Did you know Instagram has over 100 million users? This is why it can be an essential part of every business, especially Real Estate.
"I'm doing Fine without it."
Well that may be, but why limit yourself? You're missing out on an entire traffic funnel. Don't sit back and let your competition capitalize on that.
Not only can you leverage it to promote your listings, but you can use it to showcase how you do your business as well.
Growing your audience can be tough, but if you want to increase your online presence, here's what you need to do.
Connect your Instagram and Facebook accounts
This one is obvious. 20% of all users on Instagram are also on Facebook.
When you connect your two accounts to each other, your Facebook friends will notice it and start following you on Instagram as well. On average, 3% of your Facebook friends will start following you on Instagram. If you happen to post a status update on Facebook asking people to follow you on Instagram, that number can increase to just under 5%. Doesn't seem like much, but remember everything adds up.
Research and use popular Hashtags
Similar to Twitter (and Facebook now too), Instagram favors certain tags over others. If you use these hashtags on your photos, they are more likely to be discovered by other users.
Here are the top 20 tags for Real Estate on Instagram:
- #realty
- #brokerage
- #realestate
- #listing
- #greatvalue
- #Realtors
- #NAR
- #luxuryrealestate
- #mansion
- #foreclosure
- #househunting
- #makememove
- #luxuryliving
- #homegoals
- #housegoals
- #investmentproperty
- #emptynest
- #broker
- #realestateagent
- #locationlocationlocation
Make Things Pretty
If you don't have good content, you simply will not have a strong audience. You have to make your images appealing to your followers. Utilizing many of the filters or by editing your photos can really help with this. No Filter can be good at times too for really stunning professional looking photos.
Top Filters
- No Filter
- Earlybird
- X-Proll
- Hefe
- Rise
- Valencia
- Amaro
- Brannan
- Lomo-fi
- Hudson
Engage with Users
Engaging with other users is the key to getting more likes and comments. Before you do begin engagement, understand that liking comes a lot easier than commenting. Every second people create 575 new likes versus 81 comments.
So, if you take the time to comment on someone else’s profile, that person is more likely to come back to yours. People will not only comment on your photo if you comment on theirs, but they are 401% more likely to follow you in this case.
LIKE LIKE LIKE
On average for every 100 likes on random photos of other users that aren't followed by you will generate around 20-22 likes on photos and 5-10 more followers than if you wouldn't have done anything. That doesn't even count following people back.
Liking random photos will not only increase your number of followers, but it will also increase the amount of likes on each photo from people that are friends of your followers.
This could account for 30-40% of all the likes and comments on your photos.
Timing DOES Matter
According to Hubspot Blog, on average, here are the best times to post on Instagram during the week: Note that the suggested times are in Pacific Standard Time
- Sunday: 8 AM – 12 PM PST
- Monday: 8 AM – 3 PM PST
- Tuesday: 3 AM, 7 AM – 4 PM PST
- Wednesday: 3 AM, 9 AM, 1 PM PST
- Thursday: 3 AM, 9 AM, 1 – 4 PM PST
- Friday: 3 AM, 7 AM – 2 PM PST
- Saturday: 9 AM PST
Some Content Works Better than Others
Typically speaking, images that are about lifestyle (cars, homes, living a luxurious life, etc.) or that are personal (like your business) tend to get the most engagement. Photos that don’t contain either of those two elements simply do not get as much engagement.
Conclusion
If you want to grow your account by a few hundred followers a day, it will take some work. This can be a tedious task, but it works really well.
One unfortunate issue that can not be avoided with this method, is that a good 10-15% of your followers are most likely bots and/or fake.
If you follow the suggestions above, you’ll maximize your engagement faster than if you just shared your shots randomly
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