Tip Tuesday: What I Wish I Knew Before Starting My Beauty Instagram. Tips and Tricks for Popular, Semi Professional Instagram Accounts.

So I'm not an expert... but I did get kind of a lot of followers in a fairly short amount of time... so I think my tips could be helpful for some people and here's sort of what I do... if I use any other apps to do anything and just what I want to do with my instagram.

Don't just buy everything to do a post on it... 
First off... I'm not getting paid for my blog or my instagram account... so I try not to buy all the latest and greatest things just for review. If there is something new that I want, I'll buy it and review it... but its more of a "give feedback on what I have" type of account.

And a lot of times I'll review something more than once. For example: I posted a review of a Milani Rose blush when I first started my account and I recommended it for prom makeup... but then I used it to travel with and I was like "this is really good for that too!" So I reviewed it in a different light. And sometimes your opinions on things change and update and sometimes a product that's been around for a while will suddenly gain popularity... or something you got during a holiday sale could end up at Nordstrom Rack... so don't be afraid to review something more than once.

That also challenges me a little bit more creatively because its easy to just get all new things and review them... but its a little more challenging to find new things to like about something you've had for a while or to shop your stash or something like that. I think its helped me become more creative on my blogs too... and I'm just happier with what I post and more proud of my accounts that way... so I like that a lot actually.

If you like it than you shoulda put a watermark on it... 

Alright this is something I've just started doing recently. No matter how big or small your account is... watermarking is just an easy step. And it isn't the most secure thing in the world, there are ways to remove watermarks... in fact you could probably crop a photo and remove the watermark... but I like having the watermark.

Its just one extra step and I kind of like the way that it makes my pictures uniform. I use the app LiveCollage, which is the same I use for my collages. And I write @shannonsreviews and I just post that in a random corner of the picture so that its visible, but not overly distracting... and I just think its a good thing to have. If a big company were to repost my image, they would see that watermark on the image and then people would be like "Ohhh. Shannonsreviews, I'll go follow her!" And I repost a lot without using the repost app, so I'm sure a lot of people do and rather than have people tag me, it'd just be easy for them to see my little watermark on the corner.

In reality... you don't need to do it... but it helps.

What Camera Do I use? 
My iPhone camera. I know people use professional cameras and stuff... I don't have a camera and I don't have the money to buy the ones everyone recommends. Plus its apparently harder to post that way. I know I've posted from my camera to my iPhone... I think it was just a photo that was in the cloud and I used my iPad to do it or my older iPod... so I guess you can... but I really have no advice if you're using a fancy camera.

But instagram wasn't really meant to be that way... and my account follows more of what instagram was really about. I just like posting on my instagram... so that is what I do.

When To Take Pictures... 
The daytime. I really like if I can get up early and take a bunch of pictures in the morning that way I can watermark it and post them throughout the day. If I'm doing really well, I do it the day before. That also gives me a little bit more time to play with the background of the images and make collages if I want to. Sometimes I'll even write what I want to say about the product before posting it... which I'll get to. But yeah.

I'm not always home all day to take the pictures... so that's why I like doing it before. If not I'm just in a hurry taking pictures, or maybe not even getting them and then not posting for the day... which can make you lose followers and that's not the worst thing... but I like being consistent... if you can tell by my daily blogs at basically the same times every day... lol.

When to Post... 
I tend to start posting at noon and then I usually wait about a half hour in between posts. Idk if thats the right thing to do but more or less thats how I do it. Sometimes I'll go hours between posts, but I just never post too many pictures at once.

Scheduling Posts 
So I did a review on the app latergram and then I did an update and redacted everything I liked about the app. It would only let you schedule a limited amount of posts per month... and that doesn't work for someone that posts a lot every day... and maybe it would work now that I post a little less and I guess I don't need to schedule every post... but it still made me mad and I don't have enough data on my phone to really keep it on my phone.

There's a little hack for that though! I use the Notes app on my phone and just write everything out before and copy and paste when I'm about to post it. It isn't quite as easy as later gram... but it isn't as difficult either. You could even schedule reminders yourself to post it on your phone if you're really that obsessed... but I don't do that yet... lol.

Respond to Your Followers 
I just really like responding to followers. I don't like when people don't respond...so I like responding! It's just fun. Half the reason why I keep doing it.

Hashtag 
I'm not an expert on what hashtags to use... I think you're supposed to use at least 30 hashtags... I don't do that... but you get more likes using more hashtags. You can look on pinterest for more about that... as I said, I'm not really a hashtag expert. They say "makeupmafia is the number one hashtag... personally that doesn't get me any more likes than anything else... and I don't really like the hashtag that much. I think its silly. I wear makeup and like talking to others about makeup... I'm not in some sort of mafia about it. So... just hashtag every pic.

Other tips 
Just as I've said... be consistent. If you have a blog, you could post a picture of what you're blog is about with a link to your latest blog in the info... that's a little hard to remember to update every day... but thats helped my blog a lot.

Ohhh and for backgrounds... I use different things. Usually I just take pictures on my bed so my sheets are the background. I've used notebooks, table cloth, scarves, today I took some pictures on a pretty kimono... just a plain white surface. Some people go outside or use a poster board. Marble slabs, or marble scrapbook paper work... just be creative. Thats another thing you can look up on pinterest.

And that just about does it... so I hope that helped. If you follow my instagram, maybe it was just a fun behind-the-scenes... but these are some tips I'd wished I'd known before I started my account and just what's worked and what hasn't worked for me.

Ohhh and a useful Facebook group Beauty and The Vlog. Its a closed group with a lot of great girls that will answer any question you have, give you feedback and collaborate with you if you want!

BTW, my instagram is Shannonsreviews, its mostly beauty related... and yeah. Check it out if you haven't already. Lol. Leave me fruit emoji's if you see any hidden minions on my posts!

Byeee!
-Shannon