Competitor Analysis
The Secret Weapon for Growing on Instagram
The Importance of Competitor Analysis
Imagine being a pioneer in the age of social media, a true digital explorer. Now, to navigate successfully in the turbulent waters of Instagram, you need a detailed map of the territory, right?
This is where competitor analysis comes into play.
Study Your Rivals: Your competitors are like road signs pointing you in the right direction. Observe closely the accounts similar to yours, those that have an audience that might be interested in your content. What are they doing well? What are their weaknesses? Find out everything you can!
Knowing your rivals allows you to avoid obstacles and accelerate your growth. Learn from their successes and their mistakes, and adapt your strategies accordingly. This way, you can grow smarter and faster.
Competitor analysis helps you discover what works best in your industry. You can identify the types of content that get the most engagement and create a targeted editorial plan. Remember, it’s not about copying but being inspired and improving!
How to Start with Competitor Analysis
Now that you understand the importance of competitor analysis, let’s get to the specifics.
Competitor analysis can be divided into three phases:
- RESEARCH
- FILTER
- STUDY
1. Research Phase: In this phase, you’ll compile a list of all your competitors. However, for this purpose, competitors are not only those who sell the same services to the same clients but also all accounts that deal with topics aligned with your niche.
For instance, if you are a fitness instructor, you should analyze not only those operating in your area whom you see as potential competitors but also all accounts talking about fitness, even foreign ones, to understand their behavior.
Identify the accounts that compete with yours for public attention. These can be direct competitors or influencers in your field.
This list should be as long as possible since it will undergo a significant cut in the following phases.
2. Filter Phase: Create a table that contains as much data as possible on the competitors you identified in the research phase.
Decisive data for you include:
- Name
- Number of followers
- Engagement
- Monthly growth
- Average likes
- Average comments
- Comment quality (create a value scale from 1 to 5 where 5 is for accounts with relevant comments, down to 1 for accounts with fake or bot comments like emojis or one-word comments)
- Monthly posting frequency
Once you’ve created this table (preferably using Excel or Numbers), apply a filter to sort your competitors in ascending order based on the comment quality scale.
This way, the software will show you the competitors with a loyal community that comments relevantly (exactly what you aim for).
Then, analyze each line of your table, eliminating profiles with below-average engagement or even those losing followers.
You will now have a list of accounts that I call “sources” because:
- They deal with your topics
- They perform well
- They are worth imitating and studying
The table you now have will be much shorter but richer in content.
Even in this second phase, you can discover important information for your editorial plan. For instance, you will know how many posts are published monthly by the top-performing accounts, giving you a benchmark for your posting frequency to achieve similar goals.
3. Study Phase: Remember, for optimal results, you should reach this phase with at least 10 sources; otherwise, you won’t have enough data for your analysis.
Now, create a new table, or rather one for each source account that has made it to this phase.
This time, the data you need to enter are more specific and refer to the analysis of the last 20 posts of each source. Note down:
- Type of post (Reel/carousel/post)
- Number of likes
- Number of comments
- Topic
- Description of the image
- Information on the caption
- Predominant colors
For Reels, also include:
- Number of views
- Video length
- Type of audio
When you have completed the tables for each source, print them out, pin them up, and observe. Your perfect editorial plan is right there in front of you, a perfect mix of the best content from the most performing accounts in your niche.
Competitor analysis is one of the secret weapons of successful insta-gurus. It gives you the opportunity to grow smarter, avoiding the obstacles others have encountered.
So, don’t waste any time! Study your rivals, get inspired by them, and create an editorial plan that will lead you to success on Instagram.
Don’t forget to follow me for more tips on the digital world and monetizing on Instagram.
See you next time,
Digitally Yours
📱 Sara 📱
