How to get more followers on Instagram: 10 strategies
Written by Kelsey Herbers
Published on March 20, 2026
Reading time 12 minutes
Table of Contents
Many brands use Instagram as the foundation of their social presence since it can drive traffic, support sales and engage customers. But if you’re not thrilled with your Instagram marketing growth and engagement, you’re not alone.
Competition on the network is fierce, and cracking the code of Instagram’s algorithm can be tricky. However, taking steps to increase your audience is absolutely worth it. The bigger your audience, the more opportunities you’ll have to build brand awareness. If you’re just starting out, learning how to promote your Instagram is the first step toward building a sustainable community.
If you’ve been feeling stuck, follow these 10 strategies to learn how to tweak your online presence to get more followers on Instagram.
10 key strategies to get followers on Instagram (for free)
To be clear, this post is about building an organic following—and yes, the distinction matters.
Some brands turn to pay-to-play sites that help them instantly up their follower count for the right price, but these services aren’t worth it for brands long-term. The Instagram algorithm weeds out low-quality accounts and fake engagement from paid bots. Plus, these “followers” aren’t going to turn into paid customers or valuable referrers.
Growing your audience authentically gets you results that actually matter to your business: brand awareness, increased revenue and loyal customers.
Watch the video below and continue reading for best practices on getting more followers for your Instagram account (the right way).
- Prioritize short-form video content
- Engage like your brand depends on it
- Post consistently–and strategically
- Collaborate with influencers to expand your reach
- Create personality and human-driven content
- Engage with customers and UGC
- Go live on Instagram
- Use hashtags and geotags to increase discovery
- Optimize profile for conversion
- Maintain a strong visual Instagram brand
1. Prioritize short-form video content
According to Sprout’s 2026 Social Media Content Strategy Report, consumers on Instagram are most likely to interact with short-form video content (under 60 seconds), particularly when it feels native and creator-driven. That makes original, episodic Instagram Reels a critical priority for brands looking to satiate the growing appetite for human-generated content.
Reels are fun and snappy algorithm gold. Use them to share tutorials, product highlights or quick behind-the-scenes peeks. To maximize your reach, learn how to get more Instagram likes by creating high-energy, relatable video content.
(Source: Instagram)
Since you only have a few seconds to grab attention, be sure to get creative. Add stickers, cuts, filters, music, voice-overs and transitions to craft trendy, eye-catching videos.
The best part? You can cross-promote these bite-sized videos on networks like TikTok to reach new audiences and attract more followers. However, expanding to new networks is often the biggest hurdle for social teams. According to our 2026 report, 87% of marketers want to show up on more networks, but many struggle with the manual effort required to manage multiple cross-platform presences.
Don’t let the manual overhead of cross-posting slow your momentum. With Sprout Social, you can move from “Instagram-only” to “multi-platform powerhouse” in minutes.
Use our unified calendar to seamlessly schedule, optimize and publish your Reels across Instagram and TikTok simultaneously, ensuring your brand stays visible exactly where your audience is scrolling.
2. Engage like your brand depends on it
Instagram is perfect for conversing with followers. In fact, many popular Instagram post ideas center around asking questions and engaging in a dialogue. Off-the-cuff questions, shipping concerns or praise for products are all fair game from followers.
Community-led growth is the standard. Your comment section isn’t just a place for customer service. It’s a goldmine for research and content inspiration.
As Josh Rangel, Social Media Director at Ogilvy, explained in the Sprout Social webinar, Index™ Insights: How to Gain Executive Buy-In for Bolder Social Moves in 2025: “I’m a big fan of saying that the comments are your creative brief for future content. Your audience is telling you exactly what they want and they’re giving you inspiration.”
For example, coffee company Cometeer actively responds to customer queries in their comments, showing genuine engagement with their interests and ideas.
(Source: Instagram)
(Source: Instagram)
You’d be surprised at how much your follower count can increase once you start acting more invested and personable towards your audience.
Not to mention, responsiveness signals both care to followers and engagement to the algorithm. You don’t need to monitor notifications constantly, but replying within a few hours during the business day can be a huge differentiator for how people perceive your brand. On the algorithm side, conversations in the comments section can extend a post’s lifespan and increase its reach beyond your existing audience.
