Growing a meme page on Instagram can be a challenging task.
If you’re starting the account from scratch with no prior connections, growing it might seem impossible.
Moreover, there are thousands of meme pages on Instagram which makes it harder.
In order to stand out from the rest, you’ll need to post really unique content.
In this article, you’ll learn how to grow a meme page on Instagram from scratch using 7 actionable steps.
- Step #1: Pick a (sub) niche
- Step #2: Optimize your profile
- Step #3: Join follow for follow groups
- Step #4: Post often, but not too much
- Step #5: Use the right hashtags
- Step #6: Always engage
- Step #7: Add your niche in your name
Step #1: Pick a (sub) niche
The first and most important step to grow a meme page on Instagram is to pick a niche.
The bread and butter of a successful meme page on Instagram lies in its niche.
However, you shouldn’t just pick a niche—pick a sub-niche. This is because a sub-niche allows your page to stand out from the rest.
For example, instead of just posting random memes, you can post memes about gym, astrology, relationship, etc.
Successful meme pages on Instagram tend to post hilarious or relatable content that caters to a specific audience.
Content that makes you go, “This is so relatable!”. Content that really resonates with people. Remember, the keyword here is, “relatable”. After all, relatable content is the trend on Instagram.
An example of a meme page on Instagram that is successful at this is @zodiacbear.
This account caters to people who are into astrology and zodiac memes. Check out the number of people that related to the post in the comment section.
Now you might be wondering, “Can I start a meme page without posting relatable content?”.
The answer is—you sure can, but it’s much harder to. Posting general or random memes isn’t going to make the cut because they are way too saturated.
Similarly, it shows that you put little to no effort in sticking to a theme that will shun potential followers away.
Moreover, relatable content tends to get shared on Instagram stories and messages more often than non-relatable ones.
There are tons of niches you can dive into on Instagram. You should look into the ones that you’re passionate about.
That way, you’ll know the type of content that your audience relates to.
Step #2: Optimize your profile
After you’ve picked your niche, it’s time to optimize your profile.
Optimizing your profile is pretty straightforward, but many meme pages get this wrong.
They either have a low-quality profile picture, a senseless bio, no highlights, or an inconsistent theme.
These pitfalls can hold someone back from following you. The key here is to make your profile as appealing as possible to attract people to follow you.
There are four parts to optimizing your profile:
- Profile picture
- Bio
- Highlights
- Theme
By the end of this section, you should be able to have an immaculate profile.
Let’s get to each one of these parts in detail.
Profile picture
First and foremost, you need to have a high-quality profile picture for your meme page.
Your profile picture is one of the very first things someone will see when visiting your page.
That being said, your profile picture needs to be professional or at least decent enough to attract people to follow you.
So the question is, what profile picture should you use?
As a rule of thumb, you should use a profile picture that is related to your niche.
For example, if your page is about cat memes, your profile picture should have a cat in it. That way, people will able able to tell who your page is for.
Try not to use a picture that is unrelated to your niche as it doesn’t make much sense to.
Bio
Next, your bio plays a huge role in telling people what your meme page is about.
Your bio should be able to explain the niche of your page in a few words. It’s also really helpful if you want to promote your other accounts or a website.
If you have other accounts that you want to promote, you can add a @username on your bio.
On the other hand, if you want to promote your website, you can add the link in your bio.
Tip: Use a pointing down emoji (?) to increase link clicks.
A good tip is to use a pointing down emoji to increase link clicks.
Sometimes, people need to be prompted to click on something, and a pointing down emoji does the trick.
Highlights
Instagram highlights is an opportunity for you to beautify your profile.
It’s basically a section below your profile where you can showcase your previous stories.
You can also add a custom cover to each highlight by posting them on your story beforehand.
Though not as important, Instagram highlights is a great way for your audience to get to know your meme page better.
Unlike Instagram stories where they will disappear after 24 hours, highlights will stay on your profile forever.
However, the only setback for this is that you won’t be able to track the number of people that have viewed your highlights.
Step #3: Join follow for follow groups
Now that you picked a niche and optimized your profile, it’s time to expand your follower-base.
Growing your followers should be one of your main priorities. Without followers, your posts will get little to no engagement as they won’t show up in anyone’s feed.
After all, posting something that gets no likes or comments is a waste of time as no one is engaging.
However, growing your followers is challenging, especially if you have no prior connections.
Moreover, there are tons of generic advice out there on the internet; and none of them work well.
One of the more unconventional strategies out there to grow your Instagram followers is to join follow for follow groups.
These groups are places where you can share your Instagram link with others and connect with people within your niche.
There are a number of follow for follow groups on Reddit, Facebook, and even Tumblr.
For a start, you can try joining r/Instagram and r/Followback and share your Instagram link there.
Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to use them:
- Share your Instagram link and a short description of your meme page.
- Follow others that might be interested in your page.
- Direct message them, “From Reddit” for a follow back.
You can gain about 10 to 20 followers a day from doing this.
However, you need to be wary of the rate that you’re following and direct messaging others. If you follow or direct message too fast, you will be action blocked.
The action block is a temporary block that can last for a few hours, 24 hours, or more. This will hinder your growth efforts.
In order to prevent the action block, be sure to follow others and direct message them in intervals of 5 to 10 minutes.
All in all, joining follow for follow groups is a quick way to grow your meme page on Instagram from scratch.
In addition to follower growth, your engagement rate will increase as well if you connect with the right people.
There are lots of people who grew their followers by the hundreds using these follow for follow groups and even increased their engagement rate.
The best part is, you can stop using them once you’re satisfied with your numbers.
