Latest / Massive Agent Podcast / Why I Deleted My Instagram Account and Started Over From Scratch

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Why I Deleted My Instagram Account and Started Over From Scratch · Massive Agent Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Two years ago, I completely deleted my Instagram profile.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: I had 14,000 followers at the time, and I deleted it.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: I started over from scratch at zero.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to share with you today if that was a good move or not, what's happened since, and the reason why I did it.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Because some of you may have the same uh ceiling, like the same headwinds that I did that caused me to start over from scratch and beginning.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: Most of you don't need to, but I'll help you understand if you're someone who should or shouldn't.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_01: The massive agent podcast.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: We lead generation tips and strategies to give you more leads and sell more balls.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: I love to buy houses.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: I like to sell houses.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Wait a minute.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: Leads a week.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: You're a week.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: I've had better.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: Have I got your attention now?
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: Here's your host, Dustin Brohm.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: What is up, guys?
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to episode 322 of the Massive Agent Podcast.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: I am your host, Dustin Brohm, here in Salt Lake City, Utah.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: And today I'm going to talk about Instagram and why two years ago I deleted my account.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: I had 14,000 followers.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: You might think everything was going great, like you know, but I deleted it and started over from scratch.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: Spoiler alert, it was one of the best decisions I've ever made in business.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: But I'll explain why.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'll explain why I deleted it in the first place, why I felt that that was a good move, what it did for me, and what my experience has been over the last two years since I first did it.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um let me say this up front.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Most of you should not consider deleting your account.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need to.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's unnecessary for most of you.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: But in very specific situations, especially if you've ever bought followers, which admittedly, I bought a certain number of followers back then.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: Uh admittedly, that could be really hurting your account.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and there's a couple other things to consider.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: So uh stay tuned.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: But don't go deleting your account before you before you hear the full context, because most of you don't need to do it.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: You just need to start doing the right things consistently and you can have the same results that I've had.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so there's nuance to this conversation, okay?
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: So let me say that up front.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: Don't go deleting your account unless you've made the mistakes that I have made and plan on doing the things afterwards to remedy it like I did.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh welcome to the show, guys.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: This week, um yeah, it I can't believe I didn't do a recap after the first year, but um, I'm glad we're doing it this time.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: Two years later, better late than never.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be a good one.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh before we do, make sure that you go to trykcm.com/slash bam.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: Keeping current matters is a tool that every real estate agent needs to have because it helps you see the future.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's like a crystal ball, but not just a crystal ball.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you can see the future, but you don't quite know what it means or how you know how to how to use that in your own life, it's not gonna help you all that much.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: But keeping current matters tells you exactly what is happening, what's about to happen, and what it means to you.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: So uh especially with with economic data, with the housing market, with interest rates, with sales, everything you need to know as an agent.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Keeping current matters is the tool you need in your tool belt.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: So go to trykcm.com/slash bam and try it out for free.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: And then BAM X is one of the most powerful, most valuable real estate communities in the industry.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: With BAM X, they you get a bunch of online courses, a bunch of courses that not just they don't just say, hey, you should do these things.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's hey, here's you should do these things.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: Here's exactly how to do it step by step with screenshots and everything.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: And you're also surrounding yourself with a bunch of agents that have already done that thing that you're trying to do.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: So for as little as$10 a month, you can get access to Canva 101 from Coffee and Contracts, Objection Handling from Tom Tool.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's a great one, by the way.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: Creating green screen videos, and the ultimate Instagram course from Eric Simon, the broke agent himself.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure that if you're going to join BAMX, you get yourself a discount, save yourself some money, use code MASSIVE at checkout to get 10% off the year.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: Learn more about BAMX at massive agentpodcast.com slash BAMX.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: And uh lastly, before I tell you all about why I deleted my damn Instagram and started over from scratch, which at the time made me very nervous, obviously.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: But I've also had a lot of people since ask me why I did it and if it might be a good move for them.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're one of those people, I'll help you, I'll help you understand that here in just a second.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: But have you heard of the massive agent referral network?