Quick response times not only show that you’re attentive, they also build trust with potential customers, as they know they’ll be able to reach you if they need help.
Tools like Sprout’s Smart Inbox make this easier by routing incoming messages from all social networks into a single stream so you don’t have to stay on top of multiple message centers. The Collision Detection tool makes sure you aren’t sending duplicate messages if multiple team members are responding to queries from the same account and at the same time.
3. Post consistently—and strategically
Momentum matters in social media marketing. In other words, it’s tough to get more followers if you post without consistency. However, how often you post may not matter as much as it used to.
Today, impact outweighs volume. As consumer expectations shift toward authenticity and originality, brands that focus on connecting with their followers through high-quality content are more likely to stand out.
According to research from the 2025 Sprout Social Content Benchmarks Report, social media users consider how brands interact with their audience before deciding to hit “follow.” This gives you an opportunity to focus less on publishing and more time on meaningful engagement.
Posting less doesn’t mean doing less—it means making every post, interaction and partnership more purposeful.
If you’re still worried about visibility, consider how features like Instagram Stories can get more eyes on your content if it didn’t get the expected reaction the first time.
Scheduling content like Stories, carousels, Reels and posts in advance ensures control and organization. Using Instagram scheduling tools can help make sure your posts go out at optimal times, no matter how busy you are. The ability to crosspost content from other networks helps here, too.
While the above posting times are true at a global scale, they might not match when your followers are online. To get more granular data, you can also use Sprout’s ViralPost platform, which analyzes your engagement history and identifies the most active times for authentic interactions. You can then publish content automatically or manually.
4. Collaborate with influencers to expand your reach
If you want more Instagram followers, consider teaming up with social media influencers and other brands that share your values. Collaborations open doors to new audiences and help you build trust quickly.
Working with influencers in your niche, especially those with small but highly engaged followings, can amplify your reach and boost your visibility. However, finding the right influencers can be tough. Not every creator aligns with your brand or has an authentic following (in fact, they might be bots).
Working with creators in your niche, especially those with highly engaged communities, is one of the fastest ways to learn how to get more followers on Instagram. In 2026, creators aren’t just partners, they are media channels. Prioritize creators whose content consistently reaches non-followers, not just those with high engagement rates.
Sprout Social Influencer Marketing streamlines discovery by surfacing vetted creators that match your brand. You can also check out Sprout’s free influencer database by industry, which is full of insights to help you plan your next influencer marketing campaign.
Strategic brand partnerships can also boost your Instagram engagement and inject a fresh perspective into your feed. You don’t have to limit yourself to your own industry—think about your audience’s broader interests to come up with creative collaborations.
For example, Uber Eats teamed up with Blueland, a sustainable home essentials brand, to let people buy the eco-friendly company’s products directly from the Uber Eats app. The campaign included a co-branded Instagram Reel to drive awareness.
(Source: Instagram)
When approaching potential partners, focus on mutual value. Start small—co-hosting an Instagram Live or sharing each other’s content—then build bigger campaigns based on your results.
5. Create personality and human-driven content
Content that highlights your personality and the people behind your brand can help you connect on a deeper level. This includes:
- Inspirational content
- Humorous content
- Resharing UGC with unique captions
- Storytelling posts
- Behind-the-scenes photos and videos
- Posts raising awareness for social causes
Make sure everything aligns with your brand voice and values to ensure authenticity.
6. Engage with customers and UGC
Figuring out how to get more followers on Instagram means engaging your audience, and user-generated content is one of the best ways to do that.
UGC campaigns create social proof, but more importantly, they increase your chances of distribution. Content created by real customers often outperforms branded content because it aligns with how users engage with creator-style posts.
For example, Drunk Elephant skincare regularly regrams posts from community content it’s collected through branded #DrunkElephant and #DrunkBreak hashtags. These reposts often spark further engagement, like congratulatory comments from other followers.
(Source: Instagram)
But don’t just wait for UGC to happen—spark it yourself by encouraging your customers to create content. Give them a reason to share. For example, you could run a Reels contest where followers show off your product in action. Winners might receive free merch and a feature on your page.
