Is Getting a Lot of Likes on Instagram Really Worth the Effort?

Specifically that one of a little fun, social, interactive app on your phone. Three things to keep in mind here: 1) You have to post things that are interesting, 2) You’ve got to not always focus on yourself, and 3) You have to do tags.

In posting things that are interesting, this is a little bit of photography plus a little bit of uniqueness. You’re not just taking pictures of another coffee cup unless it’s got a cool message on it or you’re making sure you’re lining up on the Rule of Thirds and the overall composition of the picture is nice, the color is nice, the lighting is nice, something brings it up above the level of ho-hum-ness to a level of “Oh, that’s pretty neat, I’m willing to double tap that thing.”

Watch the video or read the transcription:

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As far as being not just focused on yourself and interesting to other people, which is number two, is nobody really cares if you went to the gym another time, unless you’re a supermodel and you’ve got 8 million people following, in which case, okay, they do care. You’ve got that going for you, go for it.

But if you’re just a regular person trying to make it and get a bunch of likes on Instagram, you’re going to have to pull stuff that when people look at it they say “How is this interesting to me? How does this make me feel? How does this add to my life? How can I explain this as a cool thing that I just liked to other people?”

For instance, if it’s a picture and you know the other person on the other end posting that picture and you like it, they’re going to know you liked it, and you have to think to yourself “Hm, is this so cool that I’m okay with that other person knowing that I liked it or is this embarrassing?” Or “Would I want my friends to know that I liked this thing?” If it’s true, if that’s the case, you wouldn’t mind them knowing, you pass that test.

Number 3 – tags. Do your short little nice, neat, inspiring message first and then on a second comment, add in somewhere between five and eight hash tags that specifically describe your picture and leave it at that. Don’t fill it up in this gigantic, huge 80 tags – I know there’s a limit that’s less than that – 80 tags comment and then do 2 or 3 more after that. I know some people do that and they get a lot of likes for that, but come on man, that just looks silly.

But if you do these three things in combination, you will open yourself up for having pictures that are nice for other people to view and hash tags that are searchable and findable from now until Instagram dies. Keep those three things in mind and you’ll optimize your chances for getting likes.

Now, if you’re like me and have almost no followers, you’re kind of limited but the randomness can come across when you put those hash tags in there. Be interesting, take interesting pictures, share them and then give people a way to find it and you’ll get those likes. Good luck in your Instagram adventures and peace out.