How to Leverage Instagram as a Health and Wellness Expert

You’re waiting for the kid’s school bus, or sitting in the doctors office waiting room really not wanting to touch the crusty magazines on the table in front of you, so naturally, you reach for your phone for short-term entertainment. Where do you go to pass a few minutes? My #2 choice (after Pinterest) is Instagram.

Instagram has become one of the greatest tools for small businesses to take advantage of, to widen their reach.
With over 500 million active monthly users and 4.2 billion likes per day, you can see why exactly it’s such a beneficial platform for wellness businesses.

Facebook is starting to feel a little stale, Twitter is extra “business casual” (yuck), Snapchat is still young and a little immature, but Instagram still feels just right.

In addition to that, 75% of Instagram users take action, such as visiting a website, after looking at an Instagram advertising post. Um hello?! 75% chance of getting a customer, I’d take those odds any day over a measly 2% conversion from email!

You’re probably thinking: “Yeah, yeah, so Instagram is great, but how exactly do I use it for my business? I don’t want to be annoyingly sales-y.”

Yeah, I hear ya.

Here are a handful of ways to use Instagram effectively as a Wellpreneur.

Share Good & Relative Photos

– This keeps your feed looking pretty for your current followers, and hooks new ones to follow you. Good photos are key to an effective Instagram account.

Post Consistently

– This makes it so easy for people to learn to expect to hear from you. Being a frequent flier on Instagram matters for several reasons – to stay relevant, you need to regularly show up in their feed. Also, the chance of new followers finding you is more likely when you post content regularly – as people engage, their activity shows up in their followers’ activity feeds. Plus, if you’re using hashtags, each time you post, you have the opportunity to get new people to your account and following you!

Use Instagram Stories

– Posting stories is an awesome way to encourage engagement with your followers. It’s still relatively new to Instagram, so the amount of people using stories for business is somewhat low. Which, I estimate will change as time goes on and more people realize what an effective tool it is. Take full advantage of it while you can before the floods of wellpreneurs come in.

Incorporate Seasonal Content

– This is easy to skip, as you’re mostly concerned about posting your latest blog post, or promotion. You’re still a real human, remember, so connect with your followers as the seasons pass. Christmas, Hanukkah, Thanksgiving, Chinese New Year, etc. Share how you’re celebrating, or even seasonal specials. Fun idea: if you’re a nutritionist, promote healthy/alternative holiday recipes! Tailor this to your niche – Easy and effective.

Join an Instagram Pod!

– These are amazing tools that you can put together with others in your niche to create engagement on each others posts, to help everyone collectively. So how they work: You’ll usually get together with these people you want to join a pod with on another platform other than Instagram, though it could happen there. So one person creates the “pod” which is a group Direct Message on Instagram where you can all post your new posts, asking for likes and comments. This is awesome for engagement because it’s real folks, related to your industry, that are commenting, and liking on your posts. And you do the same for them, of course! This is an amazing way to make friends!

I take this one back. (as of 2020)

Post Targeted Content

– Post content that your target market engages with. You might do some research and notice that your competitors are posting more quotes, or perhaps some quick tips, and getting tons of engagement. Test this out by posting your own branded quotes or tips related to your specific wellness niche, and see how your followers react! Don’t forget to use related hashtags!

Promote Your Instagram Account Elsewhere

– Join Facebook groups, and when they have their “share your stuff” posts, share your Instagram account! Put your handle on your business cards, and include your feed in your website. Having your live feed directly on your website is an amazing way for people to get a sneak peak at your content, and hook them in to see more, therefore encouraging them to follow you.

Leverage those Hashtags

– Posts with hashtags get on average 12.6% more engagement. Using hashtags in your posts is a great way to help new people discover your account. They’re searching for what you’re posting, make sure you’re using the hashtags that relate to your post and your industry. Sure, some hashtags have been overrun with spammy posts, but there are still super relevant hashtags that you can leverage to grow your instagram account.

Plan for Reposting Potential

– This can be tricky. There are accounts on Instagram that curate and repost others content for a living. Have you ever seen those accounts that just post cat photos? Yes, those, but there are some for your specific industry. In order to get their attention, use their hashtags, and make it known that you’re posting content that they may like, and might be interested in reposting. Yogi? Check out yoga based instagram feeds that only repost yoga related photos, and use the tags they use (or maybe they’ll mention one in their bio that you should use to be noticed for reposting purposes)

Tag People, Brands, and Places

– When you do this, make sure the person, place, or brand is actually in the photo. If you do this without actually including the specific thing, it looks spammy to the people or brands you tagged. No one likes a spammer. By tagging brands, people, and locations it brings their attention to your post, and perhaps that may lead to a repost for your account! #Score.

There is a ton of information in this post that will let you easily grow your Instagram account for your wellness business.

What are you doing to grow your Instagram account?

What are some of your favorite hashtags?