In this podcast episode, I want to share with you my Instagram strategy that I'm doing currently as of April 2023. This is the show for creative entrepreneurs who have a message to share and want to live a life of freedom. Learn how to grow your network and net worth. Hear from exciting guests and more. My name is Dylan Schmidt and welcome to Digital Podcaster. Now, I don't have like the biggest Instagram following. you know, there's people with, there's always someone with like a larger platform than what we have, right. But I feel like I've successfully been able to monetize my Instagram. And the engagement feels really solid. Like I feel like my Instagram account is healthy. And I feel healthy running it like it feels sustainable. So I thought it would be advantageous to share what I'm doing, real quickly how I got to what I'm doing. Because kind of knowing how I got to where I'm doing it to is a whole part of the journey. If I only shared what I was doing today, how beneficial would that be for you? Because maybe you're starting from zero or a smaller, less engaged following. Again, I say this with like a disclaimer, there's plenty of Instagram experts out there. I'm not claiming to be some Instagram expert. I'm simply sharing my own experience and what I've done to get to this point. Because I read a I think it was a tweet, you know, a a couple of years ago that was like something like, you know, commit to six months of posting nonstop, you know, consistently, and it'll change the rest of your life. And I was like, you know what, I could actually buy that.'Cause I'm not new to social media, I'm not new to online business and stuff like that, but I am new to it for myself. I've done it plenty of times for other people, but starting my own, you know, personal brand, brand from scratch was something completely new to me. And it's way different being in front of the camera, on the microphone than doing it for someone else. It's way different. And I, so I just kind of took that to heart. I was like, all right, let's try this. So I started my digital podcast or Instagram account in June of 2021. Not that long ago in the grand scheme of things. I think it's coming up on two years now. And again, I say for the third time, I don't have the hugest following, but I started from zero. There was no other account that like shouted me out and then, you know, got me going. I literally started from scratch. I had an idea one day of like, hmm, what if I started a podcast coaching Instagram because I'm helping podcasts clients. And that was my whole idea. It was just a random whim and digital podcaster was available. And I used AI, this is two years ago to come up with the name. And then I created the account because it was available and I just started posting. And when I first started, my very first goal was just to do 100 posts. That was it. I didn't care too much about the quality. I didn't care too much about how many likes something got. I simply tried to get to 100 posts. And I think it was around post 20 or maybe even a little bit less. I came across someone on Instagram help offering Instagram marketing services. So I got help and I didn't plan on getting help, but I got help from him. And he basically, I think he was like gathering case studies or something, but like he helped me with a whole bunch of stuff, like making posts, captions, editing videos, like he promised the moon. And so I got help there. What was good and bad about that, like one good thing about getting help so early on was it like forced me to be consistent and it forced me to like actually take my Instagram a little bit serious-er, that's not a word, serious-er, more seriously. Because if it's just me I don't feel like anyone's paying attention. You know, how likely am I to be to stick with something? And I think the same is true for a lot of podcasts as well. If you don't feel like someone's listening, how likely are you to stick with it? Right. But then once you start to get like a little bit, even just a tiny little bit of traction, whatever that means for you, then you can start to like gain a little bit more momentum and that momentum builds upon itself. So I got help and he was doing like outreach, um, and he's like outreach, meaning like he would engage with other pages and things like that. and then create these posts. And there were errors in the posts, like I wasn't super happy with the posts. But again, my goal wasn't to be super happy with the posts. The goal wasn't to go viral. The goal was just to make 100 posts. And of course I wanted the content to be valuable. So there was the focus on valuable 100 posts. And then I worked with him for just a couple months, and then that went away. But I saw this as a long-term project anyways'cause I was already starting to see a little bit of momentum. I was starting to see some other podcasting coaches and teachers in the space just kind of like engage with my content and I was like, whoa, this is cool because they've maybe been doing it for a year or multiple years and I'm just starting from scratch and I was like, this is kind of fun. And then just like a few months after that, I started this podcast and people had already assumed that I had my own podcast. I didn't have my own podcast when I started Digital Podcaster, but my therapist, I was telling her like, oh, this is going cool, you know? Like I'm seeing some momentum on Instagram and like, that's me making it and I've never done this before. And it's a weird way of me being seen because I had like scrubbed my information from