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: If you have heard of this before or you're hearing about it the first time, a couple months ago, I created the Massive Agent Referral Network.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: And this is a place for only the best agents.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: So you have to qualify by selling a certain number of homes.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: You have to actually work and service the area that you're claiming.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: And there's some monthly dues to separate those that are serious and the takers from those that are actually committed to giving and receiving as well.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Uh there's certain qualifications, and I'll give you a link here in a second to apply, but it's a vetted community.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so because of that, you're able to claim as the only agent in your entire market, you can claim that market in our referral network.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: And just yesterday, I'm recording this on a Tuesday, just yesterday on a Monday, we had five referrals.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: Might have been six, five or six referrals given out in the group just yesterday alone.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: But here's here's what I need from you.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: We had a few referrals for markets that we don't have representatives for.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: So we need an agent in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: We need an agent in St.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: George, Utah.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: We need an agent in Philadelphia.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: We need an agent in New Orleans.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: We need agents in Montana.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: In there's so many parts of the country that we still don't have representatives for.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're an agent there, you could be missing out on referrals that we just don't have an agent for.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: Check our maps, see which markets are available, which ones are taken, and then apply for yourself over at MassiveAgent Podcast.com slash referral.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Massive Agent Podcast dot com slash referrals.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: And hopefully you can claim your own market.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, don't just assume your market's taken because there's there's a lot that are still available.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: So check that out.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: MassiveAgent Podcast dot com slash referral gets you to the application and the map of what's available is on that same link.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: All right, let's talk Instagram.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: Two years ago, February, February 11th of 2022, to be exact, I deleted my Instagram account.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: I had just over 14,000 followers at the time, and I started over completely from scratch.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: And when I say that out loud, it sounds crazy.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: And you're probably thinking, well, you have 14,000 followers, what the hell?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I was noticing.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and in full transparency, in my climb to build an audience, quote unquote, if you're watching the YouTube video, an audience of 14,000 plus followers, uh, I got a little overzealous and impatient.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: So there was a time, you guys that have been on Instagram for years remember this, when when Instagram first came out with the swipe up feature in your stories, you could swipe up to go to a link that used to only be available for accounts that had over 10,000 followers.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I had like 8,000, 8,500 or something at the time.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, damn it, I really want that swipe up feature so I can put links in my stories and people can, you know, I can add calls to action in my stories.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: So dumbass Dustin, uh, not fully understanding the concept I'm gonna lay out today, because I'm gonna explain why what I did is a bad thing and why it killed me and made it made it necessary to delete my account.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: But I thought, okay, I have less than 10,000 followers, I only need 1,500 or so more to get the swipe up feature.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: So let's buy some followers.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: So I did.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: I went to one of these online garbage websites and bought 2,500 followers.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: So that brought me over 10,000.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: I think I had like 11,000 or something.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um is that right?
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it brought me over 10,000, which is all I cared about.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: And and then I, you know, slowly over a couple of years, I grew it up to 14,000.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: But here's the thing when you buy followers or when you have fake followers, when you have followers that are not real accounts, bots, for example.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: So if you if you've been somebody that that overly uses hashtags, and you use big hashtags like hashtag real estate, stop it.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: You get followed by a lot of fake accounts.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, even if you don't buy them, those fake accounts crush you.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: So here's what I did.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't understand this at the time because I didn't understand how the algorithm works the way that the way that I understand it today.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: When you buy followers, so let's say you have 10,000 right now, or let's say you have a thousand followers and you buy 250.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: So now you have one oh my god.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, I'm a realtor.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm uh 1,125.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, why am I struggling so bad with this?
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: No, 1250.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: Idiot.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: You you have you have 1250.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: You had a thousand, you bought 250, you have 1,250.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: That was embarrassing.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but here we are.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: What happens is now 25% of your follower base is fake.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: So even if you have the best video, you post the best content, you're doing literally everything right, and you're doing it at an elite level, you still have 25% of your followers that will never ever engage with that content, no matter what.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: So you put a ceiling, you put a limit on the engagement rate, you put a limit on how well that content that you're posting can perform.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, some some people, some of you have bought a hell of a lot more than that, right?
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: You bought 10,000 followers, you bought 50,000, whatever the number is.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: I just want you to get the concept.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever percentage of your followers are fake, they can never engage with your content.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: They will never like it, they'll never comment, they will never watch, they'll never share, they'll never save.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: They will never engage with it.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: So you have a limit on how well a post can do.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: Here's why that's a problem.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: The way the algorithms work is when you share a post, it shares it out to a small portion of your followers.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: If you have a thousand followers, it sends it out to, and I don't have an exact number, but just for example, it'll send it out to 50 of that thousand, or maybe 75 of that thousand.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Well, if 25% or more of that small group that it sends it out to first are fake and will never engage, even if it's the best content ever, even if literally all the real followers respond to it, you can still only have a 75% engagement rate.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: But that's best case scenario, right?
