Instagram is an incredibly important tool to have in your social media roster for any band or studio. It is one of the most effective for music promotion, as it has the highest engagement rates of all social media channels, making it a great place to interact with your fans and followers in a meaningful way!
In order to gain an Instagram following that you can interact with, though, you have to make sure you are posting the right content and that your feed looks attractive enough for people to want to engage with!
Keep reading below for tips on what content you can post for your studio or band, how to edit your photos to make sure your feed looks amazing, and tips on how to increase engagement on your profile!
What should you post?
When trying to decide what to post, it is important to know what your fans want to see and what they will engage with. These could include photos of your new gear set-up, new merch designs, the new backdrop you have for your gigs, rehearsals, or shots from your latest gig!
In addition to these photos, videos can be valuable as well! Instagram will allow you to post videos of up to one minute in length on your feed as well, so use this to your advantage and mix videos into the content you are posting on your feed. These videos can be clips of tutorials you are posting on YouTube in order to push people towards your channel, they could be clips of your latest show, or anything else you may be doing!
If you are stuck in a rut and need some inspiration, look at other bands and studios to see what kind of photos they post! Check out what their photos feature, what their captions say, and what their feeds look like overall. If they have a lot of followers, they are clearly doing something right, so adopting some of their strategies could help you grow your account.
The most important thing to keep in mind when deciding what to post is what your followers want to see! Make sure your content is interesting and authentic, and it will keep your fans engaged!
How to Make Sure Your Photos Look Great
When taking the photos you are going to post on Instagram, the first thing to keep in mind is the lighting! Bright but indirect natural lighting is ideal as it will give you the best results whether you are posting a shot of the band or a close up of your gear.
Make sure each photo contains only one clear subject. This could be yourself, a bandmate, the audience, a new sticker design, or anything else you want to share with your followers! Just make sure you are not cramming too many things into the photo or it will look to busy and won’t turn out right!
Editing photos may seem intimidating and be something you feel you are not very good at, but it is absolutely crucial in creating a great Instagram feed!
The best Instagram feeds are ones that have a consistent editing style, which makes all of the posts fit together cohesively in the feed. It is one thing to have a post that stands on its own, but if you want your Instagram to be truly successful, you’ve got to think about the bigger picture.
If you are great at photo editing and love spending your time doing that, that’s awesome! Put those skills to good use and create and incredible account for your studio or band! lf you are not as confident in your photo editing abilities, that is totally okay as well! There are many apps available for you to use to edit your photos with just a few simple clicks. One of the most popular ways to edit Instagram photos right now is through Adobe’s Lightroom CC and Lightroom Presets! Countless photographers have created packs of presets (these are similar to Instagram’s filters, but higher quality and with better adjustment capabilities!) that you can purchase or often download for free.
Once you have found a preset you like, all you have to do is import the preset into Lightroom and apply it to your photo! You may need to make minor adjustments, but for the most part, you can simply apply the preset and then your photo is good to go! If you have never used Lightroom presets and want to learn more, you can check out this guide on how to Install Lightroom presets!
After you have decided how you want your photos to look and you have chosen a preset, use this preset on all of your posts! This is a foolproof way of creating a consistent editing style throughout your feed and make sure all of your posts look their absolute best.
Generating Engagement on your Profile
The end goal of any Instagram post is to generate engagement with your followers. There are a couple of ingredients involved in getting your followers to engage with your content!
The first is the caption. Since your top goal is to get fans to engage with your content and leave a comment on your post, your caption is just as important as the photo it is accompanying! Each caption should add value to the post and contribute to your story in a meaningful way. Try asking your followers’ opinions, get them to vote on something, and ask them questions that encourage them to leave comments on the post! These comments will them generate discussions between followers on your post and up the engagement on your account. Posts with more organic engagement will be shown to more people and be discovered by more people!
It is also important that you reply to any comments and DMs you receive on Instagram! This shows Instagram that your content is something that is genuine and that people want to see, meaning they will place it higher in people’s feeds and get your content seen by more and more people.
So with these tips in mind, you should have all the tools you need to create a fantastic Instagram feed for your band or studio! Post interesting comments, make sure all of your photos are edited properly and in a consistent style, and engage with your followers, and you will have your account looking amazing in no time at all!