How To Promote Your Instagram Profile (Beginner’s Guide)
Welcome to our beginner’s guide on how to promote your Instagram.
In this post, we’ll share 18 actionable tips that will help you to get your Instagram profile in front of a wider audience so that you can grow your followers fast.
We’ve included a mix of powerful strategies to promote your profile both inside Instagram and through external platforms and marketing channels.
#1 – Cross-post to other social platforms
One of the best ways to promote your Instagram is by cross-posting your content to other social media platforms, and then linking back to your Insta profile.
First, make sure you’ve added your Instagram profile link to all the other social networks you’re active on: Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, Pinterest, etc.
Then, start repurposing your Instagram posts so that you can share them on other platforms to maximize your reach.
For example, you could take your Instagram reels and upload them to other short-form video apps like TikTok and YouTube Shorts. And you can take your image posts, edit them to change the dimensions, and then reshare them on Pinterest and Facebook.
For best results, include a CTA in the caption of all the posts you share on your other socials asking viewers to check out your Instagram profile.
Top tip: Instagram scheduling tools can help to speed up the cross-posting process. You can use SocialBee to create, customize, and schedule posts for each social network from one unified dashboard. Plus, generate unique captions each time using AI, curate content ideas, analyze growth, and more.
#2 – Run a social media giveaway
Social media giveaways are one of the most powerful yet underrated ways to promote your Instagram profile.
Here’s how it works. First, sign up for SweepWidget or a similar social media contest tool.
Then, use SweepWidget to create a giveaway. Choose a prize (if you’re a brand, this could be a bundle of freebie products or a free subscription) and set ‘follow me on Instagram’ as the entry requirement. This will ensure that users have to visit your Instagram profile and follow you in order to stand a chance of winning.
You could also consider offering additional entries to users who follow your Instagram profile and share the giveaway with a friend. This will help improve the contest’s virality and reach.
You’ll need to host the giveaway on a landing page on your website. Then, promote it on all your socials to get the ball rolling.
Here’s an example of a successful promotional giveaway by MOB Kitchen in partnership with Pret A Manger:
They offered a year’s worth of free Pret coffee subscriptions and gift cards as the prize, and required entrants to tag a friend and follow both @mobkitchen and @pret. The giveaway was a huge success and bagged both brands tens of thousands of new followers.
Related reading:
#3 – Pay to promote your posts on Instagram
If you’re willing to spend some money on your Instagram promotion, you can pay to boost your posts so that they reach more users.
Boosting your feed posts turns them into Instagram ads. These ads are then displayed in the Instagram feeds of your target audience, even if they don’t already follow you.
To boost your posts, you’ll first need to make sure you have a business account. If not, you can convert your profile to a business account through your profile settings.
Once you’ve done that, go to your profile and tap the post you’d like to boost from your mobile device, then click Boost.
You’ll need to choose a Goal (what you’re trying to achieve), Audience (the people you want to reach), and Budget (how much you’d like to spend daily). After you’ve finished creating your ad, it’ll run for the duration you set or until your budget is depleted.
#4 – Promote your Instagram profile on your website
If you already have a website, you can use it as a vehicle to promote your Instagram account.
At a minimum, you should make sure you’ve added social icons to your website that link to your Instagram and other social handles. Don’t bury these icons in the footer where nobody will ever see them—make sure they’re clearly visible above the fold.
If you want to take things further, you could try sharing your Instagram posts and brand hashtags on your site.
For example, if you have an ecommerce store, you could have a dedicated page for ‘Instagram inspiration’ where you embed posts from Instagram that showcase your products.
Or, you could publish blog posts that drive organic traffic to your site, and promote your Instagram within your blog content.
You could even build a website pop-up or alert bar with a tool like Leadpages that asks your site visitors to check out your Instagram. For best results, include a CTA in the popup that offers some sort of incentive, like ‘follow us on Instagram for 20% off your next order’.
If you don’t have an existing website, check out our guide on how to start a blog to learn how to create one.
#5 – Promote your Instagram profile via email
Email is another great channel to promote your Instagram.
If you already have an email list that you regularly send marketing emails to, add your social icons in the footer or email signature.
You can also start sending out emails that directly promote your profile. For example, you could send out an email that features some of your best-performing Instagram posts and links back to your profile.
Or if you’re running an Instagram giveaway or UGC contest (see tip #3), embed it in your emails and share it with your subscribers.
If you don’t have an existing email list, start building one. You’ll need email marketing software (we’d recommend MailerLite) to build opt-in forms, manage your subscribers, and set up automated campaigns. You can then embed your opt-in forms on your website to collect subscribers.
