Featured on @igw_rock and @infinity_rock_
This has been a busy week for my Instagram account.
Ever since the #17DaysOfSillyFaces campaign I've been making daily posts, which is a big step up from my previously sporadic use of Instagram. That consistency has helped to increase my number of followers and interactions, which has been great. While I've yet to figure out what constitutes Instagram success, and what difference it will even make if achieved, Instagram is at least a platform where I can feel like I'm getting some validation for my work from someone other than Grandma (not that there's anything wrong with her approval - it actually means a ton).
So when I had photos featured on two different hub accounts this week, I was thrilled!
The first came on Tuesday when a photo of Erimha from 2014, which had actually been posted on October 30, was featured on @igw_rock.
This account is similar to @ig_rock_details which featured one of my Moose Blood images back in July. This photography hub re-posts original content from photographers around the world, mostly things that are music or alternative-culture related (so a lot of tattoos and scantily-clad women). They also seem to have a penchant for black and white or heavily desaturated images, which my closeup of a corpse-painted death metal artist fit quite well.
Today I had @infinity_rock_ repost an image of the backup singer for Elsie Binx which was taken during their performance at The Crofoot this past weekend. This show was the singer's first performance with the band, so it's pretty cool that her image ended up with a feature.
Between the two accounts I had my images potentially seen by over 6,700 more people than usual, which is certainly not something that I'm upset about.
The image of Erimha has only thirty interactions when I originally posted it in October, and over 220 through @igw_rock.
The Elsie Binx shot has received a lot of attention on Facebook, and thirty-eight IG interactions, but has over 128 since being reposted this afternoon.
So far it seems that the features I've received over the past few months haven't resulted in a significant number of more followers, but have definitely lead to more eyes on my work, which is my goal with Instagram. Originally I was just running an experiment of sorts with the hub tags on my photos, but it doesn't seem to be hurting, and I have definitely noticed an increase in followers and interactions since I began using them. So even if the features themselves aren't necessarily doing a ton to help me, the tags seem to be doing enough on their own to merit their continued use.