The first of the month is a great time to check your Instagram Insights to see if your posts are helping you meet your goals! Likes are not everything, and I hope you don’t focus on that.
Your insights will tell you which posts resonate with your audience, and which ones don’t. I challenge you to take 15 minutes to look at your insights. You’ll find out which post was your most popular, which posts had hashtags that helped you reach more people, and which posts had the most engagement! Of course, you can also see posts that have fallen flat.
Here are 4 questions that will give you insight about the posts you’re sharing on Instagram.
1. Which of your posts was shown to the most people?
- Click on your picture on the bottom right to get to your bio page
- Click on insights (middle of the page right below edit profile)
- Change the date range to last 30 days (top left)
- Click update on the top right
- Scroll down to the “Content You Shared” Section.
- Click the right arrow on the line that says posts
- My screen defaulted to: any posts, show the reach, for the past year. Change the date range to 30 days.
This view will update immediately and shows which of your posts was shown to the most people in the last 30 days! I was surprised at mine — were you?
**Important to note: Do not gauge success of your IG strategy on this number alone. This simply tells you which post was shown to the most people based on the IG algorithms. The actual # for reach should be put in context by how many followers you have, how consistent were your posts, and what was your most popular post the month prior.
2. Which of my IG posts had the most engagement?
- Click on your picture on the bottom right to get to your bio page
- Click on insights (middle of the page right below edit profile)
- Find the Content You Shared section and click on the right arrow by the number of posts.
- Change your Time Range to Last 30 days.
- Change the middle drop down to “Post Interactions”.
**Once again, it’s important to look at these stats in context and not get discouraged by small numbers. Scan the numbers, look at which posts had engagement, and which ones didn’t, and try to determine what posts are resonating with your audience. Time also plays a factor here — it’s likely that the ones you posted earlier in the month, have more engagement than the posts from the past couple of days!
3. Which of my posts encouraged someone to visit my bio or website?
- Click on your picture on the bottom right to get to your bio page
- Click on insights (middle of the page right below edit profile)
- Find the Content You Shared section and click on the right arrow by the number of posts.
- Change your Time Range to Last 30 days.
- Change the middle drop down to “Profile Visits”.
Why is this important? Visiting your bio is the first step to gaining a follower, and it’s also the place where you can have a link for prospective clients to visit your website.
4. Did the hashtags I used help get my post in front of more people?
- Click on your picture on the bottom right to get to your bio page
- Scroll down on your bio page to see your past posts! This requires the “grid” icon to be selected right above the posts! It’s the one on the left.
- Click on any post, then click on view insights right below the post.
- Scroll down to the Discovery section.
- Under the impressions section — look for the “from hashtags” number. If this number is small (or it isn’t there) your hashtags are not working. You will want to re-evaluate your hashtag strategy.
You can check your insights by post or by time range to evaluate your instagram strategy. There are some changes that I’ll be making after doing this, I’d love to hear what your thoughts or questions are after looking at your insights. Feel free to comment below!
I’m focusing on Instagram Tips and Tricks this month on my Instagram Feed. Check it out here or follow @farmgirlmktg.