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's best case scenario.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: So you you're automatically limiting how many people will ever engage with that post.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: So Instagram, the way the reason that they send it out to just a small portion is they're trying to find out is this good?
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: Is this worth sharing with more people or not?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Is this worth giving prime placement in the most valuable real estate on the phone, which is the news feed?
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: And if it if it doesn't perform well in that small sample group, it's not gonna show it to that many more people.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna, it's just not.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: It has to perform well in that small sample size, it has to get engagement, it has to get views, it has to be seen by the algorithm as being great content.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: So if you've bought followers or have a bunch of fake ones for whatever reason, you just can never get a great engagement rate.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: So your content will always underperform.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: You'll always be hitting a ceiling.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: And once I learned this, so I learned how the algorithms work after I noticed that my posts seem to hit a certain level and they just kind of die.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: They would hit a certain level and just and just fizzle out.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, what weird.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's like there's a ceiling on there.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I couldn't quite figure it out until I learned how the algorithms actually work.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, wait a minute.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's because of the followers I bought.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's because of the, and even before I bought followers, I did some ridiculous uh like auto-commenting thing.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like that stuff is all fake.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: The the algorithms know it's fake.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: It they know it's gamed, and we all know it's fake too.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: I can look at your account, and within just a couple minutes, I know if you bought followers, I know if you bought engagement.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's so obvious.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's just so obvious.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but I didn't understand that at the time because I was naive and I didn't I didn't have the experience that I have now.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, luckily, hopefully, I'm saving some of you from making the mistakes that I made.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: Some of you have already made the mistakes, and you may need to do what I did.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: So the problem, I started to worry.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, is is my account ever gonna can I ever go viral?
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: Can I ever really grow the way that I want to?
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: Can I ever really have much success with this Instagram thing?
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: And my friend Neil Dingra, Neil Home, who's been on the show a few times, you guys hopefully all follow him at Neil Home, N-E-E-L Home on Instagram.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: Follow him for the love of God, one of the best content content creators in our industry for sure.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: He deleted his account and started over years before.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: And once I learned what was happening, and I'm like, I'm like, wait a minute, Neil already went through this.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: He deleted his account and started over for the same reason.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: So I reached out to him and I was like, hey, was it a good move?
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: And he told me the only the only mistake he made was not deleting and starting over much sooner.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, okay, that's a he's doing well, he's growing like crazy, uh, he's thriving on Instagram.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: So he's saying the mistake he made was not starting over sooner.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that that made me feel a lot better.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: So then I then I started to research, okay, how to do it.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: I how to do it, the timing and all that, and I realized I just needed to post on my one account, hey, I'm creating another one.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um let me make sure that I got this right because the the process is a I'm not even gonna go there, all right?
