Nowadays, companies utilize influencer marketing as a marketing strategy because influencers connect directly with the company's target audience and have the power to influence the followers purchasing decisions. However, what is an influencer? 

The expansion of social media has led to the creation of a new type of celebrity called influencers. Influencers are content creators with huge followers who post short videos or posts on social media handles about a specific genre. The key point here is the followers look forward to their favorite influencers posting new videos and posts. 

Content creation on social media became an income source when Instagram introduced a paid advertisement feature in 2013. Different companies started collaborating with the budding group of influencers to promote their products and services. In return for collaboration, these influencers received handsome paychecks as per agreement. Since then, the number of influencers and influencer marketing has grown significantly, such that there are approximately 64 million influencer accounts on Instagram across the globe, as per the 2023 report. 

Are you also considering starting a passive income source by becoming an influencer on Instagram? Becoming an Instagram influencer might not be easy as the competition is pretty tough. Nonetheless, if you are determined and have a passion for content creation, you can become one of the popular influencers one day in the future. 

How do you start the journey? This guide explains how to become an influencer on Instagram in detail. 

Skills Required to Become an Influencer on Instagram

If you think being creative is only required to become an influencer, then you might be wrong. It requires myriad skills to become a successful influencer on Instagram. Let's look at the different skills that you might come in handy to become an Instagram influencer: 

1. Communication Skills 

Instagram is a platform where you interact with millions of people worldwide. It is a stage where anyone can express their opinions and allows followers to connect with influencers directly through direct messages (DM). As an influencer, you should be careful before posting any content on the social media platform. 

Some influencers are skilled at keeping the conversation going using well-timed humor, empathy, anger, and apology. Sometimes, influencers may face a backlash or get heavy criticism from their followers, but it is essential to take the right steps, manage it, and not get overwhelmed. 

2. Creativity 

Trends on social media platforms can easily become outdated. To keep up with followers, an influencer must stay updated on new trends and create content revolving around that topic to keep them entertained. When an idea fails to create that spark, it is time to develop a more creative idea and bounce back. Also, consistency is essential because one never knows when a creative idea becomes viral. 

3. Time Management 

Even for Instagram influencers, it is essential to plan your creative calendar so you know what needs to be done. After some point in becoming an influencer and posting creative content, there comes a burnout phase, which is a serious hazard to the job. Around 80% of influencers suffer from job burnout. It is essential to replenish your physical and emotional energy to prevent burnout symptoms, including chronic exhaustion, cynicism, detachment from your personal life or job, a sense of ineffectiveness, and a decline in performance. 

4. Brand Management 

An influencer is itself a brand. So, if an influencer goes off-brand, there is a risk of losing followers, sponsors, or cancellation. For example, an influencer who promotes vegan cosmetic products cannot be seen at a trendy new hot chicken pop-up. As an influencer, if you grow up and get big enough, you will be responsible for managing your brand and maintaining relationships with other brand partners. 

5. Data Analysis 

Data is essential as it helps to predict the future more precisely and helps to make decisions more effectively. You might be wrong if you think you will not have to deal with numbers once you are an influencer. You are a marketer if you are involved in influencer marketing and need to rely on data analysis to succeed. By using engagement rates and predictive analysis, influencers can easily determine the best time to post, what type of content the audience likes, and more.  

Understanding What It Means to Be an Instagram Influencer

Before jumping on how to become an influencer on Instagram, it is essential to understand what it means to become an Instagram influencer. As an influencer, you will create and share content regularly to establish your expertise in a specific niche. Regularly engaging with your audience and offering insightful content can influence your followers to try a particular product. 

Brands often connect with influencers to promote their brand or service and reach their target audience effectively. Besides, followers trust the influencer, so they see the product endorsements as recommendations, and there is a chance they will try it.

Types of Influencers

Based on their number of followers or audience, social media influencers are categorized into different categories: 

• Nano influencers: Zero to 10,000 followers
• Micro-influencers: 10,000 to 50,000 followers
• Mid-tier influencers: 50,000 to 500,000 followers
• Macro influencers: 500,000 to One Million Followers
• Mega influencers: More than One Million Followers

Responsibilities of Influencers

Being a social media influencer is a job where your entire day will be occupied by completing tasks like content creation, editing, brainstorming ideas, and connecting with followers and brands. Let's look in detail at the daily tasks of an Instagram influencer: 

• Brainstorming new ideas.
• Content creation.
• Gaining publicity on Instagram.
• Scheduling content.
• Analyzing the feedback.
• Engaging with followers. 
• Attending events.

