Let's Explore - infatuation

Let's explore infatuation's Instagram page.

What is infatuation?

Two words: food porn. Infatuation's Instagram account, at its core, is a place to get mental satisfaction by looking at beautiful images of food. With 683K followers, to whom they share about 5 photos per day, The Infatuation calls themselves "Your Restaurant Decider". This brings us to the point that The Infatuation is actually and primarily also a website. On this website, they primarily write food articles and reviews on various different restaurants and areas. They have main focus in some of the larger metropolitan cities in the United States (New York, Chicago, LA to name a few) and even in Europe. As for their picture feed, the majority of their photos come from others, not all original content. They do take some of the pictures themselves of course, especially if it is for a restaurant they have been to or a meal they have eaten. Here we can see two different images, the left one being a post that is an original photo and the other being one taken by clerkenwellboyec1:

In the left and original content photo, the caption promotes an article that was written on the infatuation website and advises the onlooker to go check it out. The right picture references the photographer and mentions another account, infatuation_london, which is one of their associated accounts for where they have affiliations in the world. In order for someone to get their photo posted to this account, they must use the hashtag #eeeeeats. 

What do they do well?

Other than the obviously mouthwatering food porn, they have an extremely varied food feed, which ranges from finer foods to sloppier and hand-dirtying foods. On top of that, all photos posted are of very high quality, adding to the virtual food experience. Also, they do a very nice job at mentioning a new website article in certain posts. Here we can see an example of this:

The caption mentions their recent article reviewing something that is in relation to the picture being captioned. They will always link the article that they mention in their bio, until a new post is made about a new article.

What could they improve on?

To start off, the photos that mention a photographer do not tend to mention where the food is from. As a curious onlooker, it would be nice to know where I could possibly find this food. The account should start referencing where the food comes from, if possible. It would also be nice if they would talk slightly more about the articles that they mention in certain captions. This could help grab more reader attention and heighten chances of redirecting them to their article. Lastly, they make certain self-promotional posts that stick out like a sore thumb and take away from their beautiful food feed. Here is an example:

They post pictures like this every so often, and when they do, followers don't particularly seem to like it, considering the amounts of likes being 10x less than usual. 

How about monetization? 

In their bio, Infatuation provides an email that refers to partnerships. These partners seem to be focused on events to be hosted with restaurants, galleries, other companies, etc. They promote these events in their posts, uploading something related to the event and food. These partnerships must bring in some form of money and the events themselves as well. Here is an example of a concert with themeadowsnyc:

Furthermore, they promote their own website and its articles with their posts. This will redirect followers to their website, which in itself provides them revenue. Overall, it seems that their Instagram monetization is limited to the aforementioned partnerships and that they should be monetizing more from their website. They use their Instagram, and the related city specific accounts mentioned earlier, to redirect traffic to their website.

Let's Explore - black_list

Let's explore black_list's Instagram page.

What is black_list?

This Instagram account is a collection and curation of automotive content. According to their bio, they are an "Automotive Lifestyle & Marketing" account as well as providers of "Brand, Event & Ad Management". The account curates a collection of mainly cars and often bikes. It does not post original content, rather it posts mainly high quality pictures taken by photographers all around the world. With this in mind they always give proper credit and referencing. It caters to an audience with a more expensive taste in cars. I say this because most of the pictures and videos posted are of luxury vehicles or ones that are more unique and rare. In addition to beauty pics, they also post in order to stir discussion as well as post updates related to the car world. Here is an example of their content, the original photo belonging to jorgeponcevisuals:

What do they do well?

First and foremost, as an Instagram account with 2.3M followers, it is essential to post high quality content. Fortunately, black_list constantly uploads high quality and diverse content, which can explain their high following. To add to this, they also post very frequently, with approximately twenty photos a day. They post incrementally throughout the day, in order to not flood the feed at any certain time. Also, for such a large account, their use of promotions and ads are very modest, which help in not taking away from the onlooker experience. Lastly, their crediting and ownership referencing is a plus, allowing users to explore other accounts that post high quality content as well. Here is an example of a picture taken by toronto_exotic_car_spotting, in which the vehicle is owned by mrtrig:

What could they improve on?

Overall, this account, for it's size, has very few flaws, which is rare when looking at Instagram today. If there is anything, perhaps they could expand their diversity of photos in order to start posting a wider variety of cars, ones that are slightly less luxurious. This could help them in reaching a larger market, further expanding their audience. Furthermore, for any photographers interested in having their pictures shared, black_list can express more clearly what the criteria is to be posted, further expanding their basis and selection of photos.


How about monetization? 

As it was briefly mentioned, black_list's promotions and ads are very modest. The first thing to point out is that they sell their link space in their bio. Currently a car-related youtube video is currently occupying this space and it is a fair assumption that it was paid for by its creator. The promotion can be seen here:

Furthermore, they seem to sell postings for any car company willing to pay for advertising. Here is an example for ceramicpro_official's product:

Additionally, based on exploring the feed and understanding how Instagram accounts monetize, they seem to have deals with certain accounts, being some sort of car-related company. The deal would be to post their photos in order for them to get a greater audience, more followers and hopefully more business. One that seemed to pop out due to frequent posts on their behalf, would be a Montreal business, toyzautoart. Here are a couple examples that helped come to this conclusion:

 


Overall, their monetization strategy seems to be quite straightforward, at least from the viewpoint of a curious follower. Their modest monetization strategy, which does not emphasize self-promotion and keeps high quality content standards only adds to their bottom line and content delivery.

Let's Explore - art_collective

Let's explore art_collective's Instagram page.

What is art_collective?
This Instagram page is a collection of visual art. The page contains visual art ranging from drawings, paintings, sculptures, tattoos and many more. They post about 15-20 pictures per day. The vast majority of their posts are the pieces of art themselves, while some art promotions, either for other brands, products or accounts but as well as for their own website (artcollectiveshop.com). They consider themselves the "Official Art Nerd Brand" that curates visual art on Instagram.

What do they do well?
This Instagram account's content is very diverse. They evidently take a good amount of time to find new art daily to share with their followers. A great example is this piece by Stavros Damos.

Overall, they curate a wonderful collection of visual art with important credit references and modest promotions.


What could they improve on?
Their self-promotion manages to stick out like a sore thumb. As an example, this post of an art_collective mug.

A modest suggestion would be to spice up the picture by making it slightly more artistic and adding some visual art elements that make it blend better within their page, without it getting lost.


How about monetization?
This next part is solely based on looking into the posts and understanding just how Instagram can be monetized. According to next web's "How to grow and monetize your Instagram account", Instagram as a platform cannot be monetized, but the account can be used for monetization. According to them, money can be made by selling caption space, selling URL link space in bio, posting for others, as well as linking to recent posts for other accounts. Obviously, self-promotions for own products, services or brand is a way of monetizing as well.

It seems that art_collective takes advantage of all of these ways to monetize. They promote their own brand, as it was discussed in the last section. They also post for other accounts and brands and give what seem like paid for shoutouts. Here's an example of what seems to be a paid shoutout for christhevalentine.

Furthermore, when it comes to art_collective's online store, a sufficient amount is saved when it comes to advertising. They have exposure to an audience of 1.2 million people, all through a free account. It seems they advertise for free. At the end of the day, e-business allows them to collect varied revenue streams and reduce expenses, all contributing to their bottom line.