• The last one is going to elaborate a little bit on the engagement post we made. The post that Fohr made about engagement on our Instagram last week. It did really well. One, we talked a while back about creating content that inspires, educates or-- What is it? Inspires, educates, or entertains. I asked the marketing team to take that advice, our own advice and try and do post that. We felt like our Instagram was too self-promotional. It was just talking a lot about the things we were doing. I think it happened over time because we were doing so many more things and we felt like everything that we were doing deserved an Instagram post, so the Instagram became this place where we were just saying, "Hey we're doing this. Look at us. Go to this thing."

    We did this thing and it wasn't super valuable for influencers, so we're taking a new philosophy and saying anything that we do. Whether it's a podcast, a Fohr Ground, A Drink with James, anything. We're trying to make sure that it's beneficial to influencers. Just the same advice that I am giving you all. Our Instagram is performing quite a bit better than it has ever with that simple shift. We're still promoting the things we're doing. It's just, again, when we interview someone for Fohr Ground, instead of saying, "Hey today we have a new Fohr Ground up with this person." We pull out what we think are the most helpful and valuable insights from that interview, and give that away without having to dive into the content.

    Now, hopefully, you see that and you say, "I'm going to go check that out," but if you didn't, it's still going to help you and you're going to learn something rather than learn there's a new podcast up. Learning there's a new podcast up isn't valuable. Learning the most salient point from that podcast is really valuable. That stuff has worked really well for us. We had our best performing post ever last week. Very simply just talking about engagement. We looked at the 85,000 influencers we have, and the engagement rates across all the follower counts. It showed, I think, a trend that most of you probably assumed was true, but that micro-influencers are getting exponentially more engagement than larger influencers. What's that first group, is it zero to 25?

    On the zero to 25,000 followers, it's 9% is the average and above million, it's something like 2.2%. Micro-influencers getting four or five times as more engagement than the largest influencers. I know we've talked a bit about this before, but Facebook-- We'll zoom out and talk about Facebook. Facebook knows that that platform is all about connecting with family and friends and sharing photos. It is why any platform that emerges that people are sharing photos, family and friends, they will do anything to buy it. WhatsApp, there was a stat that came out right before Facebook bought WhatsApp. That was more photos were being sent through WhatsApp every day than were being published on Instagram. A month later, they bought it for $20 billion.

    There was eight people working at that company when they bought it. They knew that any platform that comes around that people are sharing photos with their family is a threat to Facebook that they cannot take lightly. It's why they bought Instagram. It's why they ripped off Snapchat. It's why they're now working to rip off Tik Tok. For micro-influencers, it looks like the algorithm, the way it works, is that if you're under a certain level, certainly if you're under 1,000 followers, they're assuming your following is mostly friends and family. They want to make sure that that content reaches your friends and family because that's the core of the platform. While we sit every week and we talk about you all's world, you're in the 1%. You're in the top, top, top of followings on Instagram.

    Most people just have a few hundred followers and are sharing photos with their friends and families and colleagues. Instagram wants to make sure those photos get to those people, so that the platform stays sticky because if you have 300 followers, and you post a photo, and they're getting the same reach, and only 20% saw that, that's 90 people. That's going to just be a bummer. Because you're not using Instagram for your job, you might be less likely to use it.

    It makes sense that the smaller the following, the more people are seeing it. The other thing is, I think a psychological one of if someone has 5,000 or 10,000 followers, you as a follower, feel a lot more connected with that person because if you send a DM or you like a post or comment on it, you can be pretty sure that that person is going to see that comment, that like, that DM. It feels more like a relationship.

    If I like Kim Kardashian's posts, which I do all the time, I know for a fact she's never going to see that like. If I comment on every photo, she's probably never going to see those comments. She’s never going to go to my profile, we're never going to have a relationship on this platform. For smaller influencers, that's certainly true. I think what you can learn from that is understanding the core philosophy of the platform and what is working, and the influencers that we see who are doing it really well, they're not as focused on the next follower. They're answering their DMs, they're engaging in the comments. They're acting like a smaller influencers. There's only so much you can do to buck the way the platform is built, but learn from what is working. If you're not a micro-influencer anymore, congratulations. It doesn't mean that you can't try and act like one, and engage like one.

    It's certainly exhausting to do so, but give it a try. Again, this is where we're seeing a lot of success come from on Instagram, are those influencers who are super invested in their existing audience. If you haven't seen that post, check it out. We are doing these "for your information" posts more often on our Instagram. We have an in-house data scientist on the team now who's helping Tim and the marketing team pull together these really cool insights. If you don't follow us, you definitely should. There is some cool stuff coming out every week on there.
    Episode #162
    - Using Your Platform for Good, Seeking Mentorship, Engagement Rates