How to Create Instagram Posts that Go Viral

Do’s and Don’ts to Create Viral Instagram Posts: Change Your IG Success Level

Create powerful Instagram posts that go viral with these 18 specific goals. What to do and what to avoid to take your Instagram to a whole new level!

How to Create Instagram Posts that Go Viral

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Do you ever wonder what it would take for your posts to go viral? I mean, really hit the big time. There are many factors we cannot control, and we acknowledge a degree of luck and timing. But there are still many things you can control to increase your chances. Focus on the following objectives and you will undoubtedly increase your traffic and engagement. Perform well with all 18 of these goals and watch your Instagram posts go viral.

18 Goals for your Instagram Posts:

  1. Connect with your audience.
  2. Elicit emotion.
  3. Be original.
  4. Be consistent.
  5. Stay authentic.
  6. Make every post count.
  7. Say something with your picture, say something with your words.
  8. Be memorable.
  9. Create beauty.
  10. Understand your audience.
  11. Post Regularly.
  12. Use relevant hashtags.
  13. Comment back.
  14. Share love.
  15. Be humble.
  16. Keep it fresh.
  17. Keep it relevant.
  18. Elicit a response.

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How to Create Quality Instagram Posts

1. Connect with Your Audience

You want to create posts the draw your audience in, in to your life and your world. Posts should make them want to know you better. How do you achieve this? Make it personal and develop a rapport. Be multi-dimensional.

2. Elicit Emotion through Instagram P0sts

Great photos stir the soul. So, to elicit emotion you really need to become a great photographer, or if not a great photographer at least think like a great photographer. Capture raw, authentic life that makes people feel, grab your audience’s heart and you will have their attention.

3. Be Original

Stand out from the sea of squares. People are scrolling fast. Your photo has to have something to slow them down, grab their attention, and make them pause. To do this you must stand apart. Let your pictures and your style be recognizably you.

4.  Be Consistent

I want to explain this one carefully. Being consistent means presenting a reliable product. Your followers have signed up because they count on you to deliver reliably. If your feed is lifestyle, stay in your lane. If your decor is glam, those who love that style are following you so a farmhouse style photo will not go over well, and vice versa.

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I created a gorgeous photo of a glam style bar cart, but it was such a departure from my usual farmhouse style that it bombed. There was nothing wrong with the photo, but that’s not what my followers expect, or what they signed up for. If you are presenting home decor photos and all of a sudden you post a picture of your family don’t expect it to do well.

5.  Stay Authentic with Your Instagram Posts

As in life, our best advice is to be yourself. The more authentic you can be the greater your ability to connect with people.

6.  Make Every Post Count

This is quality over quantity. Every single post has the power to help or to hurt. If you have nothing special to post don’t post anything. Wait.

7.  Say Something with Your Picture

Tell a story. Great photographers tell stories with their photos. This is the ultimate goal. It is hard to achieve but it is a great goal to work toward.

8.  Be Memorable

Take photos that are powerful and memorable. Speak words that stay in people’s minds, that change their day. Affect people with your Instagram posts and you will remain in their hearts.

9.  Create Beauty with Instagram Posts

People come to Instagram to be inspired. What do people want? They want to be inspired by aesthetic visual beauty in some form. Display beauty in whatever niche you are in and they will follow. Ugly photos cannot inspire. Dark photos do not inspire. Your photos need to capture light regardless of content. However, be careful not to overexpose your photos. We still want to see what’s in the photo.

10.  Understand Your Audience

Always post with your audience in mind. When you realize your feed is not about you but about your audience you will be more successful. Your feed is a service to your followers. If you don’t deliver a high-quality product, they will not follow.

11.  Post Regularly

This goes back to reliability. Both your followers and Instagram reward regular activity. Once a week is not really in the game. Once or twice a day or at least every other day is considered regular, reliable activity. Research indicates optimally one to two a day for maximum growth and engagement. You also need to post at regular intervals. Posting too many photos is even worse than not enough. You can’t make up for absence by flooding people’s feeds with photos.

12.  Use Relevant Hashtags on Instagram Posts

Use hashtags to help your Instagram posts get found. Make them relevant.

