As a business or content creator we always need to create content that will be relevant and provides the most value to our audience.

Here are 9 content ideas that will be easy to implement in your social media strategy.

1) Introduction post

Introduce yourself or your company. Share some fun details about yourself or why you even started your business or blog.

2) BTS (behind the scenes)

Do you sell wedding gowns? Show behind the scenes of a gown being handmade.

3) Ask your audience a question related to your niche

There is a holiday coming up and you want to know if your vegan bakery should sell vegan cupcakes or cookies. Ask your viewers to vote on their choice.

4) Showcase you product or service

If you are a bath bomb company, show a video of you throwing the bath bomb into the water. I binge watch these videos on Instagram ;-).

5) Throwback Thursday or Flashback Friday post

Share a picture or video of your first workshop, office, or where you started your business to the present day.

If you started your business on your kitchen counter, but now have your own office, warehouse and 10 employees, then share your inspiring past and present.

6) Share a clip of your YouTube video, podcast or blog post

Sharing clips of content you posted on another platform is a great way to cross promote your social media platforms.

7) Acknowledge your employees

Highlight an employee or intern that is making great contributions to your business.

8) Educational post/tips

Are you a language instructor, skincare company or a makeup artist? Share tips that your audience will benefit from.

9) Shareable quote related to your business

If you own a social media agency, posting quotes about cats won’t provide value to your clients, but quoting Seth Godin will.

Read how to build a community on Instagram with a small following here.

Need help creating an Instagram aesthetic? Read this quick read here.

Long checkout process

Why are you making it so hard for your customers to check out via Instagram?!

Please include product tags into your Instagram feed.  Are you selling a beautiful dress right before Valentine’s day?  Instead of 30 women wondering how much it is or having them DM you and wait for your reply, please use the product tag features for your account.

Glossier makes it super easy to check out. Be like Glossier 🙂

This post shares how to set up Instagram shopping.

Not talking about your product/service or talking too much about it.

People don’t understand what the hell you sell.  Your page has all these beautiful aesthetically pleasing photos and quotes, but where is your offer? Are you selling photography services? Are you an interior designer? Make sure your caption makes it’s clear so you are generating leads/sales.

OR

Your newsfeed has the same product in every picture and your boring caption says “To buy, click link in bio” You have to learn the art of selling something without seeming spammy and sleazy.

Using the wrong hashtags

So many businesses are using generic hashtags that have nothing to do with their product, and they don’t have any hashtags based on their niche.

Your Instagram profile is not optimized

Visitors seeing your profile photo don’t understand what your company is about. No one knows where you are located. Your Instagram handle name has too many underscores or the name doesn’t align with the brand.

If you got this far and some of the above applies to you, I have great news! I’m teaching a free one hour workshop Saturday May 16th. If you are interested, please e-mail me at salmaspalette@gmail.com subject line: RSVP May 16th.

Happy New Year everyone! Oh yes! Finally we get to live in the Roaring 20s 😉

So we are on that New Year, New Me mood.

How about changing up your Instagram account as well?

Below are 3 tips that you can implement to make your Instagram account feel brand new and help bring in potential customers, leads and build a community.

Change account name

I know this might be such a tough one to change, but if your current screen name is Mami, too many underscores or looks like an AIM screen name, it’s time to change your screen name.

If you are a content creator or a business, really think about which screen name will instantly speak about your Instagram account.

If you are a content creator it’s okay to include your real name in your screen name. Many people think it’s “boring” to just have your name but think about all the top designers and influencers who have branded their name and created multimillionaire dollar companies out of it.

Unfollow

Instagram is a community and one that you must be social on. If you have accounts looking on your Instagram stories and never engaging with your stories or commenting/liking your newsfeed, please do yourself a favor and delete them. Your Instagram algorithm doesn’t need them in your life.

I would also unfollow accounts that you are always leaving comments and engaging with but they never return the favor.

The last category of accounts you should unfollow are ones that are not active. This is the account that hasn’t posted in over a year.

Instagram account highlights

If you have had the same highlight cover colors for more than a year, switch it up. Go on to canva.com and you can easily create highlight covers.

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Update your highlight stories as well. Add latest stories in your highlights so if a potential follower is on your account, they know you are active. When someone sees your last highlight was from 86 weeks ago why would they follow you?

Accounts follow other accounts that are active and contributing to their engagement.

If you need help building a community with a small following read this quick post here.

Here is a list of content creation tools to help you create content quicker.

The last week of November is pretty much Thanksgiving followed by non stop holiday parties and then New Years.

How the hell do you stay relevant and make sure your engagement is high during the holiday season?

Well homie, I did some research for you, and I’m sharing my tips with you below.

