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Instagram comments are crucial for reaching your target audience organically. With over a billion users worldwide, Instagram is a powerful tool for marketers when used correctly.
However, the Instagram algorithm customizes each user’s feed by sorting the most relevant content based on their activity. To beat the algorithm and reach your audience, leveraging Instagram comments is key.Having a substantial amount of Instagram comments on your profile helps build engagement with the followers and acts as social proof for your total follower count—like the way @netflix does it.
More comments also enhance your reputation as a customer-centric brand.
How To Manage Instagram Comments
One of the reasons why some people avoid getting more comments is that it takes more work. Not only do you have to put in the effort to get more comments, but you also need to manage them. You’ll need to respond to genuine comments and hide comments from cyber bullies.
This can seem time-consuming, but with a comment management plan that’s an integral part of your Instagram management strategy, you can execute this in five to ten minutes a day.
The key is to set aside a time every day for this. You can do this on the go on your mobile device or you can use a management tool with an inbox where all the messages collect.
Now that you know the importance of comments and how to manage them, here are the best tried-and-tested methods that work!
8 Ways To Get More Comments On Your Instagram Post
1. Create Valuable Content For Your Audience
The algorithm rewards content that adds value to the users. Irrespective of how often the Instagram algorithm changes, you can maintain a good level of engagement by consistently creating valuable content.
To create and post content regularly, you would need:
You have to categorize your content into relevant niche(s) for your brand. Identify your target audience and tailor your content according to their likes and preferences. People will follow and engage more if they can relate to your content.
Create a visually appealing Instagram profile using brand colors, fonts, and style. Instagram is predominantly a visual platform, so it’s important to create an aesthetic look and feel to attract users and invite them to follow and engage with your content.
Posting on Instagram without a content calendar is like shooting in the dark. You have to first ideate and jot down creative ideas before creating the designs and writing the captions. Once you have some content ready, you can start posting!
Remember—your followers will engage with your posts only when you give them something useful or relatable. If you’re unsure what content your audience wants to see, you might need to conduct some market research using Instagram stories. People love engaging with polls, questions, and questions. It’s a fun way to gather a ton of information.
@eclat_official.in’s Instagram feed presents a good example of educational and value-adding content for its audience. From skincare hacks to tutorials for using their products, the brand offers great content to its followers.
2. Leverage All Content Formats
What started as an image-sharing platform has today become a multimedia social network!
Instagram offers many features for marketers to share content like reels, guides, and IGTV videos to stories, live videos, and carousels—you can use a combination of these different formats to build your brand on Instagram and engage your audience with more and better content. Hubspot perfectly exemplifies this. By creating content for reels, IGTV, highlights, guides, and feed posts, Hubspot attracts comments from users across the world.
However, creating so much content in different formats is no cakewalk. You can easily hit a roadblock and find yourself scrambling for good ideas. So, a good practice for building multi-format content is to make a planner with Instagram scheduling software like Tailwind and batch-create your content for consistency.
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Instagram users are more likely to engage with material that is humorous, unexpected, or controversial since it draws in viewers and evokes strong feelings. Because they appeal to people’s need for novelty and amusement, these postings have a higher chance of being liked, shared, and commented on. In the packed feed, interesting material sticks out and encourages interactions that tell the algorithm to share your post with more people, boosting exposure and building a feeling of community among followers.
3. Choose The Best Time To Post
An easy way to hack the Instagram algorithm is by posting during the most optimal times.
According to Instagram expert Sue B Zimmerman, the best time to post content is when most of your followers are online.
How do you find out when your audience is active?
Through Instagram Insights or another analytics tool.
Your Instagram Insights will offer you details like:
- A location-wise classification of your followers
- A day and hour-wise activity graph of your followers
- Age and gender classification
Using this data will help you target the right audience and post at the best time for generating more engagement.
You can also check out the live section when you plan to post to see how many people are active at that time. Do this for a couple of days and experiment with your timing—analyze engagement and stick to the one that works best.
If you want an upgrade on your Instagram insights, you should get yourself a third-party analytics tool or a dashboard tool. These tools can unearth more data and also make it easy to find all the data in one place. You can also compare data from your Instagram insights with key business metrics from other platforms to figure out the best marketing strategy.
4. Write Compelling Captions
Writing great captions is another way to encourage engagement among your followers. With a solid call-to-action added in every caption, you can invite user comments to your posts.
For every post, write a relevant caption. Write it like you’re talking to a friend and ensure it brings home the point you are trying to make.
Here are a few suggestions for CTAs you can add for different kinds of posts:
- If you create some super relatable content, ask people to tag their friends and start a conversation around it.
- If you are posting something debatable, encourage people to share their views.
- If you are putting a knowledge-sharing post, motivate people to ask questions and answer their queries.
Here’s how Sumo does it.
Some common types of captions are:
- Microblog-You can create a lengthy caption providing detailed insights on the subject. These captions help establish credibility and motivate users to respond with their views.
- Story-based captions-You can express emotions related to a story and tap into the users’ feelings through the caption. These posts work best on occasions like Mother’s Day and help in getting people’s responses.
- Topical content-Instagram runs on trends, and there’s nothing better than writing captions on trending things happening in the now. Use puns to create witty captions or disruptive opinions that attract more comments.
