Many have been complaining that Instagram’s algorithms aren’t attracting new followers. There was even a crash a few days ago that saw glitches and account followings drop that was naturally met with rage by users.
One creator debunking this unfortunate trend is Jaden Versluis. Versluis works as a manager for other creators, primarily in the fitness industry. After prioritising his management work in 2021, he decided to focus on his own content in 2022. He tried different types of content and stuck with travel, particularly tips for travelling on a budget.
In the summer he set out to grow his Instagram following to reach more people, build relationships with brands, and earn money from his own social-media presence.
He started in May, when his account had about 4,000 followers. By the end of August he had more than 140,000 followers. He posted a screenshot on LinkedIn indicating that in July his content reached almost 10 million accounts.
Most of us are wondering, at this point, how on earth did he do it? For two months he exclusively posted Reels, Instagram’s short-form videos, after he heard that the platform would shift its focus to video content.
Versluis recently signed big deals with brands. One of them, signed in August, paid him $12,000 for a TikTok video and three Instagram Stories. Another deal paid a total of $15,200 for two TikToks and ten Instagram Stories every month for four months.
Versluis put together a guide with his growth strategy, which he sells on his website for $5.
Top tips featured in his strategy include repurposing trends Younger people seem to be relying on TikTok — which recently increased the character limit for captions to 2,200 characters — as a search engine.
Versluis said that whichever platform you use, “your caption should be full of keywords.” “Explain what’s going on in the video,” he added. For example, the caption of an Instagram video where Versluis talks about the travel apps he uses says, “These apps are life savers when it comes to travelling,” then repeats the contents of the video, listing the names of the services and what they’re useful for.
Versluis also recommends looking at other examples of successful creators within your niche. However, he added that watching videos from well-known creators could be discouraging because they have crews that allow them to produce content on a much larger scale. So he advises that people also analyse creators with smaller followings.