How to Become an Influencer on Instagram?

Let's understand the steps required to start your journey as an influencer on Instagram: 

Step 1. Choose a Specific Niche

A niche is an area where you specialize in. Choosing a specific niche will make creating content and building your followers easier. Besides, the right brands will partner with you if your followers match their target audience. Your niche doesn't have to relate to your educational background specifically. Rather, it should be an area of interest or niche where your skills, thoughts, and ideas can add value. Let's look at some top niches that you can select before creating content: 

• Fashion
• Beauty
• Travel
• Lifestyle
• Celebrities and Entertainment
• Sports
• Animals
• Health and Fitness
• Gaming
• Family and Parenting
• Business and technology 

Step 2. Make An Effective Profile

After selecting your niche, it is time to create a similar profile. If you have an existing Instagram account, you can use it as your influencer account by changing the name and description. However, starting a new account from scratch and separating your personal and professional lives is best. 

Here are some things to keep in mind while creating an account to start your influencer journey: 

1. Think of a Username.

Choose a username that describes your niche and is easy to remember. Don’t use complex or generic names. Be a little creative and add an artistic twist to the user name. For example, if you are Evelina Rowan, posting content about baking cakes, usernames like @evelinarowan, @evelian_rowan, @bakecakeswithevelina, and @evelinabakes might be good options. However, avoid usernames that look too salesy or over the board, like @evelinainkitchen, @cakeqween_evelina, and @cakeloverevelina.

You can utilize brand name generators if nothing comes to your mind and you require inspiration to find the perfect name. 

2. Write a Creative Bio.

Write an easy-to-understand and engaging bio that explains your background, experience, and area of expertise. You can add a bio link where you can add all the links. Linktree is also beneficial for Instagram influencers. 

3. Add a Professional Profile Picture.

Use a professional and high-resolution profile picture to represent your brand and personality. Remember, as an influencer, you are the brand! 

4. Create Highlights.

Add highlights (through Instagram's Highlights feature) to improve your visibility and online presence on social media platforms. This feature allows you to save all your Instagram stories and increase engagement rates. 

How to Add Highlights on Instagram?

There are two different ways to add Highlights. Let's look at one of the easiest ways: 

1. Head to your Instagram account, and under the Edit Profile option, you will see a New button with "+" as its image. Click on that option.
2. Once you click it, you will be redirected to the Instagram Stories Archive. You can select all the stories you want to add as your highlights and click the Next button.
3. Now, you will have to design the highlight cover. You can type the name to describe the highlight and then select the cover. Instagram suggests a cover by default, but you can add a custom cover or select any of your stories in your highlight to set it as the cover. 
4. Now, click the Done option, and the newly-created highlight will appear on your profile. 

Step 3. Create High-Quality Content and Gain Your Following.

Start creating content and publish it on the platform. Remember, there are rare chances that you will do wonders by posting a few posts or reels, but with time and consistent efforts, you will witness your account grow. It takes time to gain followers, and as per research, Instagram accounts with less than 1,000 followers witness a 9.4% growth every six months. Here are some tips that you can utilize to attract an audience and followers: 

1. Write a clean, clear, and professional bio that perfectly describes your niche. You can use your creativity and humor, but ensure your target audience can understand it. 
2. Post high-quality content and create content on trendy topics, concepts, or music tracks. 
3. Be authentic, and do not go off-brand to pull off a trend. Express your honest opinions.  
4. Engage with your followers. 
5. Add appropriate hashtags to increase your visibility. 

Step 4. Build a Strategy and Utilize SEO. 

It is essential to build a strategy so it becomes easy for you to create tailored content for your audience that they enjoy. Here are some factors that you can consider to create a strategy that works for you: 

• Understand what your audience likes and requires.
• Make a posting schedule by analyzing when your audience remains active the most.
• Plan the time to shoot, edit, and publish the content.
• Draw inspiration for new content from your audience and their recommendations.