- Engagement-specific caption-You can create relatable posts and write captions specifically to get comments like The Assembly’s post of a bunny image asking people to drop an emoji if they relate.
5. Host Giveaways And Contests
Giveaways are proven to increase engagement on any Instagram account. Research suggests that Instagram accounts conducting contests and giveaways can grow their following 70% faster than the average Instagram account. Besides, hosting a giveaway can also bring your brand closer to some followers.
The simple reason why giveaways and contests give such amazing results is everyone loves getting free stuff, especially when it’s something they want!
Here are a few steps to help you create the perfect giveaway to get more comments and activity on your Instagram account:
Before you start planning the prize and posts for the giveaway, defining its objective is crucial. Whether it’s about increasing your brand recognition or enhancing your Instagram following and engagement, or driving sales—you have to outline the goals of the giveaway.
Once you have decided the objectives, define the rules of the contest. The rules should relate with what you’re trying to do—drive more comments to your posts, so one of the rules can be “Comment why you want to win this giveaway, and tag 2 friends who would relate with it.”
Don’t forget to get creative with the rules instead of going with the usual follow, comment, and share.
Here’s a unique way Buffer did it by asking people to share their favorite emoji party combo.
- Decide how you’re picking the winner
Remember, giveaways can be a double-edged sword—capable of pleasing a few, while also displeasing many. To that end, choosing the winner of your contest is key. The choice can depend on the kind of task you’re asking people to do.
If they are submitting videos, then assemble a panel of judges.
Suppose they are writing a meaningful comment, detail the criteria for assessing.
If they are tagging friends, use a reliable way to pick a winner.
A giveaway’s popularity lies in the award up for stake. This makes it crucial to choose the prize creatively and ensure your audience actually desires it. It’s not necessary to have an expensive prize for your giveaway. You can pick something inexpensive as well while ensuring it matches your audience’s preferences.
Me To We, a lifestyle brand did a brilliant cross-promotional giveaway with Jackson Rowe and The Giving Keys!
6. Create Cue Posts Inviting Responses
A rather easy way to get more comments and boost activity on your Instagram profile is by putting cue posts. Cue posts essentially ask users to respond with their take on the subject. For instance, Hello Sunshine posted a tweet asking people about the Black Lives Matter movement and encouraged its followers to comment with their answers.
While putting polls and Q/A stories is a great way to promote interaction with your followers, cue posts help in increasing comments on your page.
One common way to do this is to take a generic sentence and leave some blanks for the users to fill. People will then respond with their version of the sentence.
Another idea is to put a prompt and encourage people to comment with their own version of it. Like, “Add the word ‘bananas’ in a movie name and comment with the new name.”
You can also create a Q&A post, encouraging people to ask questions you’ll answer in the comments.
7. Share User-Generated Content
User-generated content is the ultimate tool for increasing comments on Instagram. Not only does it simplify your work into ideating posts for the page, but it also drives traction through comments and re-shares.
Simply put, user-generated content (UGC) is a way of asking people to share their content towards a particular campaign. Crowdtap concluded user-generated content garners 50% more trust than any other content and is 35% more memorable than other posts.
You can gather user-generated content in many ways:
Launch a unique hashtag to create a collection of user-generated posts. Procreate used the #artmash hashtag to encourage artists to submit their entries for three art prompts every week.
- Re-share users’ content
A great practice to encourage more followers to post about your brand is to re-post the content they share, tagging your brand. When you post user-created content on your feed, it’s bound to get better traction from your followers.
- Collaborate with local influencers
If you don’t have enough reach on your Instagram, partnering with influencers can get you good results. Find influencers in your niche with a similar target audience and strike a deal to get more eyes and engagement to your profile.
8. Actively Respond To The Comments
While you can use every single one of these strategies to get more comments on your Instagram posts, the classic way to multiply your comments is by responding actively.
There’s nothing better for followers than to receive a personalized response from a brand they like and follow!
By responding to every comment with an engaging touch, you can build conversations around your brand.
You have the chance to connect and engage with your audience and potentially convert them into buyers. Look how Nailboo responded to a follower’s comment in a brilliant stroke of marketing.
Besides, regularly commenting on your Instagram posts will also help you manage your brand reputation. You can easily find mentions from dissatisfied customers and address their concerns by leaving a thoughtful and empathetic comment with a solution.
Domino’s did a great job addressing a distressed user’s comment by leaving a personalized response to their query.
Now Go And Get More Comments On Instagram
If you want to boost Instagram engagement, there’s no better place to start than the comments section.
Encouraging followers to comment on your posts can help build a community, create social proof for your brand, and ultimately drive traction.
But getting more comments requires well-planned strategies. Some good practices to start with are creating relevant content, writing thoughtful captions, and hosting giveaways. With these few strategies, you can give your page a good boost initially.
Once you have a good following in place, you can leverage user-generated content and create posts inviting user responses. To top it off, responding actively to every comment will help you achieve your objective.
So, use these strategies to get more comments and ace your Instagram engagement game!
Author Bio
Rachel Bowland is the content manager at Social Marketing Writing and Creativity – she likes to write about marketing and design.