Week One of Trying to Grow My Instagram Account Authentically
Sunday Oct. 05 - Thursday Oct. 09
Quick Overview
Similarly to how I am doing my daily video updates, I will be including data from 7:30pm the day after it was posted. For example: if a video is posted on 10/05, the data will be pulled at 7:30pm EST on 10/06. It is important to note that some of my videos are performing better than they were during the initial content pull.
The data I am looking at comes from the individual insights of the content. I am looking at: likes, comments, shares, reposts, saves, follows, and views.
For the data
v = video post
c = carousel post
p = static post
“morning” = my scheduled content that posts at 9:05am EST
For the trial reels, I will only look at their progress at the end of each week (for this post) unless Instagram sends me a notification that they are doing really well.
Unfortunately I don’t remember where I was in terms of follow count the day when I started this series (10/05) but I do know that it was somewhere in the 3640-3690 range. I’ll be better at this comparison in the next week!
Day One: Sunday, October 05 - Last Updated 10/06 at 7:30pm
On Sunday I did a lot of things on the back end.
archived about half my posts because they no longer fit me as a brand
removed all reels made in 2024 or earlier from my main grid (only on my reels tab now)
sent out some trial reels
redid my bio for my profile
new profile picture
redid all my highlights
likes
comments
shares
reposts
saves
follows
views
Day Two: Monday, October 06 - Last Updated 10/07 at 7:30pm
Overall, I continued to be more purposely engaged on my mutual’s posts and I followed a lot of people back that followed me. Observations, when I stated on the app and engaged there was a correlation with how much engagement I got. I posted another night video this day and it did just as poorly as Sunday’s night video so I won’t be continuing that.
likes
comments
shares
reposts
saves
follows
views
Day Three: Tuesday, October 07 - Last Updated 10/08 at 7:30pm
I deleted and reuploaded 4 trial reels, all of which still aren’t reaching what I want them to be reaching but they are doing “better”. I engaged more on Threads and I think a few people there followed me on Insta.
likes
comments
shares
reposts
saves
follows
views
Day Four: Wednesday, October 08 - Last Updated 10/09 at 7:30pm
I followed a ton of writers on my reels tab, promoted myself more on Threads, and I posted 3 trial reels. I’ve seen a lot of people talk about how much help trial reels have been so I’m still trying to figure them out.
likes
comments
shares
reposts
saves
follows
views
Day Five: Thursday, October 08 - Last Updated 10/10 at 7:30pm
I didn’t spend as much time on Insta this day because I was trying to prepare for fall break. I wanted to get all my school work done. I continued to engage with mutuals, I engaged on Threads, and I followed + engaged on the reels tab. Don’t just like + follow, comment too!!
likes
comments
shares
reposts
saves
follows
views
Week One as a Whole - Last Updated 10/11 at 8:50am
The Basics
Current Follow Count: 3795
Views in the Last 30 Days: 73.2k
Reflection
I’ve definitely seen that my videos are getting more views so I do think that IG is showing my videos to more people now.
I’ve noticed that you get what you put in so if you’re not engaging with your mutuals they’re not going to want to engage with you, and by extension if you’re not getting engagement, IG is not going to push your content.
The views for my trial reels range from 160-730. So far it’s not what I want to be hitting for views on a trial reel. At this time I don’t think they’re worth it but I’ll give it a little more time.
Next Week
I want to participate in more trends, specifically the the carousel post ones. As much as I like sharing videos, I really miss when IG was about photos.
I’m going to balance between posting videos made via IG and ones made via TikTok to see if there’s any difference in what content gets pushed out. I’ve heard that IG tends to push content made using it’s resources and I’m interested to see if that affects me.
I still want to keep working towards finding the optimal time to post to maximize engagement from my followers and engagement from non-followers.
From the Desk of Lucy Gould