Although Its common knowledge that Instagram has millions of users. What’s not so well known is that thousands of those profiles are fake accounts.

Amongst the 1.21 billion users (as of 2021) 1 billion are active at least a month however research shows that 9.5% or 9.5 million accounts could be bots.

As Instagram algorithms can deduct accounts with many fake followers and react adversely to them, you must clean your Instagram and make it look genuine. To ensure the authenticity of your account, you should conduct an Instagram audit frequently.

This article will elaborate on the Instagram auditing process and answer all your related queries. From prerequisites to best practices, we are mentioning everything to get you auditing on your own:

What is an Instagram audit?

An audit typically means inspection. Usually, it is carried out in the financial world for quality checks and balances. However, with time it has become essential to carry out audits on social media platforms.

An Instagram audit is very much like spring cleaning. First, you gauge your account and then sweep out all the irrelevant stuff. Then, instead of tidying your house, you polish your account and its content to keep it top-notch.

With that being said, let us discuss why an Instagram audit is crucial and how you can carry it out yourself.

Why auditing your Instagram is crucial?

As nothing stays stagnant on social media, neither should your Instagram. And to keep it up-to-date and to grow followers, you need an audit:

Here are some primary reasons why you should have an audit:

• As an Insta audit provides a holistic view, it can highlight areas that don’t complement the overall brand image. So instead of wondering why your content fails to convert, you can find what is lacking in your overall content plan by conducting a comprehensive audit.
• Be it captions, stories, followers, or visuals, an audit goes through your profile part by part and can highlight trouble from the core. In addition, it will suggest areas to work on and help you align your account with your marketing goals.
• An Instagram audit can also help you spot ghost followers who are a bottleneck for growth. You can weed them out as they tarnish your presence and make your account appear authentic again.

So as it is established that running an audit is never a bad idea, let us now learn how to do it.

The Best Way to Conduct an Instagram Audit

An audit sounds like a daunting process, but in reality, it is pretty straightforward. Just follow these 5 steps, and in no time will get your account exactly where you want and even make it perform better than your imagination!

1. Examine your IG feed

It may sound basic, but taking a long glance at your feed should be the first step in an audit. If you remain honest and thorough, it can help you uncover many problems. You can even ask a third party to gauge your Insta grids for an unbiased judgment.

This step is essential as your profile and feed are the first things users come across when they land on your account. It will either make or break their first impression. So begin your audit from here.

Look at your account from an eye of a first-time visitor and see how satisfying it is. If the profile feels relevant and engaging and all the elements complement each other, you can move on. If not, tweak it up a bit until you feel satisfied.

The overall look after the audit should match your marketing strategy. If your brand follows a particular appearance and tone, ensure that your feed reflects it. Make necessary changes to get a cohesive style that instills loyalty and recognition.

Tip: Remain consistent while posting, so the Instagram feed meets your overall brand image. Lastly, gauge it on both desktop and mobile

Source: Later

2. Updating profile essentials

It is not just your feed that casts an impression. What most brands miss out on while auditing is setting up the profile essentials, including username, profile picture, and bio. These are the most crucial parts of an account.

For most businesses, the profile picture is an easy getaway as it ends up being their logo. But for an influencer, this image should be of the highest quality and reflect blog content. For example, post a picture of yourself with a corgi, if your content is related to dogs, etc.

The next thing to audit is the username, which should be consistent with your brand. As username is used in search results, it should be the shortened form of your brand name to make it easy for users to find you.

Now, coming onto the most crucial portion, ‘the bio.’ This may only be a few words, but it should summarize what you do. All the essential info and a link to your website (if you have any) should be placed here.

Tip: There is no hard and fast rule on Insta, and you can change your profile essentials anytime.  So whenever you feel things need to be spiced up, edit this little space on your account and keep it fresh.

In 2020, VanityOwl released 10 tips for perfecting your Instagram Bio along with an example:

Source: VanityOwl

 3. Inspect visual quality

As Instagram is mainly about aesthetic images and videos, your audit should primarily revolve around it. All highlights and stories to reels and posts should reflect quality and consistency.

Your posting shouldn’t be all eye-pleasing; it should make sense too. All the elements need to be cohesive in style. We know it’s challenging to make all your grids similar as it will be monotonous but at least try to make the general visual of your account feel on-brand.

Remember, you will need to archive images that are no longer relevant and edit highlights as necessary. Try doing this every few months, so your account doesn’t look haphazard and is streamlined according to your brand’s vision.

Tip: You can always take inspiration by following other brands to understand where your visuals are lacking. Moreover, many free editing apps and graphic tools can help you improve the grid appearance. Just don’t go overboard.

4. Examine the content

Instagram offers a lot when it comes to creating content. However, the many formats can jumble up your marketing strategy if not used properly, making it frustrating for viewers. So when auditing Instagram content, you need to keep an eye on 2 things:

• Relevance: Your overall content strategy should complement your brand. Ensure that proper CTA’s are placed, and the content always remains relevant to your target audience’s interest. Moreover, your content should also resonate with your brand voice.
• Mix: As mentioned above, Instagram is a highly visual platform, so you need to ensure a balance between different content types. Through Instagram analytics, find which content type is top-performing and replicate it.

A word of caution here; don’t post too much as it can lead to information overload. Priorities quality over quantity. Take advantage of Content formats, but only those suitable and relevant to your brand.

Tip: Whenever you are creating content, keep your audience demographics in mind. Think from their perspective and don’t try to be salesy all the time. Instead, add informative content and make your account have a well-blended mix of images, carousels, words, stories, reels, and IG videos.

5. Auditing the analytics

How can analytics be audited? Thanks to the Instagram dashboard, you can easily audit the nitty-gritty of your account, such as:

• What are the correct times to post?
• Are my hashtags working?
• Is my content engaging?
• Are my followers genuine?

You can get the answers to these questions by looking at the metrics. If everything seems optimistic, then great. However, if any part of analytics appears to decline, revise it and test it further to improve your performance.

Tip: Don’t get overwhelmed by analytics. They might seem technical initially, but by researching and getting help, you can quickly get the hang of it. Just remember to check on analytics after every few weeks.

How often should an Instagram audit be conducted?

The frequency with which an audit should be carried out largely depends on your account size, the niche you work with, and the number of posts per day. The basic criteria is that larger accounts need more audits as they can expand quickly in the wrong direction.

Our general advice will be to conduct an Instagram audit at least once annually. However, if you have time at hand and wish to stay on top of things, you can run it biannually. Just don’t skip it, as you cannot afford to lag when it comes to the ever evolving social media platform that is Instagram. For instance in a 2022 Instagram update, hashtags now benefit from being minimalistic, 3-5 relevant hashtags will help your content be found. While in the past the algorithm favoured putting in the maximum amount of relevant hashtags on your post which was 30.

Perform an Instagram audit now!

We have handed all the info over to you. Now you can efficiently perform an Instagram audit from independently with your smartphone or PC.

In just 5 steps, you can check whether your Instagram strategy is up to the mark or not. So what are you waiting for? Jump the bandwagon today and streamline your Insta with a quick audit.