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because when when you listen to this, it may be an outdated process.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but I remember having my old account telling people, hey, go to this new account, this is my new one.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: I'm shutting this old one down on a certain date, and then at a certain date I did.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then I had it like a welcome post on the new account.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: Once I deleted the old account, I could then change the username on the new account to match the old one.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how I got at Massive Agent back on Instagram for a while there.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: It was like at the Massive Agent, I think, for a while until I was able to get the old one back.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, anyways, uh that was kind of a pain in the ass, but it was worth it.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: So, what I realized, so just to skip forward to it, once I decided that the the followers I bought put a ceiling on my growth, and I didn't see any way past it.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: Because no matter how well I did, no matter how good of content that I did, I'd always have that ceiling.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'd always have a good 25% or more of my followers that would never ever and could never ever engage with it.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: So my content would never do that well.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: So Neil said, Yep, do it, great idea.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: He did it for the same reasons.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I decided to pull the trigger and do it.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: Within the first few hours of starting my new account and having only real people who actually chose to follow me, who actually chose to be there, I realized within the first couple hours, what a great move.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason I noticed this was the engagement rate, how many more conversations I was having, how many more comments I was getting, how many more story replies and story views.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: I was getting so many more.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: The engagement was so much higher.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: So after the first day or two with my new account, I had like 600 something followers.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, because I told everyone I was doing this and you know, promoted the hell out of it.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: So you know, 600 or so of the 14,000 came over to the new one.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: And just with 600 or so followers, let's call it 600 even, just with them, my engagement rate was dramatically more than it was on the old account.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: My story views were more than on the old account.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: So that showed me right there.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: I made the right decision.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: So then from that point on, I just focused on creating great content on a consistent basis with my audience in mind.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I didn't do a bunch of random stuff with like showing my kids a soccer, soccer game on my reels and like on my stories, yes, because the people who already followed me, people who already knew me, would see the behind-the-scenes stuff.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's where you put the behind the scenes in the life of stuff, is in your stories.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: But if you have a certain audience in mind, which for me is you guys, real estate agents, especially entrepreneurial agents that are trying to build and scale, that's my audience.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I kept my my content that I posted on the feed very focused and always with my audience in mind.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I made sure to do it consistently.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: In the beginning, I decided to post every single day because you just have more practice, you have more at bats, you have more chance for your content to reach more people.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: And and if you want to post two or three times a day, great.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but when you're in growth mode, you should be posting at least once a day on Instagram, in my opinion.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have to?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: But do you want to, if you really want to grow the fastest, you should be posting at least once a day.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: Twice a day, great, if you can, if you can sustain it, but you have to sustain once a day while you're growing.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: Once you get to a certain point where you have a decent size audience, you can pull back a little bit and post every every other day or every third day, or even every fourth day.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: I've experimented with that over the last little bit.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: But I realized what a powerful thing it was to have an audience of real people who chose to follow me and my content performed better.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: Every single thing that I posted performed better with much with far fewer followers than on my old account with 14,000.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: At least 2,500 were fake.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: More probably because bots and shit.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, this is amazing.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm getting this outperforming, and I don't even have a thousand followers yet.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: So I just kept doing it and doing it and doing it.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: And now, fast forward two years later, I've just broken 22,000 followers, all real, all organic.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, are there some fake bot accounts that have followed me along the way?
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm sure that's the case, but it it's such a small minuscule amount because I've done it the right way.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: I have not used third-party, you know, engagement boosting services.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: I've just focused on posting consistently, great content.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: I in I made sure that the video quality was better.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: I learned how to do hooks so that I could hook people in the beginning to actually watch my stuff.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: I started to do stories more regularly and just thought what would be interesting or entertaining for somebody else.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I did that stuff.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: And it's incredible how powerful Instagram has been for my business and building my brand, building my audience in the last two years versus the previous six years or eight years or however long I had been using it prior.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: So should you consider deleting your Instagram and starting over?
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to start at a no.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I just want you to default to no, you don't have to do it, unless you've bought a significant number of followers, right?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: And you just haven't been doing the right content on social.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: Most of you, if you're if you're frustrated with Instagram not growing as fast as you as it should, it's not that you need to start over from scratch.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's you need to start doing the right type of content, focused for your audience, better quality, switch it up, switch up the formats and styles, use reels, use uh carousel posts, you use all the different stuff.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: But keep it focused for your audience and do it consistently.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: Do it every damn day.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: And it, or maybe it's for you, it's every other day.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's whatever you decide to, you have to just do it and do it and do it.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: And then look at the people that are in your space that have a similar message, similar audience to you, the creators that you look up to.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: And you're already looking at them for inspiration.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: So, what exactly are they doing?
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: What are they doing talking head videos?
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: Are they doing green screen videos talking about an article or something that's behind them?
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: Green screen videos have been crushing for me lately.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: There's something about the green screen format that creates a hook in and of itself because people are curious what the hell are you gonna say about this?
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, green screen videos are a great way to get high engagement and high views because they just visually they hook people.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: So, what are the accounts that you look up to that you aspire to grow like?
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: What type of content are they doing?
