INSTAGRAM MONEY THREAD DAY 2/10: Getting Started

Welcome to my second of 10 threads released on 10 consecutive days about starting an Instagram business!

Today we will cover:

Goals
Niche
Market Research
Branding/Profile
Account Type

Let’s go!

But wait! Make sure you’ve read the first thread, which dropped last night: https://twitter.com/macbookmilli/status/1293416446685519872

Clarify Goals

Social media money is about creating a funnel. Your accounts are the tops of the funnel

To create a great top-to-bottom funnel, we need to:

Build a following
Choose business model
Find something to sell
Fill out funnel
Automate
Scale

Keep this funnel framework in mind whenever you do anything related to your Instagram account:

You are building and maintaining a funnel.

Choose Niche

When you choose a niche, you can choose to make a personal page, or theme page.

I highly recommend making a theme page because:

Proven system
Existing audience w/ clear needs
Don’t have to sell self
Easier to create content
Can make multiple pages

Best theme page niches:

ECommerce
Finance/Investing/Trading
Luxury lifestyle
Travel
Motivation (beginner friendly)
Food
Nutrition (beginner friendly)
Cars
Graphic Design
Art

I marked a couple “beginner friendly” because content creation is easier IMO

I would recommend choosing a niche that:

Does not require you to take photos
Has an audience that is influenced by emotion when they spend money (ex. The motivation niche is emotional)

Should You Choose a Sub-Niche?

Good, consistent content is the MOST important part of the Instagram success formula. If you can nail that, you don’t need a sub niche.

Let’s still compare

Pros:

Dominate market
More targeted followers (charge more for promos)

Cons:

Smaller market (limited potential)
Slower growth
Fewer opportunities to generate income

I would personally recommend starting with a little bit of a broad niche and teaching yourself to rely on content to succeed.

Content is !!!!!

Market Research

You must know your niche well to grow.

Study big accounts and take note of:

Logo
Colors
Username + Name
Bio
Post frequency
Post times
Content type and style
Hashtag strategy
Caption style
Interaction w/ followers

Take note of all of the above until you feel that you have a solid understanding of how the successful pages in your niche operate, what works, and what doesn’t work

I recommend studying the 10 most successful accounts in your niche

Branding

You are selling your brand(ed content) before you are selling yourself!

Your brand should represent:

Who you are
What you do
Who you target

The stronger the brand, the better the following

Overall branding(what your brand is actually made up of) includes:

How your brand looks
How your brand interacts w/ the community
What value your brand offers
Your brand story
How your brand makes people feel

Profile

Your profile is like your landing page.

It must be optimized to convert visitors to followers.

Your profile is made up of:

Username
Name
Bio
Logo

Let’s talk about each one

Username

Your username should reflect your niche.

A popular strategy is to use one niche keyword + 1 word that reflects your brand or helps you stand out

Try to make your username something you won’t ever change

Name

For a theme page, your name should NOT be the same as your username

Treat it more like 2-3 niche keywords

I’ll attach some examples to demonstrate towards the end of the thread

Bio

Your bio is one of the most important parts of the profile - it’s where you tell visitors what you offer.

Traits of a good bio:

Clean
Structured
Uses Emojis
Demonstrates authority
Bullet style

Also remember that you most likely will add a link and CTA later on

Logo

One of the common mistakes rookies make is overthinking their logo.

It should be simple:

2 colors is enough, 3 is the MAX
Something you can use as a stamp/watermark for your content (having a transparent version of your logo helps)
Can easily create in Canva

Account Type

Lastly, let’s talk about account type.

Use a business account, ignore the other options.

The business accounts offers necessary features that you won’t be able to operate an income generating page without.

These features are:

Insights (reach, where your reach is coming from, demographics)
Swipe up feature in the story (once you have a good following, you can direct your followers to a link through your story)

Don’t complicate this part. Choose the business account.

If you follow the guidance outlined above, you’ll have an excellent foundation to move forward with.

If you enjoyed this thread, stay tuned for thread 3, where we’ll discuss the types of content on Instagram

Lastly, if you’re serious about Instagram, you NEED to be following my friend @PascalGrosz who is the master of Instagram growth. He’s already built a network of over ONE MILLION followers!