7. Go live on Instagram
Instagram Live is a powerful way to interact directly with your audience and build a sense of community.
Lives are great for product launches, candid chats and Q&A sessions. If you run an e-commerce store, you can even use them to let viewers browse and buy your products in real time.
Plus, you can repurpose Live videos by downloading them and uploading them to your Stories for up to 24 hours, giving followers who missed out a chance to catch up.
In the example below, Chipotle used Instagram Live to share a margarita recipe for Cinco de Mayo celebrations.
(Source: Instagram)
8. Use hashtags and geotags to increase discovery
Location tags and hashtags are powerful tools on Instagram. They can help your target audience discover your posts (and profile) faster.
While Instagram hashtags have long been a staple on the network, how you use them matters more than how many you use. Overstuffing captions with hashtags provides diminishing returns and can clutter your aesthetic.
The key to using hashtags is to focus on industry-specific tags that are relevant to your customers. For example, Lashify regularly posts to the #LashEducation hashtag, which is less general and competitive than #beauty. Becoming visible within niche tags can be a meaningful way to increase discovery.
(Source: Instagram)
Understanding how your hashtags perform is also critical. Sprout’s hashtag analytics tools give you direct access to in-depth performance and usage data to take the guesswork out of knowing which ones to use.
Geotagging is a smart way to attract local followers. Using geotags in your posts and stories makes your content visible to nearby users and those checking where you took the photo or video.
(Source: Instagram)
To tag the location in your Instagram Story, simply use the location sticker and type in the place you want to tag.
9. Optimize profile for conversion
Visibility begins with searchability. Instagram is increasingly functioning as a search engine, meaning your profile, captions and content should include keywords your audience is actively searching for.
One way to make your profile more discoverable is to add the right keywords to your account.
There are three places to focus on here:
- Your username (or handle)
- Your profile name
- Your bio (or description)
To create a search-friendly username, stick to either your brand name or whatever’s closest to your existing social handles.
If your name is too long, shorten it to a variation that your audience will recognize. For example, Cold Stone Creamery’s account is @coldstone. You can always write the full version in your profile name.
(Source: Instagram)
Next is your bio. You can use this space to add keywords related to your niche, industry, products or services.
(Source: Instagram)
The keywords in Peach Slices’ description make the skincare brand more likely to pop up for search terms like “K beauty,” “skincare” and “acne.”
10. Maintain a strong visual Instagram brand
Instagram is a highly visual network. If your images or graphics aren’t eye-catching or interesting enough, they’ll quickly become victims of subconscious scrolling. And, if they aren’t consistent in terms of color, formatting, imagery and fonts, it’ll be hard for your audience to recognize what content is yours in their feed.
But brand consistency isn’t just important for in-feed posts—it’s also crucial for your profile. Consistent visuals help you create a cohesive, well-branded account. Disorganized or clashing content can make your profile feel unprofessional and overwhelming, which may turn away potential followers.
Your Instagram profile is part of your brand identity and can act as a first impression. Make sure you’re putting your best foot forward by presenting a clean, professional look and the information audiences need to quickly understand who you are. You can do this by:
- Using your brand name and an appropriately sized logo to make your profile instantly recognizable
- Adding your location to push your profile higher up in search results for local audiences
- Writing an engaging bio with keywords related to your industry, products and services
- Including links that drive meaningful interactions, like specific product pages or a social landing page with additional link options
(Source: Instagram)
How to grow your Instagram following with Sprout Social
Sprout helps social media marketers adopt a data-driven, intentional approach to gaining Instagram followers. This way, you don’t have to guess what to post or when.
Post when your audience is most active
Sprout’s Optimal Send Times feature automatically identifies several suggested times for you to post based on past engagement data. The times are suggested in the Compose box, eliminating the need to research your analytics every time you go to post.
(Source: Sprout Social)
Posting when your audience is most active increases your chances of engagement and expands your reach as they share your content.
Create smarter content, faster
Scale your content production with AI-powered captions and inspiration tools. Sprout’s AI Assist capabilities help you generate multiple Instagram captions in seconds. Just drop in a link or a couple of ideas, and it will deliver different drafts that match your brand voice.