#6 – Run a blogger outreach campaign
Often, when people are looking for new Instagram accounts to follow, they’ll search Google.
For example, if you’re looking for some visual inspiration for your home, you might Google ‘Best Instagram accounts for interior design’.
Or if you’re into minimalist fashion, you might search for something like ‘best minimal fashion Instagrammers’.
There are lots of blog posts out there that rank for these kinds of keywords. And if you can get your Instagram profile featured in blog posts like these, it can bring you a ton of exposure.
So how do you get featured in these Instagram-related blog posts? Through blogger outreach, of course!
The idea is to compile a list of bloggers that have published posts that you want your profile to be featured on, grab their contact information, and then send an outreach email to each of them asking if they can add a link to your profile to their post.
If they reply, fantastic! If not, you can follow up with another message a few days later to give them a nudge.
Blogger outreach tools like BuzzStream can help to automate and streamline this process.
We’d also recommend checking out Adam Connell’s guide to creating pitches that convert.
#7 – Promote your Instagram profile on Reddit
Reddit is a massively underutilized channel for promoting your Instagram. If you get it right, you can use Reddit to get hundreds—or even thousands—of new followers totally organically.
The idea is to join a bunch of subreddits that are related to your niche, participate in the conversation on those groups, and subtly lead people back to your Instagram account.
For example, let’s say your Instagram is all about vintage fashion. The kind of people that might be interested in following you probably hang around on subreddits like r/vintagefashion, r/vintageclothing, r/thriftstorehauls, r/thrifting, etc.
So first, you’ll join those groups and read the rules. Then, you’ll start leaving comments in threads and generally being an active member of the community.
Gradually, you might start sharing content from your Instagram in your Reddit posts.
You won’t be able to link to your Instagram profile directly from these posts (self-promotion is against the rules of Reddit and is likely to get you banned) but you can indirectly lead people back to your profile by adding a link to your IG in your Reddit profile bio or flair.
#8 – Create share-worthy content
The best way to reach more Instagram users organically is to create content that people want to share. Here’s why.
Let’s say you create a post that’s so great that 10 of your followers share it in their stories. Now let’s imagine that each of those story posts reaches 50 people that don’t already follow you.
Already, your post has reached 500 people that otherwise wouldn’t have seen it. But wait—it doesn’t end there. Let’s imagine that 5% of those 500 people share it with their followers. That’s 25 more shares, which gets it in front of 1,250 more people.
And the same thing could happen again and again, until your post has gone totally viral and reached millions of people, promoting your profile far and wide.
The kind of posts that tend to get the most shares are those that are funny or relatable, like meme content, so make sure to incorporate these types of posts into your content mix.
For example, Instagrammer @cancerdestructionclub regularly shares funny memes that cancer patients find relatable. As a result, they get dozens of shares on almost every post.
#9 – Post consistently
Another top tip to maximize your reach within Instagram is to post consistently.
Posting consistently strengthens your brands, improves your reach, and boosts engagement. Your audience/followers will know what to expect from you, so they’ll be more likely to see your posts and like, comment, and share them when they go live.
This, in turn, helps to convince the Instagram algorithm that you’re producing content that people enjoy, which can increase your visibility in the app and make it easier for new followers to discover your profile.
We’ve already touched upon social media scheduling tools already. These can help you a lot with maintaining consistency. SocialBee, Sendible, Pallyy, Metricool, etc. You can’t go wrong with any of them.
The important part is that you at least have some tool that makes it easy to schedule posts to Instagram (and other social networks) so you can maintain consistency without having to be chained to IG every hour of the day.
You’ll be able to publish fresh content on/at the same days/times every week. All whilst you’re doing something else.
For further reading, you may want to check out our comparison of social media scheduling tools.
#10 – Experiment with posting times
While consistency is important, it’s also worth experimenting with posting times to figure out the best time to post on Instagram if you want to maximize reach and engagement.
Depending on who your target audience is, you may have more success posting at specific times of day and days of the week than others.
For example, if your Instagram is promoting a B2B product and targeted at professionals, your audience may be more likely to engage with your posts during office hours.
If you’re targeting regular consumers, they may be more active during evenings and weekends in their local time zone.
Look at your Instagram analytics to see when your posts get the most engagements/views, then use this to inform your posting schedule so that your posts are always going live at the best possible time.
#11 – Experiment with new content types
Try to include a good mix of content on your Instagram profile and experiment with new content types to see what works.
For example, try posting a mix of Instagram feed posts, Instagram Stories, Reels, Carousels, and Live Videos. This can help you to reach new audiences and tap into all of Instagram’s discovery features for maximum exposure.