13.  Comment Back

Commenting on your own feed makes double duty sense: 1) it adds engagement for IG and 2) it builds relationships, rewards those who comment, further increasing future engagement. It’s a win, win, triple win.

14.  Share Love

Be generous. Instagram is a community. To be part of a community is about sharing and giving back. The more you give, as in life, the more you receive back in joy, in connections, in intrinsic and extrinsic rewards. Just give!

15.  Be Humble

Attitude is everything. No one likes a braggart or a showoff, and there is a fine line, especially when the goal is to inspire. Your photos need to inspire with beauty and a life one might aspire to, but it needs to be delivered with grace, humility and gratitude.

16.  Keep it Fresh

Remember I said be consistent? Yes, so this is a fine line. Be consistent with posting and in your style and niche but keep your photos new and interesting. Use your creativity to bring a newness to your feed.

17.  Make Your Instagram Posts Relevant

Keep your Instagram posts relevant to the day, the season and the times.

18.  Elicit a Response

Start a conversation. Create a dialogue. The more comments you have the more IG will perceive your post as high quality and they are more likely to send it out and show it to more people. Comments are king!

Create Powerful Instagram Posts

Want a huge, engaged audience that puts you in the driver’s seat and makes your feed valuable? Anyone who spends a lot of time and effort on Instagram of course wants these things, but why is success so elusive? Do these 18 things with your Instagram posts, and you will be leading the charge. Focus on creating high-quality, fresh, unique photos, stirring words and engaging dialogue, and your feed will become something people respond to; something people want to follow.

Be sure to check out this article for more information on how to go viral on Instagram.

Happy Posting, Friends!

With Love,

jodie & julie

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Article Name
How to Create Instagram Posts that Go Viral
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Create powerful Instagram posts that go viral with these 18 specific goals. What to do and what to avoid to take your Instagram to a whole new level!
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The Design Twins
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  1. Nancy says:

    Oooops they did it again, they wrote a great blog!!! (Sing along the Britney Spears song hehe ????) awesome blog, my friends!! Always sharing and giving! That’s why you girls are so successful at what you do! Keep them coming, they are incredibly informative and true! Thank you ????????

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Nancy, You are the bomb!! And you are hilarious…I totally started singing along 🙂 So glad you found this helpful, sweet friend! We hope you continue to enjoy. You bless us with your kind support. With gratitude, Julie & Jodie

  2. Theresa Gilmore says:

    Girls….your posts are always fun to read and find some little tidbit to use in everyday life! Keep the inspiration coming!

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Dear Theresa, Wow, what a great compliment. We appreciate your support. And we really appreciate your taking the time to comment back. It makes it all worthwhile. Don’t worry…we plan on keeping all the inspiration coming! If you keep reading we’ll keep sharing! Deal? Deal! Haha, God bless you, My Friend, XO ~ Julie & Jodie

  3. Thanks so much for this post! I’m always looking for ways to make my IG posts more exciting and engaging so this really helps. Hope you are doing well! xoxo

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Aw Lisa, You are such a love. Thank you for your kindness and support. It means everything to us! So glad this helped you. wishing you blessings upon blessings in all you do. XO ~ Julie & Jodie

  4. Chris (@our_dirt_road_life) says:

    Ladies, Thank you once again for being an inspiration. I know, I tend to say Thank you quite a bit, but you truly give your all on IG and your blog. I love following you both, not only for your home decor but also, your personalities! You are both kind, giving and just the sweetest. I enjoy soaking in as much of your knowledge as I possibly can.. ????

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Chris, Gratitude never goes out of style! We appreciate your expressing your thanks more than you know. Most people who see, enjoy and read our IG posts and our blog do not reply back, so we really don’t know what they think. It is the relative few, like you, who take the time to reply. And therefore it really does mean the world to us. So in turn, we thank you dear friend! And we truly wish you all God’s great blessings as you journey. With gratitude right back to you, Julie & Jodie

  5. Chris (@our_dirt_road_life) says:

    I forgot I wanted to pick your brain a little bit! ???? As my IG name implies, my feed is just that…. our life on a dirt road. So my postings are not just decor related but outdoor life, vacations, time spent with our son, family and whatever I choose to share regarding our life. As for my home decor, I have an eclectic mix of vintage, country, a small amount of modern, rustic and farmhouse. How do you maintain consistency with that kind of mix? We moved from a farmhouse to a more modern home about 3 years ago and honestly, I’m still trying to figure out my style in this modern house. We’ve lived in an 1832 farmhouse, moved to a 1792 stone farmhouse and into our current home. 27 years of farm living worked with my country style but now I’m not so sure. I would appreciate your advice and again, Thank you!

