How to Perform an Instagram Audit in 3 Easy Steps
One thing I’ve come to realize in life, is before you can get anywhere, you’ve really got to stop and take a look at where you are now. Only then can you make adjustments and ultimately reach your goals. This is true in all other aspects of life so why shouldn’t it apply in social media too?
Today we’re talking about an Instagram audit; what it is, why you should do one and how to get it done in 3 easy steps. An Instagram audit is a good hard look at your profile; Does it have all the necessary components, is it optimized, and does the overall look and feel of your account fit with your goals and brand message? Let’s break it down step by step and get this audit underway.
Step 1: Where do you want to go?
Since you’re reading this article, I’m going to assume that you’re trying to grow your instagram account and if thats for business purposes you’ll especially want to make sure that what you’re putting out there fits with your company’s purpose.
Step 2: Does it have all the necessary components and is it optimized?
Username: Your username should be the same as your brand name and should be the same across all platforms. If you can’t get the same name across all platforms you’ll want to make them as similar as possible so it’s easy to to recognize the brand across all platforms. You’ll also want to leave out periods, underscores and cutsey spellings. You don’t want to make it complicated to find you.
Profile Photo: Your profile photo should be a clear photo of you or your brand logo if you’re a large corporation. Generally speaking a close up photo fo you is best since it’s easier for someone to connect with a face rather than a logo.
Bio: Your Bio, just like your username should be as consistent as possible across platforms. You’ve only got 155 characters so you’ll not only have to be strategic, you’ll also have to get straight to the point. This isn’t the time for wordy descriptions, let the people know exactly what you’re about.
Link: You only get 1 link so you’ve got to to make it count. Once someone finds you on Instagram, where should they go next? There are so many different things you can do with this and unless you’re able to stay on top of this and keep it current you’ll want to stick with your website URL.
Step 3: The overall look and feel of your account
Your instagram feed should provide a glimpse of who you are as a brand and company and what followers can expect of you content wise. For example: If you’re a fitness brand, you’ll probably want to exclude cakes, pies and ice cream from your content. If you’re a clothing brand, you’ll want to make sure the photos are of your company’s clothing and that it’s done in natural “non-salesy” way. If you’re a lifestyle brand and cover various topics, you’ll want to have a balance of all those topics. Additionally, you’ll want to examine your feed really take notice of whether or not some pictures extremely edited and others not so much? Either pick one side of that fence to stick with or make sure they’re well balanced so your followers aren’t caught off guard. The biggest thing you need to remember in this step is that from the colors you’re using to the style of photography and everything in between, the overall look and feel of your account must be cohesive since you get a very short amount of time to grab someones attention and get them to engage.
Performing an audit is essential to the growth of your account and should be done every quarter just to make sure things are going as they should be. So there you have it, 3 easy steps to audit your Instagram account today.
Hey there I’m Kylie Simao, owner of a boutique social media marketing agency dedicated to helping new, local and small businesses who want to promote themselves online using social media.