Starting Your Side Hustle: How to Monetize Your Instagram

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With one billion active users and new people joining every single day, Instagram is more than just a platform to stay connected with friends and snap photos in cute jumpsuits and sunglasses.

For inspiring girl bosses of the world, Instagram can be an incredibly powerful business tool.

If you’ve ever thought about starting your side hustle but weren’t sure how, building a solid presence on this photo- and video-sharing app might just be the perfect way to grow an audience–and maybe even start raking in the cash!

From identifying the core of your unique personal style to collaborating with your favorite brands for product or payment, here are some tips for how to monetize your Instagram.

Starting Your Side Hustle: How to Monetize Your Instagram

Build Your Personal Brand

You might have heard of the concept of building a personal brand before and been told how important it is to growing an audience on Instagram. While the phrase could seem a little bit confusing, the actual process of building your brand doesn’t have to be complicated at all.

Think of your personal brand simply as a combination of a few of the key factors that make you uniquely you. Just like a marketer might create a brand around a collection of products or services based on what makes them different from their competitors, think of what separates you from other people out there.

To get started, ask yourself some questions:

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  • What are some words your friends might use to describe you?
  • What words would you use to describe yourself?
  • What are your favorite things in the whole wide world?
  • What are some things that you don’t really care for?

You are a combination of so many different hopes and dreams and talents. By taking some time to understand who you are and what you stand for, you’ll be able to better identify the core elements of your personal brand so that you can communicate them clearly!

Determine Your Direction

Starting Your Side Hustle: How to Monetize Your Instagram

Source: ESB Professional/Shutterstock.com

Once you’ve identified a few key factors about your personality, it’s time to strategize the direction you want to take your Instagram. While you are ever-evolving, and your page and your goals will likely develop over time as well, it can be helpful to try to pick out a few key elements of your lifestyle that you might enjoy featuring.

  • Are you really amazing at styling outfits for all sorts of occasions, and at spotting the next big trend?
  • Do you have a hidden talent, like painting or interior decorating, that you’ve been eager to share with the world?
  • Have friends always come to you for advice on relationships or navigating their corporate careers?
  • Are you a master DIYer who might eventually want to turn your hobbies into a full-blown business?
  • Do you have a passion for health and fitness?
  • Do you love giving detailed accounts of all the fun activities you do throughout the day?

Once you have some ideas for where you want to take your content, combine this direction with your personal brand by snapping some photos that best reflect your style! You can even create a special logo with your initials or signature.

Post (and Engage) Consistently

While you don’t need to set out to acquire hundreds of thousands of Instagram followers in order to monetize your account, it is very helpful to build up an audience that is interested in what you have to say. To do this, it’s important to keep active on the platform.

Some people find it easier to take a bunch of photos or videos at one time and then post them over the next few weeks, while others prefer to share everything in real time. Regardless of when you create your content, posting regularly to your Instagram can certainly help increase the visibility of your account.

When you’re snapping your pics or filming your videos, wear what you feel most comfortable in and stay true to that personal brand you’ve built! Whether you love staying comfy in casual dresses and white sneakers or prefer to get super sophisticated in cocktail attire and costume jewelry, you’ll be most confident in your content if you stay true to yourself.

As you’re growing your account, pay attention to the feedback that you’re getting on your posts so that you know what people like most. Don’t be afraid to respond to comments and DMs, or to comment on other people’s posts, too.

Identify a Revenue Stream (or Streams!)

It’s not just the mega influencers who make money from Instagram. Once you have some pictures and videos up on your page and are starting to build a community of people who enjoy following you (even if it’s 500 people!), you can probably begin to explore opportunities to generate revenue.

A few ways you can do this are through working with brands on sponsorships, becoming an affiliate, selling your original content or even opening your own online store.

  • Brand sponsorships don’t always go to Instagrammers with the biggest following. If you take great pictures and have people who really enjoy hearing from you, you can often work with brands by creating content on their behalf. Some may pay you in product, which is typically called a product exchange, while others might pay you, too. Depending on the agreement, you might post to your account in your stories or feed and/or you might give the brand permission to feature you on their own accounts. You don’t have to wait for a brand to reach out to you. Email their marketing team or DM their account directly.
  • Affiliate marketing is where brands offer rewards to people who help introduce others to their products or services. As an affiliate, you can make money or get access to perks when you send your friends and followers to brand sites. Just make sure you disclose in your posts that you stand to benefit when other people follow your lead!
  • Selling content doesn’t have to mean selling a physical product. If people like what you post online, they might want to be able to showcase it in places other than their saved folders. You can give people the opportunity to purchase digital files of photos you take–for example, if they want to get a picture of the sunset framed for their home. You can also license out the use of your content, such as allowing media companies to share a video that you’ve made.
  • Opening your own online store might be the biggest time investment when it comes to monetizing your Instagram, but it can be very powerful if you have products that your customers are interested in purchasing from you! This is an especially great choice for Instagrammers who DIY crafts, like to thrift or even make their own designs. Once you have a loyal audience on Instagram, your followers will be so excited to see what you’re selling!

Growing on the ’Gram

Source: wichayada suwanachun/Shutterstock.com

While building up your personal brand and translating it into Instagram content can take some time, for a lot of people, it’s a worthwhile investment! It’s not just an app, but it’s also an opportunity to build relationships with others and find ways to give them easy access to the content and products that they love. If you can make a little profit by helping bring joy to your internet community, that’s worth more than a million likes.

Like this post? Please share!

Do you monetize your IG? What are some helpful hints you’d share with new Instagrammers?

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