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: What type of like the camera angles, the lighting, like all try to just rip off and duplicate everything about it, but put your own spin on it, of course.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: You have to put your own spin on it, and that's what makes it unique original content.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: You can and should be inspired by other content creators.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: You should be getting ideas from other content creators, but then taking those ideas and making them your own.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: I do this all the time.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: I get ideas for posts from golf accounts, fitness accounts, uh other business, business content creators, other real estate agents where I'm like, oh, they talked about this topic.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I'm gonna talk about that topic, but in this way.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: Or oh, I love the hook that they used.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna use that hook, but I'm gonna talk about it a little bit differently.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's the path forward.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: What's beautiful is it's not like you have to recreate the wheel and reinvent something here.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: The path has already been figured out.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: Like the path has already been the the trail has already been blazed.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: There's out there's people out there blazing trails.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: Just follow the trail.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_00: Do what they are doing.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: Not but make let me say this too.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: I told you there was nuance to this.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: If you are following people that do a bunch of skits, they do a bunch of humor and comedy stuff, but that's not really in your personality.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: Don't feel like you have to do the lip syncing or the comedy or the skit shit just because somebody else does.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: If that's not authentic to you, you've noticed I don't do skits.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: I do hot takes, I give my opinion on a lot of shit, I make bold statements, I'm sarcastic, and I do some humorous memes every once in a while because that's authentic to me.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not doing skits, I'm not trying to do comedy and all this other stuff because that's just not me.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's not me.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: So take inspiration, but put it through the filter of is it authentic to you?
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: And that's gonna feel weird for a little bit, right?
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: You have to practice your way through feeling comfortable in this.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: So do as long as you're doing all of this work, you could probably revive your account.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: Consistency, increasing the quality, increasing the focus of who you're speaking to and speaking to them with valuable stuff with great hooks, you can revive your account.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: You probably don't need to start over.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: But if you've bought a bunch of followers and you've been doing a bunch of crap wrong on social, there may be value in starting over from scratch.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: It worked for me, it worked for Neil Dingra, it was one of the best moves that I made.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: I highly uh recommend that you don't just default to, well, I'm gonna delete and start over, because it it's a pain in the ass.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: It is, it's also a pain in the ass to be stuck, right?
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_00: So just ask yourself the tough question: do you really need to do it?
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure you're doing it for the right reasons and make sure that you've exhausted all other options because I did.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: I I felt like I was doing the right content, it was focused, it was there was just that that ceiling because I had bought followers and paid for engagement in the past.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: So there we go.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: I deleted my Instagram account February 2022.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh after the first month, I think I had a thousand, twelve, maybe twelve hundred followers, something like that.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: But my engagement was through the roof.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: I had more comments, I had more views, I had more story views and story replies than ever on my old account, which told me everything I needed to know.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: And since then, by staying focused, I've grown it to 22,000 and the sky's the limit.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's been great for my business, great for my brand, great for sales, great for everything.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: Instagram can be extremely powerful when you're intentional and you're consistent.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: So I hope that that helps you in your decision on whether or not uh some of you are just wondering why does my Instagram, why is it not growing?
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: Not always an easy, not always an easy answer, not always an easy diagnosis, but I think you know.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: I think you know why your Instagram is not growing.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: I think you do.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_00: Is it that you bought a bunch of followers in the past?
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: Hopefully you did not.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're thinking about buying followers, for the love of God, it's 2024.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: First off, it destroys your account, it destroys the engagement on your account.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: Your account will underperform forever, but it's more than that.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's a credibility killer.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: You you've been to another agent's account and they have 55,000 followers, and they post something and it gets four likes.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: They post a video and it gets 47 views and two likes.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: I see this all the time.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: Your clients are seeing that shit.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: The people you want to hire you are seeing that, and they know it's so obvious.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: People understand how Instagram works now, and it's obvious to most people that you're full of shit.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: So please don't buy followers.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: Don't pay for performance on Instagram.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: Earn it through consistency and great content, and that is the way to true growth on Instagram.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening so much.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: Hope this helps.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: Share this with an agent that needs to hear it.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, if if I jumped on your toes, you needed to hear it.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_00: If you bought a bunch of followers and you post something with your 30,000 followers and you get six likes, that's a huge credibility killer.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: It just is.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like start over.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: Do it right from the beginning.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it it's so much worse to have a low follower.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's so much worse to have obviously a fake following than to have a quote unquote smaller one, but have a very vibrant community.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want influence or do you want vanity metrics?
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to have a large follower count or do you want to actually get business?
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to actually make sales?
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to actually build relationships?
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: Hopefully.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: Hopefully, you know the answer to that and it's the right one.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate you guys listening.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: See you next week.