If you notice a particular type of content is bringing you lots of views/engagements/followers, double down on that type.
For example, when Instagram first released its Reels feature, creators noticed that their Reels posts would get tons more views and engagement compared to other types of posts as Instagram was focusing heavily on promoting short-form video content at the time.
#12 – Use the right hashtags
Hashtags are an essential tool for promoting your profile on Instagram. They’re used to categorize content and increase its discoverability.
By including popular hashtags in your Instagram post captions and profile bio, you’ll make it easier for your target audience to find you through Instagram’s discovery features.
There’s an art to using hashtags effectively, so make sure you check out our in-depth Instagram hashtag guide to learn the ropes.
#13 – Promote your Instagram profile in real life
When most people think about promoting their Instagram profile, they think exclusively in terms of digital channels. But it’s also possible to promote your Instagram offline.
For example, you could print business cards that feature your Instagram handle and hand them out at events.
Or if you have a business premise, you could create an Instagram photo spot/booth and invite visitors to the premises to take snaps and tag your brand’s profile when they share them.
If you want to get really creative, you could even have a t-shirt printed that features your Instagram handle to turn yourself into a walking billboard, or add a sticker to your car, etc.
#14 – Collaborate with other influencers
Influencer collaborations are great for promotion, particularly if you can score a collab with another influencer that has a larger following than your own.
The reason they are so useful is that they can help you to get your content seen by a totally new audience. Also, if Instagram users associate you with a profile they already follow and like, they’ll be more likely to follow your profile too in order to support that creator.
One of the most famous collaborations on Instagram is between Meghan Trainor and Chris Olsen.
The pair were independently famous and decided to create a viral reel when they first met. They both saw a huge increase in followers thanks to the collab, and they now create reels and content together regularly.
#15 – Interact with your audience
Building a community and interacting with your audience is one of the best ways to promote your page and increase your reach on Instagram.
If your followers feel like they are a part of your community and they can chat and engage with you personally, they are much more likely to take actions that support and promote your profile.
For example, if you are sharing news with your followers, or you’re running a competition or giveaway, your followers will be more likely to share it to their own story or save it in order to support you if they feel personally connected to you as an influencer.
So be sure to like comments from your followers, and where possible, interact with them, ask them questions, and generally get to know your followers as much as possible.
#16 – Engage with likely followers
A great way to promote your profile to Instagram users is to find likely followers in your niche and interact with them. To do this, search for similar accounts to your own, and competitor accounts.
Once you’ve found a selection of good accounts in your niche, simply start engaging with their followers in the comments sections of their posts. You can follow them in the hope of a follow back, or just chat with them and like their comments in the hope that they will notice your profile and take an interest.
When trying to grow your following, it’s much more beneficial to follow average users that are following similar accounts than it is to follow other influencers.
The reason for this is that they’re much more likely to see that you have followed them and follow back than a large influencer is, as they get fewer notifications daily. Also, if they’re already engaging with content like yours from other creators, then they’re likely to have an interest in your content too.
#17 – Sign up for influencer agencies or marketplaces
If you have a decent-sized following already, and you’re keen to promote your Instagram profile to brands who may want to partner with you, then a good way to do this is to sign up for an influencer agency or marketplace.
When you sign up, you’ll usually be asked to fill out a profile that can be shared with brands that are looking for influencers to work with for their marketing campaigns
There are tons of different agencies and marketplaces to choose from, but some popular options include ViralNation and Neoreach.
Once your profile is live, companies will be able to view it and reach out to you or your social manager if they have any campaigns that they think you might be a good fit for.
#18 – Leverage trends
Staying on top of the current Instagram trends is a great way to ensure that you promote your profile as much as possible. One of the best ways to promote your profile and reach new audiences is to share reels using trending audio, filters, and more.
When using trending audio clips, Instagram will push your video clips to the Reels feed of more users, so they’re likely to reach more viewers than the average video post will.
This tactic also works for feed posts too.
Final thoughts
That concludes our complete guide on how to promote your Instagram profile.
We hope you found these tips helpful. But remember: The most important thing you can do to be successful on Instagram is to consistently create great content.
All of the promotional strategies we’ve looked at so far can help you to reach a wider audience, but it’s the quality of your content that’s going to determine whether the people you reach stick around and turn into long-term followers.
For more advice on how to be successful on Instagram, check out these posts:
- 30+ Instagram Tips, Features & Hacks To Grow Your Audience & Save Time
- How To Make Money On Instagram: 9 Ways To Profit
- 16 Best Instagram Tools To Grow Your Profile
- The Best Instagram Link In Bio Tools Compared
- How Many Instagram Followers Do You Need To Make Money?
Good luck!