the internet and now here I am recording videos and making posts and collaborating with people, connecting with people. That was weird to me. And then I was just like, but I don't wanna have a, the rebellious side of me is like, I don't wanna have a podcast because it seems like ironic to not have it. And then like, why do I need it? I'm helping other people with theirs." But then she was just like, basically called me on it, like, "You should just start a podcast." I was like, "Okay." So I did it, and obviously I'm loving it. And it's so much easier for me, again, once to be behind the microphone and practice what I preach and also just see things from this perspective. I couldn't imagine not doing this podcast now. So super happy. I took her advice and I started Digital Podcaster, the podcast. And so my kind of idea for Instagram has shifted subtly over the last couple of years. When it started out again, it was just like quantity. And I still try to follow a little bit of quantity. Why I really like following quantity as a metric is that it helps me get outside of my head. So I'm great at imposter syndrome. I'm great at experiencing, And saying this like subjectively or objectively, I always get those confused, you know, saying this, like I don't want to come off wrong here, but like it's, it's so what I, in my experience, people that can like help the most or have the most knowledge typically also seem to have like a lot of imposter syndrome. And maybe that's something to do with the consumption of the social media. You know, maybe it's like I'm looking at so much social media that like I see everybody else doing it and then me doing it. I feel like, oh, am I good enough? But I know like the stuff I'm offering is valuable and I get that feedback, which has kept me going basically. So I still like using quantity as a metric, but I was like feeling very extra creative when I, um, I would say like a good chunk of doing a digital podcaster, um, just the Instagram posts. And again, like I'll post the same post to tick tock and YouTube shorts. So there's a lot of like overlap on the content here, but just specifically talking about Instagram because I guess that's kind of the main one if you will, even if my following is like bigger on Tik Tok. But yeah, regardless, I felt like creative where I'm like, Oh, I want to, you know, make this I just constantly trying to reinvent the wheel reinvent the wheel. And that comes with its highs and lows. You know, like, I saw a good analogy of, you know, third, something like 33% of the time, you'll be doubting yourself and just like want to quit. 33% of the time you'll feel like neutral about it, I believe. And then 33% of the time you'll be like, hell yeah, this is awesome. I want to keep going. So when I'm feeling like super creative, what about that 1%? That's 99%. That 1%, I'm just sleeping. So when I'm feeling super creative, that can be like exhausting at times, right? Like it's hard to stay, keep that quantity high and be creative at the same time because creativity can take time. Like I could have a fun idea about doing like two people, just myself, but like two people talking to themselves. And that could take time to post. So like having an idea and then having the time to execute it is like its own thing. Right. So sometimes it's like been easier for me to just get in a groove of like keeping things simple. Um, when I don't have as much time to dedicate to the creativity, sometimes the ideas have been flowing and I could just hop right in. Uh, But I've really tried to do my best to not let myself get too attached to the process. I know that sounds counterintuitive because if I feel like it has to be done a certain way, then that doesn't really fit with my life because my life isn't the same every day. I don't have the most predictable days, which I like. I like that part of being an entrepreneur. I love running content clips and I love doing digital podcasting and Podcast Academy because that helps me get to the point where I can do my best. podcaster and podcast academy because that has a lot of variety. Um, but that variety at the same time, it's not like I can just like check out for a month and be like, I'm just going to dedicate this time to fun, engaging content, um, like short form content for Instagram, for example. Um, so I don't really have that. So I have to like, kind of go with the flow. And one of the biggest lessons I ever learned with doing this whole Instagram, putting myself out there has just been grace, like having grace in myself, having grace, you know, just like just going easy, like treating myself like how I would treat you listening to this. Like I would treat you with respect and, and courtesy and just like, uh, and just ease, you know, I wouldn't be so hard on you. So I really quickly, I feel like I had to learn how to do that with myself because it was so easy to be like, Oh, this isn't good. Or this isn't how I want it to be. Or, you know, we all have these ideas of like, it could be better. It could be better. So that is a little bit of the internal game. And then the actual like strategy of there is like quantity. So these days I am currently doing this and this is somewhat fairly new, I guess. Um, but basically I'm trying to, um, follow like content pillars. I've done this again, like this is morphed throughout the last couple of years, but this is where it's at currently. So I currently have like five podcasting podcasting pillars. I look over because I could talk about this stuff all day and I completely forget what the