September 3, 2018

I posted for 31 Days straight on Instagram

Hi everyone,

Welcome to September! It seems like the year just started and it's already ending. I'm not sure if I've accomplished a quarter of the things I wanted to do this year. But there are 4 months in the year left - a little over 120 days, so I really should do what I can to make them count.


Today I'd like to share about how my approach to social media (Instagram in particular) has changed in the past few months. As a blogger, I typically would be looking to have as many likes as possible on my photos. Influencers (which I am certainly not, but maybe one day I'll get there) like to see a high amount of likes and engagement on their posts. There are some who will delete a photo or video because it didn't get a base number of likes. I should point out that sometimes it's out of vanity, but a lot of times, the need for likes comes from a business standpoint. Brands usually look for social media accounts with not only a large following, but also very high engagement (likes, comments, etc).

Ideally, if I wanted my blog brand to make money, I would be going after the likes (there are several things you can do to increase your IG likes and engagement). However, you all know that I've struggled with life and blogging in the past couple of years. That doesn't mean that I lost my blogger mindset. In the back of my mind, I'd still wonder about how many likes a photo would get and silently complain to myself if a photo had less than a certain number of likes. 

But that's kinda changed for me since I took on a photo challenge in May. I was born in May, and decided to follow a Photo A Day challenge I found online. I had a couple of followers join the challenge, and I'm glad they did because halfway through, I was tired. But then I'd see that one of them put up their daily post, and I had to follow suit. 

An unexpected part of doing the challenge came with seeing some posts get less than 20 or 30 likes - to be sure, sometimes I posted just for posting sake. At first, I didn't like seeing a post with so few likes (when I was more used to 150+, which is still low compared to other people, but wa'evs). With time though, I noticed that I wasn't "chasing" likes anymore. I was posting because I wanted to post, and it wasn't necessarily for an audience. 

I think that it's great to post photos, videos, and blog posts for an audience - you learn what they like and can tailor your output to their tastes. That helps build your brand of course. However, I think that sometimes, authenticity is lost that way. As in, are you posting to "perform" for your audience or because you actually like what you're posting? If you really like your posts, then it may likely become less important if people don't react to them as much as you want them to. 

Does this mean that I don't care if a post still gets less than 50 likes? Not really. But it doesn't bug me as much as it used to. 

If you'd like to see the pictures I posted, just click here for my #PhotoADay highlights.

P.S. You can expect to see a blog post every Monday from me going forward, and at least 2 videos on Youtube every month. Please subscribe to my Youtube channel if you're not already.

2 comments:

  1. Hey girl. Photo challenges really do stretch you, but it does teach you a thing or two about acceptance. Anyway I've subscribed to your channel. Looking forward to your content.

    Madeline
    www.madelinewilsonojo.com

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  2. Nice write up. As a business owner, likes are definitely important, because it gives the business the much need exposure. It’ll be nice if likes immediately converted to sales, but hey I’ve learned not to worry too much and just maintain consistency. P.S: I loved your photo a day challenge.

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