Now you might be wondering, “What about my follower/following ratio? Wouldn’t it be negatively affected?”.
Typically, your followers to following ratio should be around 1:1 after using follow for follow groups for a while.
Considering that there will be a large number of people who don’t follow you back, your ratio will improve dramatically after you clean your following.
Step #4: Post often, but not too much
Forthly, you should post consistently, but don’t overpost. Overposting is a very common mistake that people make.
The rate that you’re posting might seem unimportant, but it may make or break your meme page in the long run.
If you post too much, your posts might end up being muted by your followers.
Overposters are one of the worst kinds of people on Instagram for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, people who overpost will flood your feed with their posts. This may bury the posts from the people you care about.
Because of this, you might miss your close friends’ or family’s posts as they may be pushed to the bottom of your feed.
Secondly, it’ll be harder for you to like every post on your feed.
If you’re following people who post too much, it’s harder to stay updated on your feed as you’ll have to scroll for a longer time.
The only way your feed is going to be sorted in chronological order is if you liked every single post on it. Since there are way too many posts, you might not be able to do so.
In addition, people who overpost tend to get their posts muted by some of their followers.
That being said, your engagement rate will be negatively affected if you overpost. As a rule of thumb, you should aim to post no more than once a day.
Posting more than once a day seems “spammy” to others and they might end up muting your posts.
Step #5: Use the right hashtags
Hashtags can help increase the reach and engagement of your posts.
They are important as it can get your posts discovered by people who are not following you.
If you’re just relying on your followers to engage, the number of likes you’ll get on your posts is limited.
Whenever you add a hashtag to a post, the post will be on the hashtag search results.
So, in order to maximize your post’s visibility, you need to add as many effective hashtags as possible in the comment section or caption of your post.
However, there are certain limits that you have to follow when using hashtags on your posts.
You should only use a maximum of 30 hashtags, and don’t use banned hashtags. Otherwise, your account may be shadowbanned.
Currently, the argument is that hashtags don’t work as well as they used to.
Although this is true, there are still a lot of hashtags that can drive a ton of likes to your post.
The thing about hashtags is that the majority of users liking your posts from them are bots. These bots are automated to like posts with certain hashtags as soon as they are posted.
Since Instagram’s announcement in reducing inauthentic activity, the number of bots and automation have plummeted in the platform.
Nevertheless, there are still a ton of bots on Instagram.
With all that being said, the general idea is to target hashtags that have a lot of bot activity as it’ll garner the most number of likes.
Based on my extensive research, Portuguese and Indian hashtags tend to bring in the most likes.
Examples of these hashtags are: #gainwithpaula, #chuva, #chavadeseguidores, #keralatourism, #godsowncountry, #chavadeseguidores.
You can experiment with these hashtags to see which combinations bring in the highest number of likes.
Alternatively, you can search for one of these hashtags on Instagram from a desktop, find a recent post, and copy all of their hashtags.
Do note that hashtags only work if your meme page is set to public. Hence, if your account is private, I highly recommend that you switch to a public one.
When it comes to hashtags, you should defer from using popular ones as they’re too saturated.
If you use popular hashtags like #love, your post will be buried in the hashtag search results. Chances are, you’re going to get little to no likes from them.
Step #6: Always engage
The notion is simple—in order for you to receive engagement, you’ll have to give engagement.
Your engagement rate is the most important metric on Instagram.
Followers are important; but if the majority of them are inactive, it’ll negatively affect your engagement rate.
Engagement rate is measured by likes divided by followers.
For example, if you have 1,000 followers and your latest post has 100 likes, your engagement rate is 10% (100/1000).
If your meme page is under 1,000 followers, you should aim for a 10 to 20% engagement rate.
In order to accomplish that, you’ll have to follow others back and make sure to consistently like their posts.
Don’t try to attain a perfect followers/following ratio as it is very egocentric, and you’ll lose a lot of followers in the process.
Following others back and liking their posts also shows that you care about your followers, which will pay off in the long run.
In addition, you should try your best to reply to every comment and direct message you receive.
Remember, no one is obligated to like or comment on your posts.
If they commented something positive on your post, it shows that they took the time and effort to do so.
Make sure to show your appreciation by replying to their comment. At the very least, you can like their comment if you don’t have the time to reply.
Back to the main point—if you’re interacting with others’ posts, they’re inclined to reciprocate and like your content back.
As such, your average likes will increase, which will benefit your engagement rate in the long run.
Step #7: Add your niche in your name
Lastly, you can add your meme page’s niche in your name. This will help to improve your SEO on Instagram.
Instead of using your real name as your name on Instagram, use keywords related to your niche instead.
Instagram search is very limited—you can only search for someone’s name or username. This means that your bio won’t be used as a factor in the search results.
That being said, you can add a keyword in your name so that people can find you based on your niche.
For example, if your niche is about gym memes, you can use it as your name instead of your real name.
So, whenever someone searches for the term “gym memes” on Instagram, your page can show up on the search results.
This gives people the ability to discover your meme page from keywords; which will improve its visibility.
Conclusion
In this article, you’ve learned 7 steps to successfully start and grow a meme page on Instagram.
If there’s one thing that you should takeaway from this article; make sure to pick a niche that stands out from the crowd.
There are a lot of meme accounts on Instagram, but there are only a handful of good ones.
For some inspiration, you can check out @piscesthingz, @the.gym.rat, @nbamemes, @unpopularcats. ✨
Further Reading
List of Instagram Follow for Follow Groups
How to Grow a Private Account on Instagram (5 Steps)
How to Find Someone on Instagram Without Knowing Their Username