pillars are. But it's essentially like planning, recording, distributing, growing and monetizing. And I have those five pillars of podcasting right now. Stick with me for a sec because this is like going to seem a little bit abstract without me being able to like diagram it with you. But I kind of also look at social media like a job, right? I don't post a lot about my personal life. I hardly post anything about my personal life, but I still wanna add value. I still want it to feel like myself. I still want it to be genuine and authentic. So I got it up to, for me, I try to approach it like a little bit regimented as well, especially as like content clips and Podcast Academy and digital podcasters just get busier. So this is how I view it. I view it as like a Monday through Friday gig, although it's really not, but like at its core, Monday through Friday, each day, I, my goal is to like make one post about the pillar. So it doesn't also feel like I'm repeating the same thing over and over. So Monday, for example, would be like planning. Tuesday would be recording. Wednesday would be distribution. Thursday would be growing. Friday would be monetization. Now that's like at its core, if I had to have like something to fall back on, like a framework of such of like how I'm approaching it, that's what it would be. And why this has helped me is because previously I've been like, how the heck, what do I post today? Like I know a bunch of different directions I could go in. What do I talk about? And it's just been easiest for me to wrap my head around. Like I also at the risk of sounding too repetitive. I say, oh, OK, today's Monday. So I need to talk about planning. And then within planning, there's a ton of topics I could talk about. but if I only leave it up to my imagination, like I might do a bunch of posts in a row about monetization or growing, and I don't really want to do that because I wanna like provide a more full spectrum. Now, part of providing a full spectrum too is leaving room for creativity, leaving room for other subjects to come in. For example, if I had an idea that was really sparked on a Monday that was about growing or something like that, I might record it today. I don't know that I would post it today or I would make it and post it today if it was a text post, but I leave room for that creativity and I think that goes back to that grace. I leave room for that, but at the same time I have a guiding north star of what direction should I head? Because part of the creative process today, I was like, Oh, I need to make a planning post. Um, that might lead somewhere else. Like it might not just look, it's not like, Oh, here's a podcast calendar. You can follow planning within planning. Uh, and looking inside podcast academy is an easy way for me to like, again, wrap my head around it because I'm so familiar with this stuff that like I almost make it more complicated than it needs to be. But within like planning, there's so many things I could talk about. There's like podcast names, podcast description, podcast topics, show art, show music, guest assets that you are going to give your guest or what type of guests you want to have on different formats of your own podcast, the target audience, just your target audience alone is like a never ending well of topics, interview skills, self confidence, imposter syndrome, getting over that stuff, procrastination, legal considerations, making your podcast more accessible. Like that I don't know, it feels like 12 I don't know how many I just said, but like that's a lot of different things. And those are all under planning, right? So like if I'm feeling stuck, the reality is it's like something else usually, because there's so many things that's just planning. And when I go into like, um, recording, for example, like, uh, Tuesdays, there's like so much, it's like, it's ridiculous. It's like microphones, headphones, audio interfaces, recording software, tripods, pop filters, shock mounts, cameras, lighting, just in cameras alone. Like there's so much to talk about. Um, so you can start to see, like, it just goes deeper and deeper, uh, at a high level, I have a somewhat of a direction and then, and then things start to pop up, right? Like, I don't know what to post. It's like, it's not that I don't know what to post. It's that like probably something else is in the way of that. Like what's really going on. Do I feel like I need to make like a really grand post? Like I need to make a video that's super edited. Well, maybe I don't. and maybe me thinking that I need to make that is actually just keeping me stuck. So kind of being honest about the process has really self-aware I guess has helped me stay in the game long enough to like reap rewards from, from posting on Instagram. Um, so that's basically what I, how I approach it. Utilizing these content pillars has really gave me like a lot of peace of mind in a lot of ways. Um, just because I feel like I have a bit of a map. Um, Now again, if I miss a planning post, this is where the perfectionism side comes in,'cause I am a bit of a perfectionist, but it's the constant like trying to unlearn stuff too. So if I miss like planning for today, right? Like say there's just too much going on and I don't get it, I don't like push everything back, I don't try to rearrange his schedule, I'm not like, oh, I'm a failure, I need to like redo everything. No, I just go to recording. Like, because no one else is like, I didn't announce to the world other than this podcast episode that I'm using content pillars at this