As a marketer, you should understand the importance of search engine optimization (SEO). Social media posts do not directly impact SEO, but personal links mentioned in the bio can help generate organic traffic to the brand's website. So, to increase sales and generate organic traffic, ensure that you post helpful content that can gain traction, increase your reach, and generate backlinks.  

Step 5. Engage with Your Followers. 

Being an influencer is not only about publishing content and entertaining or informing your followers. It is also about engaging with your audience. Some ways to engage with your audience are by:  

• Responding to the comments
• Conducting a live-streaming session
• Hosting a Q&A session or Ask Me Anything on Instagram stories
• Scheduling giveaways or contests

Step 6. Publish Consistently. 

When an influencer doesn't get the response in the initial phase, they lose the determination and will to create and publish more content. However, it is essential to post consistently regardless of the outcomes. Instagram considers several factors while deciding the visibility of your posts. It includes: 

1. Post relevancy 
2. Post engagement 
3. Past interactions 

When you post consistently, you take care of one aspect that improves your content's visibility: post relevancy. You understand everything when experimenting with different types of content and hashtags. With data analytics, you can evaluate what type of content your audience likes and the best time to post it to get higher engagement. 

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Content Ideas for Some Niches

If you have selected your niche and you cannot understand what kind of content you can create, here is a list of some specific niches and types of content you can create for that genre: 

1. Beauty and Makeup

Beauty influencers provide product reviews, skincare routines, makeup courses, and advice on achieving different looks. Honesty is essential because followers look to influencers for genuine views and knowledge regarding a particular product.

Content Ideas: Daily skincare regimes, beauty product suggestions, before-and-after transformations, and collaborations with beauty products.

2. Fashion and Style

This niche focuses on personal style, current fashion trends, and outfit ideas. Consistency in aesthetics and high-quality images are essential in this visually driven sector.

Content Ideas: Fashion haul, styling advice, OOTD (Outfit of the day) blogs, and collaborations with fashion brands.

3. Fitness and Wellness

The main focus of this fitness and wellness niche is to encourage a healthy lifestyle. It aims to promote this lifestyle by creating a community and promoting physical transformation.

Content Ideas: Exercise videos, transformation videos, nutritional advice, and healthy lifestyle-promoting vlogs.

4. Lifestyle 

Influencers in the lifestyle niche cover various topics, such as daily life blogs, home decor, and general lifestyle guidance. 

Content Ideas: Daily life vlogs, home organization tips, and general lifestyle guidance.

5. Travel

The travel niche focuses on exploring different places and sharing the travel experience. This area requires an effective mix of storytelling and high-quality imagery because followers are attracted to visually appealing information.

Content Ideas: Trip vlogs, traveling guides, photography, and collaborations with traveling vloggers. 

6. Food and Cooking

Influencers who enjoy cooking could talk about their delicious recipes with their audience. Foodies and chefs offer mouthwatering recipes, tips for cooking, restaurant suggestions, and stories about their experiences with food. 

Content Ideas: Cooking experiments, restaurant reviews, tips to make cooking easier, kitchen organization strategies, and more.

Wrapping Up

Becoming an Instagram influencer calls for commitment, creativity, and thoughtful planning. Establishing a clear niche, producing excellent content, and interacting with your audience will help you establish an effective online presence. Developing a strong profile, creating high-quality content, connecting with your audience, and constantly learning are all important steps in the process. 

Successful influencers establish their brand of consistency—both in their content and authenticity. Developing a real connection with your audience is more important to becoming an influencer than gaining followers. 

Frequently Asked Questions

1. How many followers do I need to become an Instagram influencer?

There's no specific figure, but interaction matters more than the number of followers. Your audience will eventually follow you if you develop a sincere relationship with them.

2. Can I establish popularity across several niches?

Although it's not impossible, becoming a specialist in one niche is usually a better idea before expanding out. Selecting several niches can prevent you from concentrating on just one, which may confuse visitors.

3. What is the duration required to become a successful influencer?

The time frame varies, but patience and determination are essential. Before there is noticeable progress and achievement, it could take several months or even years. Your success rate will solely depend on the consistency of your work.

4. Do I need professional equipment to get started?

Although using expensive gadgets might improve your content, many successful influencers began with simply a smartphone. Concentrate on producing high-quality content within your capabilities, then upgrade as you advance.