When you are using social media for marketing purposes, it is important to know how it is working and the ways in which you can optimise the results. This is where performing an Instagram audit helps you. But what is an Instagram audit? And how can you perform it for your business or for your client’s business?
Let’s have a look at it, shall we?
What Is an Instagram Audit?
An Instagram audit is a process of analysing a business’s Instagram account to review how the current strategy is working and what needs to be changed to improve the engagement and Instagram presence that will help the business’s online growth.
Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms and if used correctly it can double the profits, to say the least. And to use it correctly, conducting a successful audit becomes crucial.
Why Do You Need to Perform An Instagram Audit?
By performing a detailed Instagram audit, a business can find out ways in which they can increase their online presence the right way.
Social media marketing, if you know, isn’t only about posting consistently on social media. Similarly, posting aesthetically pleasing content on Instagram regularly is not all you need to do to grow your business.
A lot goes behind creating a strategy that will help in creating relevant content that will attract the right audience, and prove to be beneficial for the business and its Instagram account.
Performing an Instagram audit helps in creating that strategy. A strategy that is perfect for the business at hand.
Read more: 8 Important Social Media Marketing Skills You Need To Succeed In 2022
10 Easy Steps to Perform a Quick Instagram Audit
Usually, businesses hire social media managers and marketers who are responsible for performing Instagram audits for them. If you are a social media manager or marketer, or you are running a small business online and would like to do an Instagram audit by yourself, here are the steps that you need to follow to have a successful audit.
PS: You can get paid anywhere between INR 5000 and INR 10,000 for performing Instagram audits. To make this your profession or side hustle, learn more about Instagram management as a side hustle.
- Set Your Marketing Goals
Before starting with social media marketing, there must have been some goals and expectations from the social media platforms that would benefit the business. Identify or reidentify those goals and see if the Instagram goals and expectations of the business complement the original goals of the business. The goal may not be exactly the same but there will be notable strings attached and these strings will help you analyse if the content published or scheduled is relevant to the business goals or not.
Spoiler alert, the content published on Instagram or any other social media platform should ALWAYS be relevant to the business and its goals.
- Optimise Your Profile
Your profile, on Instagram, is everything above the post section. This includes your username, name, profile picture, bio, category, hyperlink, and story highlights.
Your username and your account name should be your business name.
Your profile picture can be your business logo or something that clearly defines your business.
Your bio should define what your business is all about in limited words. Instagram bio for your business is a copy that needs to be informative, precise, and clear. Make sure it meets all the requirements.
Your hyperlink should lead the audience to your business website, landing page, or the page that you are using as your CTA.
Finally, your story highlights should be relevant to your business and services. They should have a proper name and cover picture that goes with the category as well as the aesthetics of your account.
- Know Your Audience
Millions and billions of people use Instagram. There is no chance all these people can benefit from your business and service. You need to find your target audience. An audience who will benefit the most from your business and that shall be willing to pay for your services. Define your target audience according to their gender, age, demographics, location, and interests. This will help you in creating content that is informative and engaging for your audience. More targeted content will ensure better engagement.
- Review Your Content
Now, after identifying your target audience, it’s time to review your content and see if what you have already posted and intend to post is relevant to your audience or not. Take note of everything when it comes to reviewing your content.
- Are the posts pleasing and engaging?
- Have you posted every type of content? (video, carousels, reels, pictures, and infographics)
- Does your overall feed look aesthetically pleasing?
- Can a person who comes across your account for the first time understand what your business is about without having to scroll through each and every post?
The answer to all these questions should be a yes. Otherwise, it’s time to start working on it.
- Audit Your Content Strategy
Again, in order to post content that converts your audience into leads and attracts the right audience to your Instagram account, you need to have an effective content strategy. Even for Instagram, you need to have a content strategy so that you offer value to your followers and create a better-looking feed for your account.