time. Nobody's like has this expectation on me to fulfill this obligation of Monday's a planning post, you said it. No, I don't like, you know, it's like there needs to be a human element of it too, I think. So my goal is that. Now, like I said, I might have an idea, I might be like, you know what, I don't have time to even like think of a planning post, I'm just not in that. And I'm not like batching content ahead of time or something. I could just like look back through past podcasts, episodes I've done about planning, and then just pull a content clip from a past podcast episode. That's one of the awesome things about podcasts. And one of the awesome things about recording video with it, so I could just easily clip it and then make a post for that. And I have never seen a dip in engagement if I use something from a year ago, as long as it's valuable, as long as it's valuable and packaged correctly, people will vibe with it, right? So that's kind of like how I approach the content. It gives me a mark to at least hit, and I don't hit the goal to hit it perfectly every day, but just to hit it like 70, 80% of the time, I'm cool with that. Now there are some areas that I could use for improvement, but like based on my life, business life and everything, like this would be kind of one of those things if I had more time and resources to give to it, this is what I would do. I think I would also see more growth. So one would be more collaboration, just like commenting and genuinely engaging with more content on Instagram. That has been always really helpful for me since I started my account, is just like genuinely engaging with content. That doesn't just mean comments, that also means like DMs, responding to stories, like remembering things about people I follow and then like just engaging like a human being and engaging more with like, just more frequently with people. Another thing I could do is like lessen the perfectionist approach to content. So like I said, like I'm definitely a perfectionist. I wanna make things over the top. That is definitely at a disservice at times because I could easily hit higher quantity if I just lessened the barrier to hitting post. I've said this multiple times, it's always worth repeating. The best posts, like best performing posts in terms of like views, shares, saves, comments, all of that stuff, it's always the stuff that I spend the least amount of time on. So if I make a post really fast usually and then post it, those do the best. So it's like getting in my head about things and being like, ah, that's not good enough, I need to improve this better, I need to add this, because I could just play with something until it's done. I have a business coach and she was telling me about how she loves cleaning. And she was like, you know, I could just clean and then I find like more and more stuff to clean as I'm cleaning. And it just kind of like is the self-feeding thing. And it's hard sometimes to just like walk away from it because you've kind of seen how it could be. I feel the same sometimes with making videos. I'm like, I can make it like this, I can make it like that. And that doesn't always serve me better because I might be better off using that time collaborating or just engaging with other, making more content or just, it's fun. It's nice to have times for that, but I would be lying if I didn't say, if I look back at the last two years or so of digital podcasts or, that creativity has served me. And there's definitely some times where I'm like, I know I should just like set this down and walk away, just leave it be. But it's like kind of fun to get wrapped up in the creativity too because it doesn't, it's not always there. And then when it's there, you're like, I want to spend time with it. I want to make this better. I want to make this cooler. Uh, so that's kind of like my thought process around like if I just made it more simple, I probably would, you know, be posting a little bit more too, not all the time. You know, sometimes again, personal life just steps in the way. And then, yeah, and then like I said, more engaging with other accounts, more collaboration, just something that I see other Instagram accounts do and I could easily do is just collaborate on posts. I've been asked to collaborate multiple times and I don't know, I'm an only child, I don't know how to collaborate really on an Instagram post. I'm like, let's just do a podcast together. To me, that's collaboration. But I know that that is a valuable thing. I think I've done a couple posts. I think the person that helped me early on, I think set up a couple collaborations. I know I have for sure one on other people's accounts, for a couple times on other people's accounts, but I don't quite remember that I've done any shared with my account. But that's something that's totally a growth strategy still. So those are the three main ways I could see my own areas of improvement, but also what I'm doing and I feel like I'm doing the best I can. The growth has been slow as far as like the numbers of followers go I guess. I guess. But who really knows? Like I feel like podcasts sometimes, especially like my style of talking, my way of sharing content, it's not for everybody. It doesn't need to be. And like there was this account, uh, without, I forget, like I think a couple a hundred thousand followers, which I have been, have had experience running accounts with that amount of followers. But I was talking to him and I was just like, he was just like, yeah, like ask me anything about, you know, growing your account