How the Instagram algorithm works in 2024
Before we get started, here’s an important message about Instagram...
Instagram is not against you!
If it were trying to piss us off and never show our content to anyone, how would they make money from advertising?
Instagram is a business - it wants good content that keeps people on the platform.
It’s not purposefully not showing your content to your community.
It’s just that your content isn’t that good. So it’s up to you to get better!!
Here’s how the algorithm works in 2024...
1: You post something new to your page
Instagram doesn’t immediately show this to all your followers. It tests it out first.
2: Small group test
Instagram shows your post to a small group of your closest followers. These are the people who often like, comment or spend time on your posts.
If your community is very small, this may only be a few followers - so you only have a few chances to make an impact here.
3: Performance check
If this small group engages with your post (e.g. via likes, comments, shares or saves), Instagram rates it as a post that has promise and moves to the next phase.
4: Show a wider audience
Since the small group engaged with it, Instagram will show your post to a bigger group of your followers and even some people who don't follow you but might like similar content.
This is how you get new followers.
5: The post takes off
If the bigger group also engages well with your post Instagram will keep pushing it to even more people.
The better the post does with each group, the more people get to see it.
6: Snowball
Quality posts then gain a snowball effect - if it starts well, it grows bigger and reaches more people as it goes along.
Really good posts may end up on the explore page - and this is when they can go ‘viral’.
Instagram isn’t against you...
It wants to show your content to your community - but only if it’s good enough.
It will only show content that your community enjoys and engages with.
So the aim isn’t to get people to just look at your post and scroll past - you need them to interact with it in some way.
If they aren’t yet interacting with your content you need to try some different formats. And always make sure to include a Call to Action at the end to encourage them to engage in some way (e.g. save this post for later!)
Thanks for reading and catch you in my next post :)
Clare x
Dr Clare Le Roy
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