Over the past several years, businesses have started to flock to Instagram to add to their repertoire of social media marketing campaigns. In late 2017, Instagram reported that 25 million companies used their platform, an increase of 15 million compared to just a few months prior to the report. This dramatic and ongoing increase means that Instagram is teeming with businesses all vying for followers, likes, and engagement. Unfortunately, as people are spread thinner and thinner amongst the companies they follow, engagement and organic reach decline. Instagram influencers and businesses need new tactics to maintain high engagement levels.

Trust Insight just released a new reporton declining engagement. Nearly 4,000 brand profiles were analyzed, and the compiled average engagement rate shows a gradual decline from January 2019 to July 2019. As mentioned, this decline seemed inevitable, but it is something for digital marketers to keep an eye on in the coming months and years.

One of the biggest issues with lower engagement is less organic reach. Businesses and influencers are struggling to fight through the floods of Instagram posts to reach their target market. The fear is that Instagram will soon mimic Facebook in its methods of delivering a business’s content to consumers: paid ads. Luckily for us digital marketers, the decline is gradual so we still have plenty of time before we should jump ship from Instagram. Just because organic reach and consumer engagement are harder to get doesn’t mean it is impossible to get. Consider using these tips to boost engagement on Instagram.

1. Create visually appealing posts: People join Instagram to look at images and short videos. It’s your job to give them what they want. Brush up on your graphic design and photography skills and create posts that jump off the screen and get consumers to stop scrolling. There are countless websites and programs available to edit photos, create designs, and provide images that will all make your posts stand out.

2. Make sure your content is easy to engage with: Engagement is about so much more than just likes these days. You want people to tag friends, share your post, comment, and answer polls. Instagram marketing allows you to accomplish all of these things. In your captions, consider asking a question for your followers to answer. You can also remind people to check-in and post photos when they visit your business. With increasingly popular Instagram stories, you can include question stickers or set up a poll that viewers can answer with just a tap. Depending on your type of business, you can also opt to set up contests or giveaways that require tagging a friend to be entered. Not only are you getting engagement, but you may also end up with some new followers!

3. Post user-generated content (UGC): If you are tagged in photos posted by your clients or receive good reviews, don’t hesitate to use them in your own posts (giving credit to the original poster of course). According to a study by Social Media Lab, posts with user-generated content have 6.9x higher engagement rates than typical posts from the brand. If UGC is something you’re very interested in pursuing, consider creating a hashtag for followers to use in posts that they want you to see and share. This makes it easier to see all of the content you have to choose from and can create a following within the hashtag itself. Never underestimate the power of the consumer. With UGC, you can use that power to your advantage and increase your engagements.

These are just a few tips to help you avoid losing engagement. At the end of the day, there really is a lot involved in becoming an Insta-Awesome Business .Here at BusySeed, social media is our job. We’ll take care of your digital marketing for you so that you can focus on your business. We may not have written down all of our tips here, but we certainly use them to help your follower count grow and your business succeed. If running your company’s social media marketing seems too daunting or time-consuming, give us a call at 888-353-1484 and we’ll be happy to see how we can help you.