Last fall, I was feeling really frustrated with Instagram. My reach was so low (a few hundred views per post) and consequently it didn’t feel fun to create reels or spend time on Instagram anymore.
What was the point if no one was even going to see it?
There had been -and still is- all this hype around reels and posting daily. A lot of the information I was seeing didn’t seem genuine (20k followers in 30days!) and I was really apprehensive that it would work for me me. But, I also had nothing to lose. I decided to post a reel every day for a minimum of 30 days to see what would happen.
THE APPROACH
My biggest concern with posting daily was that I would run out of ideas for content, especially since I don’t spend every day in the studio creating. My past approach to reels was to share A LOT of my process - sometimes using the entire 90 seconds available for a reel. Because of this I had a lot of old video to re-work into new content. There is also this trend to use “b roll” video which I tired to embrace. Things that weren’t -perfect- previously became -good enough- for the experiment. I kept the new reels short (generally around from 9-30 seconds) and used trending audio.
A tip for trending audio is to always save the audio you like from other reels - then when it comes to making your own reels you wont have to go searching for the best song or clip. I find that this saves a lot of time.
An unexpected thing that happened during this experiment was that I started to enjoy the process of reels. It was if the pressure was taken off and the goal was to simply get something out there. I started to pay more attention to the videos I liked seeing and also the artist reels I wasn’t interested in. I wanted to create reels that were fun and not gimmicky. I definitely didn’t want to trick viewers or waste their time. Most “Instagram trends” feel too put on or performative for me, so I wanted to avoid those too.
Throughout the month+ of posting reels daily I began to find what felt like a more authentic approach. I kept my reels simple and had a few limited styles that I stuck to. Short process videos, reels showing finished work, and video’s with words over them seemed to become my go-tos. I really believe the “trick” to not getting burnt out on creating content is to find a way to make it not feel like work - to think about it in a way more centered on connection rather than numbers really helped shift my perspective. Also letting go of perfection actually made my reels better because I was creating and experimenting more and consequently learning MORE.
My advice for the setting up part of reels is to not over-think it. You don’t need an elaborate set up to create video content. Find the simplest way to make them work for you. With that in mind, I do think there needs to be a certain level of quality to the videos - get a phone/camera stand if needed and find some natural light to record your content in.
THE RESULTS
The first 20 days were slow and I didn’t see much change but after that the numbers seemed to take off. I had one reel do really well (80k views which for me was really good) and that brought in a lot of new followers and obviously expanded my reach.
People talk about the “algorithm” a lot like its some mean thing out to get you - but I am fairly certain there are multiple algorithms and it takes being consistent for one to catch onto your patterns.
I found that hashtags didn´t have a huge impact on reach. I experimented with no hashtags (just typing the words), lots of hashtags, a few hashtags, and also embedding the hashtags in the video itself. Even though there wasn’t a noticeable difference, I did discover that I prefer to use hashtags because then I can search my reel or post to see if it made it higher up on the Explore page.
By the end of the 40 days, my reach was over 100,000, and I had gained over 2,000 followers. Most importantly, I saw a significant increase in sales and visits to me website.
I’m sharing this to offer a realistic and hopefully encouraging perspective for other artists and makers of what is possible.
There is so much gatekeeping in social media and art spaces. But I don’t think that everything as to be for profit and genuinely believe that we ALL benefit as artists when others succeed.
Please let me know if you have any questions in the comments.
This post is based on a reel about this 40 day experiment that can be found HERE
I wanted to note that the reach for all of this was organic - I did not use any paid advertising for any of the reels posted.