create your own comments to send to this specified niche. Did I mention it also auto follows and unfollows? I have tested out AND paid for multiple autobots and so far, this really has been hard to beat.

Followers Assistant

I have tested multiple free apps to manage my followers but the vast majority flood you with ad pop ups and a minimum amount to unfollow. 

Followers assistant will quickly scan through your instagram and you can unfollow in bulk by a click of a button rather than manually pushing unfollow on each one. You have a limit per hour of 200 unfollows. Anymore than this and Instagram will start getting suspicious. 

This App is great if like me, you feel uncomfortable following and unfollowing people once they have followed you. Yes, it is the fastest way to grow your account and even the biggest bloggers do it, but I also see it as a bit of a douche move and it will get you blocked by other users in the future or even worse, called out over it!

If you would like to connect with each other on instagram, Here is my account : ) 

Business Development 

I think Instagram direct messaging is a brilliant way to build on connections. Obviously the bigger the brand the more likely they are to be flooded with messages but as a digital marketing specialist, I have managed to connect multiple clients to new distributors, connect to magazines for PR and also send out products to influencers thus skipping on paying their agents a small fortune by complimentary gifts that they are later seen wearing.

If you are looking for PR, then I would suggest googling to start with magazines in your local area and messaging them directly on Instagram.

You can often skip the advertising fees if you offer to write up your own interview. For example, we targeted female founder magazines and websites through Instagram and then offered to create an interview about our busy mum of 2 and female founder and how she started her own business.

As the idea for the interview fitted into their niche, it was publishes and alongside links to her products on her website. It increased sales AND traffic.

If you would like more information on how to manage your social media account and branding with packages starting from as little as £175 a month, click here.