You can also generate posts based on your top 20 text posts from the past year to help spark original ideas that resonate with your audience. You can post these as-is or send them to the Compose tool for editing.
Instead of pouring your energy into writing each post from scratch, you can channel it into revising and optimizing your messaging to make the process faster and more efficient.
Keep your publishing strategy on track
Sprout’s social media calendar lets you map out your marketing strategy and content calendar in advance. Use one unified calendar to create a posting schedule across all your networks, then filter it to view only one network at a time.
This makes it easier to cross-promote content across networks, helping you attract new followers while making social media management a lot simpler.
Spot trends and hashtags that drive discovery
Sprout’s hashtag tracking tools within its social media analytics feature pinpoint which hashtags perform best with your audience, including which get the most engagement from non-followers. These insights help you fine-tune your content strategy to improve reach and visibility.
You can also use Sprout’s AI-powered Social Listening tool to track real-time conversations across millions of posts, so you can spot active trends and jump in on the action.
What not to do when trying to grow your followers
As the social space becomes more crowded and competitive, it can be tempting to take risks for the sake of instant results. But when it comes to building your Instagram following, some shortcuts simply aren’t worth it.
Avoid the “quick fix” of purchased followers
Buying Instagram followers or likes might seem like a quick way to bump up your Instagram metrics, but it does more harm than good.
As social consumers get savvier, it’s easier for real followers to spot fake followers or bots. Privacy concerns and the rise of social scammers have made people hyper-aware of unusual activity, and a sudden spike in followers is a big red flag. This kind of surge can damage your reputation and hurt your long-term performance.
Also, fake followers don’t interact with your content, which drags down your engagement rate and signals to Instagram’s algorithm that your posts aren’t relevant. This could even lead to shadow banning, where your content becomes invisible to non-followers without warning.
Worse, buying Instagram followers violates the network’s terms of service. Meta has taken direct action against this practice in the past, including shutting down companies that sell likes.
All of this also rings true for follow-for-follow schemes. Following other profiles with the expectation of being followed in return might boost your numbers temporarily, but it typically leads to lower engagement and the same risks tied to suspicious activity.
How are you growing your Instagram following?
Getting more followers on Instagram isn’t going to happen by accident. And despite what you might have heard, there’s no silver-bullet solution.
Sustainable growth comes from consistent, data-driven strategies that attract an engaged, authentic audience. With a powerful publishing and analytics platform like Sprout, putting those strategies into action becomes faster and more effective.
Sprout’s platform supports Instagram audience growth through content planning, smart scheduling and performance analysis. Features like Optimal Send Times help you post when your audience is most active, while robust reporting tools surface insights about your top-performing content, hashtags and engagement trends.
Start your free 30-day trial today to see how Sprout’s suite of tools can help you build a stronger, smarter Instagram strategy.
FAQs Around Gaining Instagram Followers
How to increase Instagram followers?
Growing your audience authentically gets you results that actually matter to your business: brand awareness, revenue and loyal customers. Here are top 5 strategies to gain Instagram followers for free:
How can you optimize your Instagram account to gain followers?
Here are a few tips on getting new new followers:
- Place keywords in your name, handle and bio
- Add your location, core brand/product hashtags and relevant links
- Maintain your branding on Instagram and across other socials
How can you leverage tags and hashtags to increase Instagram followers?
Location tags and hashtags are powerful tools on Instagram. They can help your target audience discover your posts (and profile) faster.
Here are three strategies you can leverage tags to grow your following:
- Find hashtags where your followers hang out
- Use geo-tagging to attract local followers
- Leverage hashtag analytics tools to spot trends and gain insights
Can influencers help increase followers on Instagram?
If you want more Instagram followers, teaming up with other influencers can be a great way to reach new audience and increase followers on Instagram. Collaborations open doors to new audiences and help you build trust quickly.
Below are a few ways to expand your reach with partnerships.
- Find and work with influencers in your niche
- Partner with brands that are similar to yours
- Leverage influencer marketing tools to find best influencers & brands to collaborate
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