Well, Damn Instagram…

6 min readOct 25, 2020

Describe how you’re using best practices towards your personal interest profile project. Explain why is it important for a brand to know the ideal posting times for its audience? Pick a social media platform and find a tool outside the platform that gives ideal posting times.

Everyone thinks they know best, but who knows you or your brand better than you? I see best practices as more of a suggestion than a mandate I must take part in because guess what? Not every brand’s target audience, social media, and ideals are the same. So, stop stressing about what you are being told you need to do and start thinking what do my social media audience needs? Take it from me, I do not use all the best practices suggested to me, but I pick and choose for the vision of the brand and its audience.

Let me share some of the “best practices” I use for my brand @athletes_leadchange on Instagram. Remember these are a suggestion, what works for me may not work for you and your brand.

First things first, Hashtags. Hashtags have become an integral part of my brand due to 1. The platform I am using and 2. The industry in which my brand lives. My brand surrounds sports and players being engaged in the community. This is a hot topic; you are either in front of the trend or behind it. Hashtags gain me consumer engagement. My topic trending does not mean I hit my target audience. I connect the sports trend with hashtags trends that relate to the topic of conversation. For instance, my last couple of posts included the LA Dodgers winning the National League series championship and recently highlighting a Steelers Football player. By using hashtags such as #WorldSeries or #SteelerNation, my hashtags group and categorize conversations making discovery easier for those interested in the hashtags.

Then we have teaser text. I know you must be thinking, isn’t that the caption? Yes, and no. Best practices suggest that the caption stays between 1–50 characters on Instagram. Since that doesn’t fit with my brand, I have figured out how to capitalize on this without losing the vision behind my brand. Instagram does the “more..” where you can continue to read the caption after it has given you a slight teaser. What I have done is start with a short caption that reels a follower in, then I include the more encompassing material after the break. This is a great way to catch someone’s attention and get them interested in the rest of the post. I have just started doing this, so my findings are preliminary; however, they are looking promising!

Now we can’t forget about videos, they are the granddaddy of them all! I have just begun to include video in my profile because best practices say that it attracts the most engagement to a social media brand. Videos need a creative thinker who can strategically steer the brand in the direction to spark conversation. I am working on that with my brand but again I am only just beginning so time will tell. Just remember you have 10 seconds to grab someone’s attention so make sure the intro provides value to the consumer to keep them engaged.

Next, and this one is important! Actively engage in other people’s accounts that can connect to your brand. Trust me it’s fun because you get to talk to people just like yourself with similar missions and goals and it’s just fun to contribute to a topic that interests you. It will help increase your engagement as well. it can turn into an “I scratch your back, you scratch mine” but you will attract people who are interested in what you say. Engaging on other accounts establishes credibility for you, and consumers will seek you out for more information.

Finally, ideal timing is important because the same timing does not work for everyone. Timing depends on the subject, audience, and industry. In my case, timing is everything. As I mentioned earlier my brand is on top of sports trends (who is popular, why, etc.) and my audience can differ for each post. When I post about certain subjects I must cater to the audience. For example, when talking about the LA Dodgers my target audience is the west coast, but talking about the PA Steelers would be the east coast. This changes the ideal post times drastically. Research suggests that the best times to post on Instagram would be at 1 pm during lunch, 5 pm right after work, or those browsing in bed in the morning at 8 am and at night at 9 pm. This is not necessarily the case for my brand. That is why I rely on different tools like MavSocial or Sprout Social. Both tools provide ideal posting times based on when my followers are online or based on my highest engagement rates. The tools are specific to my needs and industry trends, helping me maximize efforts of being seen thereby leading to more likes, comments, and followers. These tools save me time by doing the research for me and keep me from playing the guessing game with my profile. Knowing my specific ideal post times helps me stay ahead of the game and make sense of the overload that occurs in the busy platforms. From a planning perspective knowing the best times gives me the ability to plan out my posts in advance without worry that I could be missing a prime time. Finally, it provides me with the best knowledge to stay ahead of dramatic shifts in the industry for example how Covid-19 shifted the way we use. the web is always changing, so understanding and knowing how to adapt will make for easy adjustments to keep your audience engaged.

I hope you enjoyed my take on tackling your social media best practices. Remember no account is the same, so find the best practices that work for you and still stay true to your mission. Good luck!