Instagram

Hacks
A step-by-step guide to viral posting

Even if you don't have thousands of followers

Nicole Yakobi - @boostingbee

 What Constitutes As A Viral Post?
The thing about viral posting is that there is not a certain number tied
to what is considered a viral post .

20,000 likes don’t mean that the post is viral, nor does 100,000 views.
In fact, the urban dictionary definition of viral is simply an image,
video, or link that spreads rapidly through a population by being
frequently shared with a number of individuals .

The key word we are going to focus on is shared.

Viral means shareable. If you have a post that is shareable, likes and
comments will naturally follow.

The other way I personally like to define viral is a post that reache s
over 90% of accounts that weren’t previously following you. This i s
something you can see at the bottom of your ‘View Insights’ on an y
post. That is assuming you are a business account which I recommend
to anyone that is taking Instagram seriously .

Think about how many more followers you can gain if that large
percentage of people, that weren’t previously following you, see you r
posts...

Getting a post to go viral may take multiple attempts but either way
these strategies will help your post go further then it previously would
have anyways.
 Research

The first phase of viral posting is research:

A. Decide what type of post you want to do

(motivational, educational, etc.)
B. Research Hashtags that would go hand in hand with this
type of post.

Method 1: Find large accounts in your niche that have content in line
with yours. Go through their most successful posts and write a list of
hashtags they use that are relatable to your posts and are ideally
between 50k and 2M total posts.

Method 2: Use a professional hashtag generator like Flick. This is a

website that offers a free 7-day trial and different monthly payment
levels up to $30/month. The good news is that you can typical ly do all
the research you need to do within 7 days and then cancel the service
but it can be a valuable tool to have in the future, especially if you are
running accounts for clients in different markets and are always needing
to do new research.
 Research

For the sake of this study, I have used Flick to gain insight on doing a

viral post on my @boostingbee Instagram page.

The first step is to enter a root hashtag that you feel is most relevant

to what you’re posting, and your target audience would likely fo llow. I
chose #instagrammarketing.

Then i set the limit to 30 hashtags. maximum total posts to 2 million,

and minimum average likes to 1000.

Posts with an average of 1000 likes and less than 2 million posts means
high followers but low competition.
 Research
1. This generated me 12 tags that fit this criterion. Since that search
criteria couldn't find me 30 hashtags, I clicked on the most relevant tag

(#instagramexpert) and clicked expand (magnifying glass button).

2. I used the same criteria as before but this time with a max of 10
hashtags to be displayed. This generated me 8 hashtags, which brought
me to 30 however, some of the tags weren't relevant.

For instance, one of them was #verifiedaccount. As I don’t think th at’s a

tag people would follow, it likely has a high average likes per post
because of big verified accounts are who’s posting with that tag.

3. I repeated step 2 with the hashtag #growthhacks and expanded to get

10 more tags. I selected the best 30 and then copy/pasted those into a
list to send to myself.

4. You can repeat this process with every type of post you do (i.e.
instagram tips, motivational quotes, blogs).
 Research
C. Model what's already working. Model already trending posts on the
hashtag that you would like to use. This can be done by Flick or by
simply viewing the top posts on the hashtag page.

These are the three top trending posts on #instagrammarketing, that I

thought worth studying to find common patterns.
Similar Patterns: Happy people, text talks to users directly (“YOU”), 4:5
vertical crop ratio, high definition, lighter images, white text,

uplifting caption, attractive characters, hashtags in the

caption, account handle tagged in caption, beautiful background.

Although not all of these things may be necessary, they are at least

commonalities and all things that I will do in my initial post recreations.

 Content Strategy

- 4:5 vertical crop ratio has a much higher chance to trend than square
or horizontal images. Instagram prefers it in their algorithm, and it takes
up the maximum amount of screen on the feed, so users are most likely
to stop and see it.

- The shot should be as High Definition as possible.

- It can certainly be a photo, but carousel or video posts can be easier to

get to trend.

- Have multiple likable components - The post should have many reasons
why someone could ‘Like’ it. In the case of a

motivational quote, posts with a background of a successful person as

well as a cool quote are more likely to trend than just a quote on a black
background.

If you are a travel influencer, your most engaged photos are

probably the ones where you and the background both look good. Your
caption is another likable component. The last major component is your
account reputation as a whole. If you have provided value to others and
have been active at creating relationships with your followers, some of
them will like the post just because they like you and what you stand
for.
 Content Strategy

- Invoke emotion to engage people on a different level that motivates

them to share it with others. These are the most common emotions in
viral posts.

- Humor is the most obvious. Humor in your actual content will trend
much better than just having humor i n your caption.

- People being kind to one another like when a child gives money to a

homeless person or a biker helping an old woman across the road.

- Inspiring the person that they can and will accomplish what they want
to in life.
 Execution
Posting times is going to matter a lot and is a subjective to what type of content
you are posting and where your followers are from.

1. View insights for the day you are looking to post:

I'll post the post respective of the best time for the U.S.

That is still at a time where people in other countries are still awake.

So, for me, the best time to post on Monday is during the day between 6am -
12pm. Because you want to post it shortly before your mass of followers comes on.

2. Make your post with a caption that fits the desired result that you're trying to
achieve for your audience. Have hashtags ready immediately at the time it is
posted.

3. Geotag an area near you that people would likely follow.

 Execution

4. Tagging 15 accounts is not a bad idea. The only con is that if you do it
too often you can annoy people. But if you tag relevant accounts that
you think would identify with your post, it can be an easy way to gain
some extra likes.

5. Reply back to all comments using 4 or more words. You can even ask
them a question, so they are likely to comment back again.

6. If you are in an Engagement Group, notify them of your new posts.

This is just to gain a few extra likes and comments, but the engagement
in the first hour counts the most for it to trend.

100 likes in the first hour typically gets over 1000 total likes.

7. Your content should be cool enough to spark likes and comments and
be shared naturally, but if you would like to add an extra component to
help do so, you can do a call to action.

Such as: "Tag a friend that ___".

Notice how i don't just say "Tag a friend". It just won't generate them to
tag targeted friends.

If for example, you are posting a motivational post, you could say "Tag
your most motivated friends".
 Execution

8. Create a story post that drives traffic to your regular post

immediately after posting.

9. Repeat this process until successfully making tweaks to the content,

caption and hashtags. If the content is what it should be, selecting the
proper hashtags is going to be the name of the game.

Conclusion
Thank you so much for investing some

time to read this eBook :)

If you would like to learn more about Instagram, feel free to visit my IG page
@boostingbee for more tips & strategies.

And by the way, the best thing that you can use for engagement, is the EXM –
executive mafia engagement group.

They have helped me to get onto the explore page with every post 👇

https://executivemafia.com/?ref=SW9554
And if you want me to teach you everything I know about Instagram, and all my
strategies that I used to make $5K/month

(With less than 2000 followers)

DM me on Instagram for a coaching call via Skype :)

Thank уou!