You have created an Instagram account and identified your niche. And they forgot about the competitors. It is very important for a successful start and development to be able to correctly analyze competitors and determine what place you occupy among them.
Why is it necessary to monitor competitors and track their progress?
First of all, to understand how much effort you have to spend. The competition is great, and you are just a beginner.
Secondly, to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the opponents. The further strategy of the account development will depend on this.
Thirdly, you need to do an analysis every 2-3 months. But it is especially important to do the analysis at the initial stage of the launch.
What actions need to be taken to monitor competitors?
1. Search for competitors. This is done using the built-in search in the application itself, indicated by a "magnifying glass". In the search, you need to write keywords for your profile. For example: "coffee shop", "children's toys", "balloons", "cakes", etc. In the search, first of all, the most numerous accounts will appear, which will be your direct and direct competitors.
2. Now let's move on to the recommended section. In this section, Instagram itself will offer you interesting accounts, following your preferences. And if you previously searched for something on your profile, then it will give out similar user pages. It is especially important in a commercial account not to make inquiries based on personal preferences. This will violate the integrity of the recommendations. You do not want to see images of cats instead of beautiful cakes.
3. Search by hashtags. To do this, again you need to click on the "magnifying glass" icon and drive in the required search query. You can narrow it down by specifying your city as well. For example: "tortmoskva" or "kofekazan". The search will be more specific and accurate.
4. One of the most time-consuming tasks is subscriber analysis. To do this, you need to go to the section of your subscribers and see who they are subscribed to. Most likely, there will be several accounts similar in topic to yours. It is worth paying attention to these accounts and understanding how they attract your subscribers.
By completing these 4 steps, you will collect data about your competitors. This data will help you analyze and understand where you currently occupy in your niche. Pay close attention to the number of likes, comments, and prices of competitors. It is worth identifying the strengths of each account and analyzing how they “serve” their product or service. Each account has its own style and its own promotion strategy. You shouldn't repeat it, but you can improve and bring something to your blog.
There are also some services that can help you with the analysis. For example, livedune.
The last step is to subscribe to your competitors and monitor their actions. How they maintain an account, what they tell subscribers, what they entice and what promotions they carry out. It's better to create a separate account for this.
