How to Find Your Niche on Instagram as an Influencer in 11 Super Simple Steps
Deciding on a niche is one of the most important and first things you should do when starting your Instagram journey. Assuming your goal is to become an influencer or gain a following as a content creator, you want to find your niche early on so that all your content is related.
Shifting your focus after the fact, or not having a focus at all, usually results in a bland mishmash of loosely related content themes. This is less effective for attracting a following and retaining fans, which creates an uphill battle on the world’s second most popular social media platform.
This article will discuss the theory behind an Instagram niche, tips for finding yours, and examples of what makes a niche successful. If you are lost about how to find your niche on Instagram, start here!
What Is a Niche on Instagram?
A niche is a specific focus. Some consider broad categories like “makeup” or “fashion” to be niches, while it is usually helpful to drill down even further—for example, new makeup trends or mom fashion choices.
The purpose of a niche is to minimize competition while consolidating valuable content all related to a similar topic. The result is that users interested in that topic can come to you as a resource to learn more and stay up to date with their interests. Minimizing competition is vital on Instagram with its growing popularity.
If you don’t select a niche, your content will likely be a smattering of many different things, which won’t appeal to every follower. This is likely to result in those fans finding more focused sources elsewhere. But if you stay focused on a particular niche and keep all of your content revolving around that central idea, you will attract fans interested in that topic and keep them coming back for more.
The Importance of Having an Instagram Niche
You may think the ideal focus of your Instagram page should just be whatever suits your fancy at the time. After all, won’t your fans be interested in everything you are?
Not always.
If you aim to gain influence on Instagram to leverage later on, it can be helpful to stay laser-focused on a specific topic of interest to others. This ensures consistency in your content and allows you to become an authority in that field, which will help attract like-minded people to your page.
11 Steps to Finding the Right Niche
Choosing a niche is very nebulous but critically important for your brand. If you aren’t sold on any single topic, use these tips to narrow down your options.
1. Begin With a Larger Audience
If you aren’t sure which niche to go with, an important thing to consider is the popularity of that category. For example, a vast industry like makeup will have more opportunities than something less mainstream, like astronomy. If you are having trouble narrowing down ideas, go big!
2. Do Competitive Research
The problem with larger audiences is that you will likely encounter much more competition. If you think you’ll have trouble getting a foothold among the competition, it may be better to consider alternatives, even if those categories have a smaller audience.
While researching the competition, look for underserved areas in the niche that you can fill. This is also good practice for learning how to find influencers in your niche on Instagram, which is what you want your fans to do with you.
3. Utilize Existing Demographic Insights
Part of leveraging a niche is understanding your target market. Who are you creating content for, and what are they interested in? You can use analytics to determine your audience’s demographics, but understand that your followers aren’t always your ideal audience. Targeting the right people to help you achieve your objectives is important.
4. Conduct Social Listening
Social listening is the practice of investigating how people are talking about your brand or products online. This could be advocates suggesting your company or product they enjoyed or unhappy shoppers throwing mud on your good name. Knowing what your audience thinks about your brand is crucial to position yourself appropriately in your niche.
5. Improve Instagram Targeting Through Story Polls
Story polls are not only a fun way to interact with your followers but can be used to glean valuable insight about your biggest fans. You can try asking simple questions like what type of content your followers prefer, what their favorite post has been so far, or about their interests to give you new ideas for future content.
6. Don’t Underestimate Hashtags
Compared to the rest of the advancements in the social media sphere, hashtag tools seem like old news. However, it would be foolish to ignore the classics in this case. Hyper-relevant hashtags are still effective for SEO and brand visibility, so don’t be shy about having a marketing strategy to add them to your content!
7. Make the Most of Location Tagging
While niches generally refer to business ideas, product types, or general activities, they can also relate to locations. For example, there is not a lot of surfing stuff in North Dakota. So if your business has a physical location or is tied to a specific area, take advantage of location tagging to connect with local customers in your scene.
8. Connect with Influencers in Your Niche
It may sound strange to cooperate with the competition, but being an influencer isn’t the same as other businesses. If you can find another influencer who complements your niche without directly competing, great, but even direct competitors have found success collaborating. Most fans are loyal to a single influencer covering their interests, so sharing and combining audiences tends to help more than hurt.
9. Participate in Trending Conversations
There are all sorts of trends taking over social media. These can be hot discussion topics, viral challenges, or the latest dance craze. There is no shame in jumping on the bandwagon if that means picking up more followers for making a quick video with descriptive hashtags!
10. Collect Insights from Your Content
It is important to manage your content after the fact, don’t just post and forget about it. Be sure to respond to comments and interact with your fans whenever possible. It is also vital to track which posts perform well and which don’t to make decisions about the direction of your future content.
11. Start Engaging!
Engagement rates are one of the most important metrics for Instagram influencers. In addition to posting consistently, having high engagement will attract more followers and keep the ones you have active. Engagement is also one of the metrics brands will look for when sponsoring influencers. So keep the above tips in mind, and keep creating quality content!
Scale Your Instagram Influence With Scalefluence!
If you are having trouble finding your footing as an influencer, the experts at Scalefluence are here to help! We provide training and guides to help you get on the right path to success, and we work with brands to find good fits for influencer marketing partnerships.
We work with all major social media platforms, Instagram being one of the top three. We can help you develop a content strategy for your perfect niche and the primary audience, including multi-platform tactics.
Your success is our success, so let us help you achieve your dream. Whether you are a seasoned influencer or still wondering how to find your niche on Instagram, contact us today!
