Contents of This Article
- Fighting The Instagram Algorithm
- Fighting Instagram Compression
- Caption, Hashtags, Location
Whether you are just starting out on your photography Instagram page or you have been around the digital world of Instagram since it started, the thought of gaining Instagram followers in 2021 can seem like an uphill battle from the get-go. If you are a newbie (is that still a word?) it can feel like you have turned up to the party with a big birthday cake and balloons but everyone has already gone to the after-party without you. And if you are a an Instagram vet (not the animal kind) then it probably feels like you’ve been shouting at people through a megaphone for the past 5 years about your great content and they continue to act as if you are a French mime artist. But I’m here to tell you that it IS possible to gain followers in 2021 and beyond. Just follow these three easy steps to get Instagram followers.
1. Fighting The Instagram Algorithm
Algorithm Background
As with most popular social media channels these days, an algorithm is used to display content on users’ homepages. This algorithm decides which content is most likely to appeal to each user which will determine the hierarchy of where it appears on their screen. For example, when you open Instagram it is always your best friends posts that appear first if they have recently posted, because these are the users you interact with the most, which tells the Instagram algorithm that you enjoy this content and that you want to see more of it. Alternatively, if there’s a guy you went to high school with that you never spoke to but you followed each other on Instagram when you were 13 years old and you haven’t liked any of his photos, the algorithm will make sure his content is the lowest priority and you will see this content last, if ever. Yeah, the algorithm knows more about you than your mother does.
Photographer Implications
What this means for photographers or any content producers on Instagram is that your content MUST be the best it possibly can be and it must be something that your followers WANT to see. Producing content that your viewers like will make it easier for others to notice your work. Another implication is that you want your followers to engage with your content. This is obvious, but it means that spam/bot followers are actually damaging to your account. These followers are not going to like your photos and so the Instagram algorithm will think that your content is not engaging them and then punish you for it.
Examples on Instagram
A good example of an Instagram account which posts content that appeals to its followers is @VisitScotland. People obviously follow this account to see beautiful photos from all over Scotland, including the lesser-known locations. This is exactly what @VisitScotland delivers to its fanbase as seen in the image below.
2. Fighting Instagram Compression
Compression Background
“More fighting!?” you ask. Yes, more fighting than a UFC PPV Event is required to get your photos noticed on Instagram. But it will be worth it when you are waking up on a million pound yacht sailing the Mediterranean Sea. But yes, despite being a photo-centred platform, the Instagram developers thought it would be a great idea to lower the quality of your photos after you post them. I KNOW! It sounds silly, but the sacrifice in photo quality is for a reason – To improve user experience. In other words, the images load faster because they are lower quality and so there is no waiting around for images to load on Instagram.
Photographer Implications
This of course has serious implications for photographers on Instagram, and there are best practices on how to maintain as much quality in your photos as possible. Perhaps the most important rule is to upload in either a 1×1 crop ratio, a 4×5 crop ratio for portraits, or a 1.91:1 OR 16:9 ratio for landscapes. The 1×1 and the 4×5 crops are actually better if you can get your photos into these sizes as it means the image will be as big as it can be on Instagram. The sizes that work on Instagram are constantly being updated, so for more information and an updated list click here.
While not all of your photos will be the same, photos with a low aperture tend to look better and perform well on Instagram. You shouldn’t worry about this too much, but try out low aperture shots when appropriate and you will probably be rewarded with likes.
Finally, the settings you use to export your photo from Lightroom, or whichever editing software you are using, are important. There is a lot of contradictory information out there about this so we recommend reading a few articles and testing out what works for yourself. Here are a couple of articles to get you started, here and here.
Instagram Example
A photo that successfully minimises the damage of the Instagram compression can be viewed below, from @iceland.explore. It is uploaded in a 4×5 ratio which allows it to take up a lot of space on the screen. This image also has a very low aperture giving it a nice blurry background which allows the subject to stand out.
3. Caption, Hashtags, Location.
Caption, Hashtags, Location Background
No, it’s not a Channel 4 home improvement show – It’s how to get your photos to appear in the right places at the right times and get those LIKES BABYYYYYY! Think of Caption, Hashtags and Location as the Why, What and Where of posting on Instagram. Captions should tell your audience why you are posting this particular photo and why they should care about it. Hashtags show what your post is about and what topics are similar to it. And adding the Location of course shows where this photo was captured.
Photographer Implications
Caption
Let’s start with the caption. You’ve taken what you consider to be a gorgeous photo of a serene landscape in the South of France (Maybe you are a French mime artist after all?). But why are you posting it to Instagram? Is it for self-gratification? Absolutely! But why should your followers give a merde? Well, tell them why. Tell them how you felt when you took the photo. Tell them the history behind the location of the photo. Tell them a funny anecdote from the time you spent in this place. It’s no secret that humans love stories, so give them one. For a brief moment in time, any one of your followers is going to notice your content and YOU can help shape their reaction to it through your caption. How do you want your followers to feel when they see your post? Let this guide what you write in your caption.
Hashtags
While captions are aimed at engaging people who have decided to look at your photo, hashtags are all about drawing people in in the first place. By including relevant hashtags on your photos, you will get people to look at your photos who do not currently follow you AND these people will already be interested in the topic of your hashtag, meaning they are more likely to enjoy the content. For photographers, common hashtags would relate to the location of your photo, the camera and lens you used, the type of photo (e.g. is it a #portrait or a #landscape ?), the topic, or the instagram photography communities (see below).
Location
The easiest of the three, with location you should add where the photo was captured. If it was taken in a popular tourist spot, a lot of people are likely to see your photo when searching this location. If you took it in quite an obscure place, you might want to tag the nearest city or get creative as can be seen in the example below.
Instagram Example
In this example from @gregor.chodak, we can see a number of different hashtags. One thing that stands out is that this is a German photographer and so some of his hashtags are in another language. Even if you only speak one language, using a foreign hashtag is a creative way to get more worldwide exposure for your photos. Similarly, the location is listed as ‘Black and White’. While this is not being used the way that Instagram had intended, this is a creative way to get your photo in communities that already exist. Other hashtags include the topics mentioned above.
Finishing Up
Thank you for reading, if you made it this far. Hopefully this guide has given you some ideas of how to improve your content and get Instagram followers. The best piece of advice we can offer you is to go out and PRACTISE. It’s all very well and good to know the theory but you will learn so much more about what works if you go out and try it yourself. Don’t be afraid to fail at first. If you go back to the very first few posts of popular Instagram accounts, they are often not very high quality or interesting images. But these people stuck through it and LEARNED how to improve on their posts. Now go do the same young padawan!
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