There are a lot of articles and blog posts out there about Instagram and how to use it. How I use Instagram is by posting photos that make me happy or that make me laugh or that show what I'm doing at the time or offer commentary on it, so I can't really help you on how best to use it to achieve Internets fame and I don't want to. When I'm reading those posts, I never see any of the reasons I personally really enjoy someone's Instagram, so I thought I'd list them here. I like your Instagram feed because...
1. There's color! I love photos that are a riot of color.
2. You show me your dogs, cats, and kids doing cute things. Not your dogs, cats, and kids doing cute things with very little difference between the photo you justthisminute posted and the photo you posted of your dog, cat, or kid doing that cute thing 30 seconds ago.
3. Your photo depicts what you're doing right now, not what you did last night or yesterday. Because it is INSTA-gram, not Sometime Later Whenever I Feel Like It-gram. This doesn't count if you're on vacation with no Wifi. By all means, latergram away once you get back in the zone. It obviously doesn't count for quotes and photos you're using to advertise a blog post or a sale or a charity event either.
4. You recognize vacations as a great opportunity to over-gram. I want to know if I might want to put your vacation spot on my places to go list. I can't know that if you don't show me what a great time you're having on vacation.
5. You don't gather a bunch of items together that are unrelated to each other or your caption, photograph them, and share them as if you have that stuff just laying around in proximity to you while you're taking a photo. I don't really have anything to follow this up with because I seriously don't get why this is being done.
6. You see value in landscapes. Deserts, beaches, open road, lakes, ponds, ocean, national parks, fields, mountains...just nature as you see it, whatever's in front of you. We had no cameras to shoot the landscape is no longer a thing. Show me the beautiful world around you and I will love you forever.
7. You keep the hashtags under 10. The unflattering term hashtag whore exists for a reason.
8. When you participate in throwback Thursday, you actually throw that shit back to years ago. Not like two weeks or six months ago.
9. You share urban scenes. Specifically street art or abandoned buildings or great viewpoints. I dig it.
10. You show me your real life. Not a life you think someone wants to see or a life that's curated or a life that will make you popular on the internet...but your actual life. Sometimes it's neat in the background and sometimes it's not. Sometimes you look smashing and sometimes you look like you just clawed your way through a bitch of a Tuesday. Sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's complain-y. The accounts I love best always reflect the personality of their owners.
What do you love to see on Instagram?
Happy birthday to my fabulous sister-in-law. Love you Aub!
Happy birthday to my fabulous sister-in-law. Love you Aub!