The content you post should be inclusive of every type of content that can be posted on Instagram and can get you better results. For instance, reels are trending these days and no matter how cringy or irrelevant you find them, their chances of attracting a relevant audience are way higher than a picture post going viral. Similarly, carousel content works better than IGTV videos at times.
Create a content strategy that works best for the business you are handling and make sure you use all the Instagram features for better results and engagement.
- Evaluate Your Captions and Hashtag Strategy
Instagram captions are as important as the main picture. Captions can help you drive your target audience to the CTA and convert the traffic into customers. Your captions, apart from being relevant to the post, should always have a clear CTA so that they can lead the audience in the right direction.
Similarly, hashtags play a significant role in social media marketing. You need to make sure that your business is using the right hashtags for attracting the audience. Of course, there are hashtags that work better than other hashtags but they may not be relevant to your business. They might increase your followers or engagement but these numbers are absolutely useless if they are not interested in your business and services. Target hashtags that work well in your industry and are relevant to your business. This way you will reach the right audience and get positive results which will not only benefit your Instagram but your business as well.
- Check Your Engagement Strategy
Apart from creating and posting content, Instagram is also about engaging with people.
Be it replying to comments and direct messages of your followers or starting a conversation with people and brands that are relevant to your business, you need to engage with people from your business account so that you can reach out to more people and connect with the existing community.
Check if you are already engaging with the right accounts or not. If not, conduct research and find out Instagram accounts that are relevant to your business (but not your competitors) and start engaging with them.
Your potential followers and customers, and Instagram influencers who are covering industries similar to your business are the ideal people you should be engaging with.
- Review Your Posting Schedule
It has been told over and over again that there is a right and wrong time to post on Instagram. While there are several stats and surveys available online that can tell you which is the right time to post on Instagram, conducting your own research and posting according to that will benefit you the most.
Check the Instagram metrics and analytics to find out when your audience is most active and post accordingly.
A post is bound to do better if it gets decent engagement as soon as it is posted. That is why it is also recommended to engage with comments within the first hour of posting.
- Remove Fake Followers
You have optimised almost everything and you are about to complete your Instagram audit. But wait! What if we tell you that the reason your posts are not doing well is that you have a high number of followers out of which a significant number never engage with your content?
Of course, it makes a difference. This is why people keep suggesting don’t focus on the number of followers but on your reach.
You may not have bought fake followers but fake accounts follow business accounts which affects their engagement and reach.
You need to remove these followers from your account. Sure, this may reduce your number of followers but what even is the point of having followers who aren’t going to pay for your services or take action in your favour? Have a limited number of followers but real so that you can make a profit.
Accounts that have a complicated username, no profile picture, zero posts, and an exceptionally high number of following are usually fake. Remove them, or block them if you please.
- Monitor Your Analytics
Finally, it’s time to monitor the account analytics that is available on Instagram. See which posts have received the most engagement.
This will help you identify what your audience is most interested in and what kind of content you should be creating in the future.
You can also find out the type of audience that is most interested in your content. Instagram gives you the data of which gender and age group is mostly consuming your content. You can, again, create content accordingly.
Also, check how different social media platforms are directing traffic to your website. This will help you find out which platform is working best for your business website and where you need to shift your focus.
Parting Words
Performing an Instagram audit has always been a vital step in creating an Instagram account for a business. Every business requires a detailed Instagram audit that will help them strategise their Instagram content in a way that will attract the right audience and convert the traffic into leads.
While people choose to avoid this crucial step, it is highly unlikely that a business will omit it.
If you are running a business, understand that performing an Instagram audit regularly is very important for your business account.
And if you are a social media manager or marketer, simply knowing how to conduct a successful Instagram audit can get you high-ticket clients pretty easily.
If you are neither of the two but wish to make money by performing audits for businesses, we have a course for you. Our Six Figure SMM Formula course will teach you how to become a social media manager for other businesses and earn a good income every month by literally spending time on social media apps!