or whatever. And I said like, you know, what do you see? And he was just like, you know what? This is when I had 5,000 followers. And I think I meant to say at the beginning, but I think I'm like close to 9,000 followers now. So this is when I had like 5,000 followers. and I was like, "What would you suggest I do?" Like, no ego, just what would you suggest I do? And he was like, "You have enough. Don't try to stress yourself out getting more. You have enough. Maybe that's for your exact category. Maybe that's right where you're in your sweet spot. So just focus on nurturing your community, strengthening that, those relationships." And I was like, "That's really cool." I wasn't ever, I've never been like,"I need 100,000 followers. I don't really, people know my numbers than I know my numbers. Like they know my Instagram real views and they like seem to know my content better than I do because I can't like the imposter syndrome perfectionist part of me. I got to post it and go but I'm also trying to seek and improve it and make it cooler. But after I post it I'm like I forget about it until I look back on it later and I'm like,"Whoa that was actually a really cool post." Or I'm like, "Wow I spent way too long on that." But yeah, he had given me that advice, like just pause, like on trying to like grow more, just focus on nurturing. I was like, that's, I really like that. And I just wanted to share that with you because maybe it isn't always about growth. Maybe it isn't always about like, how can I get more and more and more? It's just like, this is again, another approach I've taken since I started digital podcaster is like who's in front of me and just talking to that person in front of me. Like I know so many people who start podcasts, Instagram, like any type of accounts, any content creation, things like that is like the people will show up and then they'll like not talk to them or like treat them like a human. And then they just like are looking past the person that's showing up and being like, who else is here? And to me, I look at it like being in a room with somebody. And if like, if I was having like a party, right. And I'm like, I don't know who's gonna show up to the party. Someone shows up and I'm just like, cool. I'm like looking at them, but I'm not like really looking at them. And then I look past them and I'm like, but who else is coming? It's like, why not just talk to the person that showed up to the freaking party? You know? Uh, and that's how I approach it all the time. Like in my Instagram DMS, which I'm sometimes like it stresses me out a little bit cause there's a lot. Um, and I'm just like, and I'm, but I care cause I want to like talk to everybody and it's like a party going on and I'm like, I want to talk to you. And so like sometimes I'm slow to respond only because I'm not trying to like get through the messages, I'm actually trying to talk to people. And at scale that can be sometimes a little hard. Um, but I really like mean it because if, you know, I engage with an account and someone was just like kind of talking past me and just be like, all right, yeah, cool man, whatever. Or just like really kept it really short. It would be a bit of a bummer and I would really try to like, I don't know, I would be like let down. I feel like, so I try to not let anybody down. Um, but at the same time, you can only control what you can control, so I do my best there. That's pretty much it. That's like my Instagram strategy, and that's like pretty in-depth. This might change in six months, one month, a year, but at its core, this is how I approach Instagram, and I've gotten a lot of feedback, a lot of comments about how people like my Instagram content, people like just my Instagram. I've also heard from a lot of people, like, "Why don't you have more followers?" I don't know. Again, I'm talking to the people that are here. I'm not worried about the people that aren't there. So when people are like, "Why don't you have more followers?" I've heard that since I started. I don't know. It is what it is, and I'm super grateful for every single person that showed up. I'm not worried about more followers. I'm worried about the quality of followers. That's how I've been with digital podcasts or this podcast as well. Again, what are followers? They're people, and you're a person listening to this. And that's what I care about. I don't, like a vanity metric, a vague number, like 100,000 people, what? Well, these are people and I want to actually engage with them and share and grow with them. So I'm not trying to be the absolute biggest in the world. I sent out an email newsletter about this last week, but I had my first content clips, which is a newer account, Instagram account, get a million views on a reel. Like, what does that do for me? I can't even read the comments. There's too many comments. I don't have enough time to read the comments of that post. But like, what does that mean to me? Like, what does a million views mean? You know, I don't know. Well, honestly, it's something I think about and could go on and on about that, make a whole podcast episode about that which I'm probably not. So yeah just wanted to share where my mind was at with that because I know it could be really tricky and sometimes just like let down in the beginning of like what do I do how do I do it and I hope this answered some of those questions. So yeah let me know if it did be curious to know because again I like making this a two-way conversation. I hope you're doing well and I will catch you in the next episode.