Should you follow your competitors?

I was on a call this week with a client who asked, “What’s the best practice when it comes to following our competitors?”

When it comes to following competitors, it can feel a little complicated.

 

First, you might initially want to follow competitors so you attract the attention of others who follow the competitor’s account. If this is the goal, I honestly don’t think it would make any difference. If an account has thousands of followers, the brand nor the followers are likely paying much attention to the possibly hundreds of new followers they get each day.

 

Now if you wanted to follow to interact with the other brand’s posts, I think that makes a lot more sense for visibility’s sake, but I’d advise against it because it may look trollish or insincere.  

 

If you simply want to follow to see how other brands are using Instagram, then I say go for it! If you are using the brand account on a daily basis, you are welcome to follow from the brand account. But more likely, you’re using your personal account more regularly, so just follow from your own account. This will be more authentic and will still give you the insight to see how other brands are using the platform!

 

Now: if you see something you like on another brand, should you copy their posts? Heck no.

1. Each account has such a different audience, that what works for one will likely fall flat on another.

2. Yes, imitation is the highest form of flattery, but we can do better than being a copy cat. In this case, I’d recommend looking closely into what the client liked about the post and see if we can use that inspiration to create something unique for their brand.  

In short, here are some good reasons to follow your competition:

1. Inspiration

2. Information

 And here are some bad reasons:

1. To get their followers

2. To copy posts

3. To fall into a pit of despair and comparison

4. To troll them by leaving snarky or negative comments

When I was going through middle school friend troubles, my mind guidance counselor said, “The cream always rises to the top.” That was true then and it’s true in Instagram.

Do good work. Treat your followers well. And if they’re the right customers for you, they’ll convert.

 

 What are your burning social media questions? Leave a comment below and I’ll get to yours next!