Social media marketing doesn’t always feel easy to intuitive. Although it’s a great resource to reach a large number of people and to grow your audience, it’s easy to get stuck in a rut posting the same types of content again and again.
If this is you or you’re just looking for new ways to keep your account fresh and active, try out these 6 Instagram post types to boost your engagement and breathe new life into your account!
1. Photo Dumps
Instagram’s carousel posts make it easy to post up to 10 different pictures and videos under the same caption. It’s a great way to tell a story with a bunch of different parts. Instead of trying to sum everything up with a single image or video, you can use a bunch to give more context and a fuller perspective.
Themed Instagram pages can benefit a lot from a good photo dump. Posting themed images together in a carousel gives a really satisfying scroll for users while keeping your feed looking clean. As long as whatever you’re posting works well together aesthetically and thematically, take full advantage of it!
Photo dumps have a higher engagement rate than individual photos as well. While the difference can be slight, the movement of swiping to see more does attract more people than a single, static photo or video, especially if the first image is an introduction or teaser.
2. Sneak Peeks
If you’re working on something big, sneak peeks are a great way to maintain interest and let people know something’s coming without giving away too much. It’s great to have a bit of content when you have a long period of separation between projects.
Even if you’re not giving sneak peeks of large projects, teasers help remind people to check for your content and keep you top of mind. Building hype for your posts can draw more attention to your account and help people see more of your best content when it’s posted.
Behind-the-scenes posts make great sneak peeks, as do super close-ups of upcoming products or content. As long as you’re not giving too much away, you’re golden.
3. Engaging Stories
Instagram stories are nothing new, but there are a ton of underutilized features on stories that can really engage your audience and get them interacting with you. Here are a few ideas for how you can make engaging Instagram stories:
- Create a poll
- Do trivia questions
- Use an emoji slider
- Post shoppable stories
- Tease main feed content
- Make a countdown
- Tell a story bit by bit
Be as creative as you want with your stories! The goal is to make something that people see and want to interact with. Good stories can bring better engagement, attract new followers, and get people interested in your main feed content as well.
Because stories only last for a short time, you have a lot of freedom to try new things. Don’t take it too seriously! Have fun and see what works best for your account over time.
4. Shoppable Posts
Shoppable story posts are highly interactable and turn basic images into a potential to sell. These posts allow you to tag products or services in the image for people to click over directly to the shop where they can get them.
People can also swipe up on shoppable stories to get a full list of everything that’s tagged in the photo.
While shoppable posts don’t work for every account, they’re great for Instagram accounts that are linked to affiliate sales or online businesses. If there’s something you’re trying to sell, shoppable posts can be a nice, interactive way to sell something by showing it in use. For those selling digital PLR products, shoppable posts are a great way to create some connection between your audience and what you’re selling.
Shoppable posts can be either stories or full posts. Both have their place in your content strategy, as long as it’s not all you post!
5. Contests
Instagram has a lot of different options for giveaways and contests. Contest posts make for exciting content and tend to get a lot of engagement, as long as you’re giving away something that people will actually want.
If your account is large enough or your business is known, you can host a giveaway for your own products or services. Even if your account isn’t large, you can still do giveaways for products or services from other companies within your niche. Either partner with the company providing the prize or pay for it yourself as part of your social media marketing budget.
Contest posts can do well on their own, but they also benefit from being boosted. Make sure you’re getting something concrete from the contest, such as requiring people to like, comment, and share the post or follow your account in order to enter. The interactions the post gets organically will help to boost it while sponsoring the post will push it even further and get it in front of even more people.
You can use an add-on or a simple tool to help you randomly select the winner or winners. This makes your job super simple since the contest basically runs itself!
Even after the giveaway is done, you can get some extra mileage from the whole thing by talking about the winner and the prize in your posts after the contest is over. If the person is going to remain anonymous, you can still post about preparing to send the prize or congratulating the anonymous winner and wishing them luck.
If you host another giveaway later, use the first one as social proof to get more engagement on your next contest.
6. Live Event Coverage
Social media is a fantastic tool to live vicariously through others. If you get to go to exclusive events as part of your work, business, or lifestyle, you can make the most of it by sharing what’s happening with your followers.
Live coverage on Instagram usually means posting a series of images or videos in your stories talking about what you’re doing at that moment or giving your commentary on something that’s just happened. After the event is done, you can also do a photo dump summing up the highlights for everyone who couldn’t or didn’t keep up with the live coverage.
You can also do live coverage by giving your opinions or perspectives on a televised event. If you’re watching something that your target audience will also be watching, you can get involved in the conversation and get people buzzing through your stories and posts. While this is a strategy a lot of people do on X (formerly Twitter), it can also work on Instagram, especially if you use interactive story elements like polls or question cards.
Instagram is a great platform to build your audience and express a more approachable, creative side of your brand. If you’re not taking full advantage of what the platform is offering, start switching up your strategy today to post more diverse content your audience will want to interact with!
