Back in January, Gary Vaynerchuk published an article about his $1.80 Instagram Strategy.

He recommended that we use Instagram as the platform was intended (duh!) and you comment daily to leave your “two cents” on the top 9 posts, for 10 hashtags you used and wanted to rank for.

I had been looking for ways to grow my own Instagram account, and I love everything Gary V. puts out, so I decided to give it a try!

So for 30 days from January 8 – February 8, I gave it a try. And here’s the results….

The Instagram Experiment Set Up

Being me, I wanted to systemize this process as much as possible! So, I set up a few things to make this super easy.

The first step was to research some hashtags, and I got lucky that right as I was staring Instagram had just released the feature to follow hashtags.

And here’s the hashtags I chose to start engaging on:

1. #businessconsultant
2. #businessstrategy
3. #marketingstrategy
4. #internetmarketing
5. #contentcreator
6. #entrepreneurship
7. #startups
8. #ladyboss
9. #womenwhohustle
10. #femaleentrepreneur

I also wanted to take maximum effect of the traffic I’d be getting from engaging with the hashtags, so I made it a priority to do one post to my feed every week, and also one Instastory each day.

That way, if people came to check me out they’d see an active account and hopefully increase the chance of getting a new follower.

Ridiculously Incredible Results in Week 1

I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect, but I definitely didn’t expect what happened in Week 1…

On Day 1 of this new strategy, I gained 19 new followers!

Then on Day 2, I gained 8 more.

On Day 3, another 25! (On this day, I commented on the other tags at 9pm Eastern, and that seemed to get good response.)

Day 4, only 3. (But I actually forgot to comment this day…)

Days 5-7 I grew by 31.

So that by the end of Week 1, I’d gained over 90 new followers. And had amazing increases in my discovery and reach numbers from finally engaging on this platform, instead of just daily posting.

 

Hitting A New Milestone in Week 2

With the results of Week 1, I hypothesized I could gain ~20 followers a day going forward, and hit big numbers in no time!

But, the amazing results of Week 1 weren’t duplicated right away, with actually NO new followers on Monday, and only 6 new ones on Tuesday.

But that still got me to an over 500 followers milestone on Wednesday!

But then no real changes in growth the rest of the week… And I was half tempted to call it quits, and not stick it out for all 30 days!

 

Consistent Growth in Week 3

Over the course of Week 3, the results slowed down, but became a little more predictable.

On any day, I’d grow by 2-3 people. And at least this was heading back in the right direction!

 

Finishing Strong in Week 4

During the final week, I saw some spike in big follower numbers – gaining 18 in one day when I had tagged a few others in my comments and posts.

And I finished with at total of 535 followers, a total growth of 127 organic, non-paid for followers in just 30 days.

After this hardcore month of Instagram engagement, I did take a few weeks off from daily posting and engaging, and lost a few followers again.

But since then I’ve shifted to following just 5 hashtags, and trying to comment on their Top 9 posts, 2-3x week. And that seems to be working just as well!

So, Was The Experiment A Success?

If you’re considering trying this yourself, I just wanted to share a few final thoughts on the Pros and Cons I noticed during the process, so you can help decide if you want to follow Gary V’s Instagram Strategy, too.

Here’s a few things that happened that were super cool:

#1 – I found and followed cool new people
From the trending hashtags I was commenting on, I found some really cool accounts that I started following and connecting with.

#2 – I genuinely engaged more with everyone.
I genuinely started commenting on other posts in my main newsfeed, and found myself wanting to engage more than just a quick heart.

And here’s a few things that were not as cool…

#1 – It takes A LOT of time.
The first day I followed all the hashtags, and left my 90 comments, it took me one hour and 7 minutes to complete! But as I got used to it, it took only 37 minutes. Still not great when we’re short on time anyway! But it did work…

#2 – People follow you and unfollow you pretty quickly.
500 followers was a super hard number to keep! I fluctuated between 497 – 506 several times from people following and unfollowing just a quickly. (Something that definitely happened a lot during this experiment!)

#3 – An increase in SPAM comments.
I started to get a lot of “spam” comments on my own posts, that just used emojis or said things that clearly meant they didn’t ready the post. But even bad engagement helps the algorithm, right?!

#4 – Not all hashtags are created equal.
Not all of the hashtags I followed had a new Top 9 every day, so I did have to take a few out and add a few ones back in as I grew! (So keep that in mind if you’re doing this for yourself.)

All in all, I definitely enjoyed this Instagram experiment!

And I did get a massive boost in organic followers, just by spending about 30 minutes a day on the app, and commenting while I watched TV or made dinner.

If you’re looking to grow your Instagram following, I’d definitely give this a try if you can spare the time!

Your Turn

What do you think of the experiment results, and would you give it a try? And if you have other strategies or tips that work for growing an Instagram account, please leave them in the comments below!