IG stories

Make your stories fun and show people what you’re up to. I know it’s hard to do 3-5 posts on your newsfeed a week, but stories are quick, fun and they expire after 24 hrs.

Are you going away for the Holidays? Show IG stories of yourself packing or at the airport.

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People are nosy AF so what I love doing is just taking a picture inside of the plane or show a suitcase and ask your audience where they think you’re going.

When people engage with you, your profile is staying relevant and they remember your brand or business.

Make your stories fun and show stuff that is worth showing.

If you are a cosmetics company, show behind the scenes of a product you’re coming out with.

Public content schedule

Create a schedule of how many times a week you will be posting during the Holiday season.

Let your audience know how many times you’re posting, so they come back to your profile. Everyone knows I come out with a new blog post related to business and Instagram organic growth every Monday.

It also puts pressure on you to get your sh*t done.

Valuable content

Even if you post on Instagram once a week make sure it’s worth while. The most amount of engagement I get on my Instagram profile and blog is Mondays. My audience knows I drop a juicy blog post to help them level up on their brand and business.

How to find valuable content?

I ask my audience during the week which topic they would like to see, and I create it.

Your followers are following your brand or business page for a reason. Think about your brand and everything it entails. Give your audience content they can benefit from.

Do you need help finding content ideas? Read this quick blog post here.

Value

You have to give back something to your your followers. For instance if you are a food blogger, you should be sharing much more than just pictures and videos on your page; include helpful information, like if the restaurant has vegan options, free parking or any happy hour specials. You want to be memorable and make your tribe happy, so always go the extra step in providing more information.

Nurture your current followers

Give attention to people that have already hit the follow button. Take 15 minutes of your day and comment and like their pictures. Pick 20 different people daily and reach out to them. Be genuine with your comments, and please don’t comment solely with emojis.

Follow and engage with Facebook groups in your niche

This step actually requires you to get out of Instagram and head over to Facebook. There are tons of Facebook groups ranging from mom groups, Yoga instructors, businesses, Foodie groups and etc. Join a group that is similar to your niche. Engage with posts and try to provide some value to the group.

If you are a startup soap company that specializes in eczema clearing products, do a giveaway in the Facebook group or just skim posts until you find one that you can reply to. You don’t want to be annoying and spam people. Many groups also have certain days of no self-promotions so please follow the rules.

Remember to vote on my IG stories on what topic you would like to see for next Monday’s blog post.

Read here for content ideas when you have nothing to post about.

Many people just post and wait for the likes to happen. In the words of Brittney Spears you better WERK. I understand creating that post took time but trust me you want to make sure you leave just 30 minutes after you post to ENGAGE which helps boost your post organically. Instagram will push out your post out to more people depending on how much engagement your post is receiving the first 30 mins it is live. The following steps will ensure you have boosted your post organically.

Instagram story

This is the first thing you should be doing after sharing your post. Tap the airplane icon on your post (which is found below your post). Once you tap the airplane, it gives you an option to send it in a private message or make it your story. Make sure you add the gif “tap here” So people actually tap on your story which takes them to your post. I advise adding music or an image covering your post so people are curious to see what it’s about.

Reply to your comments

I really don’t understand why some users do not reply to their comments. People are busy and they took time out of their day to write to you. Not only is it proper social media etiquette to write back, but it also boosts your engagement. If you get 15 comments on your post and you replied to each once individually then your post has quickly shot up to 30 comments. This increase in engagement will signal Instagram to boost your post further.

Like and comment in the hashtags you just used

In your post you should have already used niche hashtags. Go into at least 10 of your hashtags you used for the post and comment on 10 recent photos that have uploaded. Please make sure it is at least 4 letters and not just emojis. Going into 10 of your niches and leaving 10 comments each means you would have left 100 comments. This number might scare you but it’s possible to do this in 20 minutes. People that have recently uploaded are more likely to return the favor by either liking or commenting your photo back. If you want to learn how to engage with hashtags daily be sure to check out my 20 20 20 engagement rule that I quickly teach here.

Ask a question in the comments section

Switch it up sometimes and have your call to action (CTA) in the comments. CTA is when you direct or ask your audience something.

Analyze your data

Did you ever wonder what content is getting you followers, website clicks, who is sharing your post via story/DM, and how many people saved your post?! If you have a business profile, click the “view insights” under your post. Once you tap “view insights” swipe up to see the full insights. You can see all this info and so much more.

Analyzing your data gives you important metrics for future content, like how many people your hashtags attracted, or how many people followed you based on that post. You then want to continuously post content and use hashtags that bring the most engagement in.

Instagram post answer: You can’t view who exactly shared your post in a DM/Story. You can breathe again 😂

Feel free to shoot me a DM if you have any questions regarding your growth on social media.