Growth on Instagram and YouTube
Hey everyone!
Just reflecting on my progress on Instagram and YouTube. It can be challenging to build up audience for these 2 platforms, but definitely not impossible.
Account created: 27 Feb 2018
1k followers: 230th post, 17 Nov 2019
10k followers 538th post, 30 Dec 2020
As of today: 11065 followers
It took a while to get to a thousand because in 2018, I wasn't posting regularly and didn't find do research on how to increase followers faster. I only started to be consistent in late 2018, and it actually took me about a year to hit 1k followers.
Instagram (and other social media platforms) always change their algorithm in terms of pushing out a post. I'd say I was doing the right stuff at that time because my account was kinda blowing up from when I hit 1k followers in Dec 2019 till Aug 2020, increasing about 1k followers a month, which was substantial to me because in my niche (Marvel action figures). There are many action figure photography and reviewers who have waaaay better pictures but I'm overtaking them in number of subscribers.
Then Instagram Reels came out (a new function in the app) around mid 2020. Reels was only for selected country, and it wasn't available where I'm at. It's a short video that you can post, which was something that Instagram was trying to do to compete with TikTok. When a platform pushes out a new function, they push the content of those who use it.
Since I don't have Reels, my followers growth dipped. I still managed to hit 10k followers by end of 2020 though. I was posting almost every day that year.
YouTube
Account created: 21 March 2020
1k subscribers: 22 Feb 2021
As of today: 112 videos, 1022 subscribers
I started the channel last year the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. I was hesitant (I'm camera-shy lol), but just decided to go ahead anyways. It was a steep learning curve, but I kinda get the hang of it. Just that it can be time consuming editing the video.
I cringe looking back at my first 10 videos lol. My recent videos are a bit better. If you watch them, you'd probably say they're not really an awesome, not even good, probably just 'ok' at most, but I still manage to get 1k subscribers.
YouTube has the YouTube partnership program whereby you need at least 1k subscribers and 4000 watch hours a year to earn from their ads. I'm at 1k, but my watch hour is only at 2500 hours. My watch hours only started to pick up last October or so when my videos improved, so yeah getting those hours is a work in progress.
I also place affiliate links at my YouTube videos, so that's another option for your affiliate earnings.
You can take a look at my IG and YouTube Channel here:
www.instagram.com/stillfigurineout
www.youtube.com/c/stillfigurineout
Check out the training I did for IG and YouTube too:
https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/training/how-to-increase-you...
https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/training/youtube-channel-get...
Maybe it might be of some help if you're working on these 2 platforms.
Anyways, bottom line is that the social media 'game' can be difficult, but not impossible.
I'm still working out on ways to increase earnings through IG and YouTube; if you have any suggestions to do so, do share it in the comments below.
Idris =)
Recent Comments
10
I am just getting into Youtube. I find this post very inspiring. I particularly appreciate you including the timeline and the number of posts to each media showing that how much you have worked at this. Thanks.
Thank you! In my niche, I've seen some who grew their channel faster than me, they simply churn out videos at a faster rate, like 3 or more video uploads a week (and of course, they upload videos that people want to watch/videos that have information that people are seeking).
Hi Idris. Thanks for the post. Have you got any tips on increasing followers on youtube? I'm currently at 45 after doing 100 videos and really want to get to the 1000.
Oh wow 100 videos and only 45 subscribers.. I understand that feeling when you produce content and don't get much views on them.
You should really watch those YouTube growth channel, like Nick Nimmin, Bryan G Johnson, Thinkmedia, and plenty others. That's how I learn to manage my channel.
Some areas that might have room for improvement:
In terms of how the channel looks
- Channel banner
- Thumbnail
- Channel description
- links on channel banner
- custom url (like mine - youtube.com/c/yourchannelname)
Video
- length of video (too long?)
- editing (too much talking? Cut out unnecessary parts)
- video and sound quality
- seo keywords
And of course there are many other areas that you can work on as well. Watching those YouTube channel growth videos would really help.
Lastly, install Tubebuddy plug in. It helps with looking at your data.
Hope this helps. =)
Posting regularly to Instagram definitely is the trick. We have been posting several times a day to Insta over the last month and we have grown by over 1000 followers already.
Likewise we have upped our game on Pinterest as well and have gone from 1.3k monthly views to 6.7k in a month.
Youtube is not so good for us yet. We post once a week and only have 16 subs so far!
Great info in your post, showing that it is perseverance that wins the day.
Wishing you every success
Jon and Debbie
Awesome! I took more than a year to reach 1k on Instagram lol.
Yeah Pinterest is an area I wanna up my game too!
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Very well done, Idris!
Jeff
Thanks Jeff!
You're welcome, Idris!