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I'm getting an unexpected audience on Instagram, should I change my content?

by shay_dreamside

I'm pretty inexperienced with Instagram and social media in general - I've just always been a lurker.

Now I'm trying to get started with socials for a side project, a local events and community website. So I made an instagram account and I started posting things like upcoming events, and started getting a few follows. But then some life stuff came up, an illness in the family, and I put my side project on the back burner and stopped posting.

I have no idea why, but after a few weeks of not posting at all, I started getting a bunch more followers (yay?), but it's mostly local businesses, not residents. And they're engaging with my posts and DMing me, which is cool, but they're not really my intended audience.

Now that I have some time to work on my side project again, what should I do? Should I change my content to be more directed at businesses, or stick to my original strategy of posting content for residents? ... or both??

shay_dreamside's avatarshay_dreamside
on March 27, 2023
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  1. 1

    Sounds like the local businesses are attempting to leverage of your instagram as an aggregator of local people. The fact they found your insta is actually a big tick for you!

    For me, I always like to remember:

    • Businesses are people also. Perhaps they are not local residents as you say. But they are still WOMers.
    • The flip is also true, people work in businesses
    • Communities are group of people with a similar context (and sometimes purpose)

    Personally I would put my focus on building the side project, true to the purpose you wanted. Plus I would DM a few businesses to seek to understand what benefit they are receiving. That to me is the new opportunity that has presented itself.

    Story : YouTube started as a dating site. The 3 boys could not get any women to post, even for $20. They opened the content to broader than dating and it started gaining traction.

    Your site is different from YouTube, as your site is about community. When citizens see a community site has been over taken by marketing guff, or direct selling, it is more often a turn-off. As the world is a noisy, and the purpose of community is different to business, for many. I am a strong community person, so maybe what I see as community is not what you see as community.

    Last point, maybe you are getting residents to your insta, but no interaction. You can test this by creating an interaction event on UnboringKW e.g. a poll about something in your community, or a poll about your insta ...

    Since your last post I have been looking at similar 'what is going on in my community - awareness sites". It is an area that can definitely be transformed, jumped up a notch. The impact will increase with gpt4 as chatgpt becomes the go-to place to ask questions and dialogue about a place. I used to plan my recent trip. Have you tested what chatgpt says about your home town?

    catalystNewbie's avatar catalystNewbie
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    3 years ago
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  2. 1

    I think it depends on what you are trying to create with the original account. What was the intention?

    marin_vino's avatar marin_vino
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    3 years ago
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    1. 1

      Basically just to get more attention for the website, and have a way to engage with other people and companies who are active in the community. It's not a bad thing to have local businesses in my network, it's just surprising since most of the content I've been creating was meant for residents.

      shay_dreamside's avatar shay_dreamside
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      3 years ago
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      1. 1

        gotcha! Maybe the businesses are interested in being featured in your content, but still keep the main audience as the residents. I would keep the original line of content and see what comes up.

        marin_vino's avatar marin_vino
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        3 years ago
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