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Hi Chris, First of all, welcome to our blog! Thank you for your kind support. We are so glad you made it here and we certainly want to help you. I took a look at your feed. The main thing I see is that your photography needs to be where you focus your efforts. If you take amazing photos your niche of “lifestyle” would be fine. But right now your photos are average. They are amateur, which is fine for yourself and your friends, but they just are not going to attract many. I hope you do not take offense, constructive criticism is meant only to be constructive. So, my advice is to take a photography course. Instagram is a visual marketplace. If you can take a course, or possibly find a friend who is talented and knowledgeable that will make the biggest difference. Wishing you all the best, Julie & Jodie

      • Chris (@our_dirt_road_life) says:

        Definitely no offense taken ladies.. I appreciate the feedback and I will work on my photography skills. I kind of thought that would be one of my issues. My phone is old by the cell phone industry standards and lighting is a huge problem I have… Thank you again for taking the time to give a gal some help! This is why I adore you both, you’re here to help us, be the best us we can be. Love and Blessings to you both.

        • jjdesigntwins says:

          Of course, Chris, So happy to help. We are grateful for your sweet support and hope you continue to be inspired. XO ~ Julie

  6. Ashyln says:

    Great advice! Thank you so much!

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Ashyln, Welcome to our blog!! We are so very glad you stopped by! And even happier that you found this post helpful. Not sure if you’ve had a chance to read our library of Instagram Insight posts, but if not, we highly suggest you make the time. 22 other posts all tackling the many topics that add up to powerful information that we have learned from our cumulative 6 years of IG concentrated experience growing our feeds, as well as lots of research. One or two a day, and in a month you’d own all our best advice! Hope you take advantage and let us know how you do. And as always, feel free to ask questions if you are confused or have a specific situation. We are always happy to help. Withing you great success and joy along the journey! With love & gratitude, Julie & Jodie

  7. Jordan says:

    Thanks for this! I am new to blogging and the IG decor community and I have this constant feeling of “am I doing this right?” This really helped.

  8. Patti says:

    Julie and Jodie,
    Thank you for the great advice, I’m not a blogger or a small business owner, but do hope to encourage and inspire with little squares of decor, The wording is always the hardest for me. You girls do it so effortlessly.
    Thanks, Patti

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Awww, Again, you just bless us, Patti! Thank you for that. We each have our gifts, our talents…not one of us is the same. We just feel blessed that our God-given gifts are finding a place on Instagram and here. There are many things we work very hard at that don’t come naturally haha, but the journey to improve is always fun too. With love and gratitude, Jodie & Julie

  9. Cathy says:

    Such an informative post. Thank you for your wise words. I love both of your feeds

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Cathy, Thank you for the sweet reply! We are so happy to hear that you found this information helpful. We hope you will enjoy our blog well into the future. With gratitude, Julie & Jodie

  10. Nida Arshad says:

    I am doing all the points you have mentioned above but my Instagram is making me cry every single day.. is there anything /anyone who can check my account and tell my mistake??

    I am a makeup artist : Instagram @nidasbeautybag

    • jjdesigntwins says:

      Hi Nida,
      I took a look at your account. You come across as very professional. I don’t see any glaring “mistakes”. The only thing I can see is possibly to add more diversity in posting. I like the solid consistency but mixing it up a little might be more interesting. We would have to delve more deeply into all your activity on IG…how you are spending your time, all your posting strategies…much more than what is visible from glancing at your account. This is why Jodie and I offer Instagram strategy consulting. We would analyze all aspects of your IG behavior and give your our best advice to improve in an hour-long call. This service represents several hours of studying and analysis on our parts to prepare the analysis/strategic proposal. It is $150.00 if you are interested. And we would be happy to try to get you on the road to more success. Wishing you all the best, Julie & Jodie

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